What did you do to your jimny today?

Any hints at what "nomade" refers too, or is this an import company?

The idea of a 5 door sort of appeals, but same engine, more weight, terrible power to weight ratio, worse performance. Combined with same suspension, same wheels and awful breakover angle don't really inspire me much.

Seems there is also a handling issue with the 5 door with excessive rear squat in tight corners that causes the front wheel to come off the ground!

Overall just seems terribly lazy design and effort on Suzuki's part that failed to address any of the issues with the 3 door and made many worse by extending the wheelbase. 

 

300bhpton wrote:

Any hints at what "nomade" refers too, or is this an import company?
 

It's just a name - in Japan the three door is the Jimny Sierra and the five door is the Jimny Nomade.  Suzuki previously used the Nomade name on some "upper trim levels" of the first generation of  five door 1.6 Vitara or, as they were known in Japan, the "Escudo Nomade".

As a prospective purchaser of a five door Jimny I had concerns about the impact of the additional weight with the same powertrain, however as an owner, I'll say it's barely noticeable, the suspension is the same from the point of view that they are both radius arm live axle front & rear, however spring & shock rates are different, and the five door is noticeably more stable than the three door.

My suggestion is "don't knock it until you try it", and this is from a person who told his wife not to buy a three door (she didn't listen), and who, three years later, went on to buy a five door after test driving it - the sole disadvantage of the extended wheelbase that I have found, as an owner of both the three & five door Jimnys is the increased turning circle, which I can live with.

A couple of noticeable things from our Short Drive in the 5 door.

Yes it has the same engine so I suspect had we have driven it more we would have found it underpowered. This was also our first time with an auto Jimny so it was difficult to gauge on our first drive whether it's more the auto box or the car. But on our short drive on 30-50mph roads it seemed happy. Handling wise though we did see an improvement over the 3 door and this is with stock suspension. Potholes & bumps which would have shaken & thrown off my 3 door felt a lot better with the 5 door. It seemed more planted on the road. I guess the extra weight and extended wheelbase help it but in the drivers or passenger it doesn't feel like you're driving a bigger car. Obviously being a brand new car and not ours we couldn't really throw it around but we couldn't see any handling issues. I was very pleased with the auto box off-road and how it crawled without being in 4wd. My 3 door would have struggled in 2wd trying not to stall. Also the extra sound deadening the car has makes it a lot quieter in the cabin. Although you can hear the whine of the auto box.

I think when it comes to design you can forget what it was built for & Market. Technically it isn't a Suzuki and was built for the Indian market where they need to be able to transport passengers but still want that lightweight utilitarian off-roader. It wasn't built to please the rest of the world but being a Jimny it has the rest of the world interested. Think of it as a Lwb samurai. It's just another variant of the Jimny. I think with some mods you could have a lot of fun building it up into a very capable off-roader and not have to worry about warranty as it doesn't have it anyway. I guess the big question is whether it's really worth 15k more than the standard Jimny but it is unique & rare in the UK.

fordem wrote:

300bhpton wrote:

Any hints at what "nomade" refers too, or is this an import company?

 

It's just a name - in Japan the three door is the Jimny Sierra and the five door is the Jimny Nomade.  Suzuki previously used the Nomade name on some "upper trim levels" of the first generation of  five door 1.6 Vitara or, as they were known in Japan, the "Escudo Nomade".

As a prospective purchaser of a five door Jimny I had concerns about the impact of the additional weight with the same powertrain, however as an owner, I'll say it's barely noticeable, the suspension is the same from the point of view that they are both radius arm live axle front & rear, however spring & shock rates are different, and the five door is noticeably more stable than the three door.

My suggestion is "don't knock it until you try it", and this is from a person who told his wife not to buy a three door (she didn't listen), and who, three years later, went on to buy a five door after test driving it - the sole disadvantage of the extended wheelbase that I have found, as an owner of both the three & five door Jimnys is the increased turning circle, which I can live with.

Thanks, wasn't aware of the name.

As for not knocking it until I try. Well seeing as they don't sell them here, it is hugely unlikely that I will get to try one.

I also don't really need to try it to look at the physics side of it. The standard Jimny is ok powerwise, but it slow compared to modern traffic and requires you to drive it like a sports car to make it go. Which can be a lot of fun, the engine is quite a peach when bouncing off the red line. But that is hardly the most appropriate driving style if you are intending to move a family about in it.

The petrol engine is also pretty gutless in hilly or mountain areas. So, there is no way a heavier vehicle will be improved by this. Let alone a heavier vehicle then loaded up with more people and stuff making it even heavier again.

It's not as if Suzuki don't have some alternative power plants or options available to them. So the decision to do nothing whats so ever, it completely lazy on Suzuki's part.

The same is true for things like the breakover angle. It is pretty terrible on the 3 door, which will happily sit on the transfer box or bash it into the ground far too often, let alone the radius/trailing arm chassis mounts which plough into the ground too at the slightest hint off road. Adding 13.4" inches to the wheelbase will make this a huge weak point off road for the XL. Given the tiny diameter tyres and stock ride height.

The aftermarket may be able to help solve some of these, but Suzuki could have done so much more in this regard.

The stock 3 door suspension was "ok" and nothing more. But was clearly under-damped. As the 5 door must be heavier you'd need a heavier spring rate to maintain the same ride height. And you'd need more damping to control more weight. But I suspect the stock shocks are still budget items providing overall poor'ish damping ability.

A 5 door however should not be any more stable. It will have less forward backwards pitching due to the longer wheelbase. Which may give the perception of a better ride, i.e. less choppy. But it has the exact same track width, so side to side movement will be the same. And as can be seen from the photo I shared above, it does seem to have an issue with lifting a front wheel. I have never seen this on the 3 door. And isn't something I experienced on a Jeep XJ Cherokee which would be about the same wheelbase as the Jimny XL.


Now, I'm not 'knocking' it overall. But it does seem hugely disappointing that Suzuki couldn't be bothered to improve on the weak points of the 3 door.

Someone mentioned/asked above, is it worth £15,000 more than the 3 door in the UK? Categorically I'd say no way in a month of Sunday's. You'd have to be out of your mind to spend £15k more than a 3 door for an XL. If it was £1500-2000 more, then fair do.

I've had two "non technical, non automotive enthusiast", three door Jimny owners in my five door Jimny - their first comment, with no prompting, was on the "increased stability", and in his post, you can see jlines' comments in that regard.

In my opinion having not driven a lwb one it's not going to take much doing to make it ride better than the swb... in fact I would contend that the 4 is actually a step backwards in terms of absolute handling compared with the 3. The 4 rides nicely in town on what passes for tarmac in this country but it achieves it by forsaking the ability to go round a corner without making you back out of the throttle for fear of finding the ditch or whatever. Before you all pile on about temeraire having modified this and that I am basing this assessment on Spare Jimny who is as stock as a stock thing. That temeraire and I have a reputation in certain hot bmw circles as being able to defy expectations on a twisting back road is by the by or should that be bye?