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27/04/2010
By EWAN KENNEDY
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There's a lot more to the soon to be released Nissan Dualis+2 than simply an extra pair of seats in the back. Though it's the same as the standard Dualis from the windscreen forward, everything behind that area is new.
The body is substantially longer (by 211 mm), sits on an extended wheelbase (135 mm) and is significantly higher (40 mm) to create extra passenger and luggage space.
Though the facelifted version of the standard Dualis has just gone on sale, the Dualis+2 doesn't reach Australia until July. However, Nissan airfreighted one to this country to give motoring journalists and dealers a preview. We weren’t able to drive it for obvious reasons, but were able to try the cabin, as well as examine the load area in detail.
The second row of seats can slide backwards and forwards by up to 240 mm to make access to the back seats simpler. The moving second-row seat also lets you juggle legroom according to need. It slides as a single unit, which is a pity because many of the European vehicles in this class have the added convenience of individual bucket seats in all positions.
The second-row seat of the Dualis+2 is split 60/40 but has a 40/20/40 arrangement of the seats as it’s not wide enough to cope with three adults. When the central section is folded down it acts as an armrest and table, with built in drink holders.
Children will be more comfortable than adults in the back seats, though the aforementioned ability to move the second-row seats does mean you can achieve a reasonable compromise if you need to cart seven grownups in an emergency.
Access to the back area isn't too awkward as the rear doors are longer than in the standard Dualis, but the extra ride height that goes with any crossover SUV does add to the degree of difficulty of ingress/egress.
The rearmost pair of seats can be folded down individually to give quite a few permutations of passenger/load carrying length and width. Quite a bit of clever thinking has gone into protecting the load from prying eyes and/or to prevent luggage from sliding forwards under hard braking or during a crash.
As with the Dualis five-seater, the Dualis+2 is being sold in 2WD and 4WD format. It comes in ST and Ti format, the latter with a panoramic glass roof.
All Australian imports have Nissan's CVT automatic transmission as it's felt that buyers of people movers aren’t interested in messing around with a stick shift.
Prices are very reasonable. The front-wheel drive comes in at $29,990 with the ST grade of equipment, the same transmission with 4WD is priced at $34,690. And the AWD, sold only in Ti trim, costs $36,890. These prices are recommended and don’t include dealer or government charges.
As mentioned, we weren’t able to drive the new Dualis+2 because there's only one in the country at this time. The only comment we can make at this time is that some drivers find the performance of the standard five-seat Dualis to be marginal, particularly with a load on board. So the Dualis+2 with an extra 100 kg and the ability to hold more people could be a bit of a slug at times. We will confirm or deny this when we get to road test one.
Nissan in Europe – the Dualis is made in England – is struggling to keep up with demand for the vehicles. So the Australian importer can't get as many cars as it wants. As there is likely to be a pent up demand for the +2 may we suggest that an early call to your Nissan dealer would make sense.
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