There is a new competition on the electric SUV market as the Chinese family SUV AIWAYS U5 riding the storm with an electric drive. The 4.68-meter long AIWAYS U5 visually familiar: protruding body, narrow headlights and of course no grille, but a closed front with the Aiways logo.
A big space is a big plus for an electric SUV. The trunk offers only average conditions with 432 liters. But the passengers are really in the business class. In the rear, the AIWAYS U5 has a lot of head and knee room.
In the front, the living space is also comfortable. The cockpit is somewhat reminiscent of Audy e-Tron, but the AIWAYS designers have installed a horizontal instead of a vertical display. There are also three displays for the instruments.
In the Euro NCAP crash test, the AIWAYS U5 scored three stars means NCAP judged the U5 to be structurally safe. The carmaker has already resolved other problems that the tests have addressed. In concrete terms, for example, AIWAYS has updated the software that controls the deployment of the airbags.
As modern the AIWAYS U5 looks, it is also technically up to date. Adaptive Cruise Control, automatic parking assistant, emergency braking system and “Rear Traffic Alert” – monitoring traffic when reversing with emergency braking function – should be available at the launch.
The AIWAYS U5 has a 140 kW / 190 hp electric motor. Nevertheless, the engine develops a maximum torque of 315 Newton meters and is particularly strong when overtaking. The car takes around nine seconds to accelerate to 100 km / h.
According to the manufacturer, consumption is between 16 and 17-kilowatt hours per 100 km. A longer practical test has shown that the AIWAYS U5 performs a range of 400 kilometers in everyday life.
Despite the manageable performance for an electric car, the China electric SUV has one major advantage: at just over 1.7 tons, it is comparatively light.
Thanks to lightweight construction and a relatively small battery (the lithium-ion battery has a capacity of 63-kilowatt hours, the battery cells come from the Chinese battery supplier CATL), the Chinese show that an electric SUV does not always have to be heavy.
The Corona outbreak in China affected the production of the AIWAYS U5, so the market launch of the car in Europe is postponed to August. The price and equipment list has not yet been fixed, but the prices should range between 35,000 and a maximum of 40,000 euros.
AIWAYS U5
