Latest news with #bootspace
Top Gear
17 hours ago
- Automotive
- Top Gear
Porsche Taycan Sport Turismo Interior Layout & Technology
Interior What is it like on the inside? A 405-litre boot that expands to 1,171 litres with the seats folded means two things. It's actually shrunk about 40 litres during the facelift and is about two-thirds the size of equivalent estates from Audi and Merc. You do notice. The tailgate's slope limits load capacity and the boot is actually quite narrow. Don't forget about the area under the nose though. Another 81 litres and just the place for the bulky cables. Advertisement - Page continues below There's more. Although this can be partially alleviated by raising the air suspension, elderly relatives aren't going to enjoy dropping down into the low seats – conversely, elderly dogs are less likely to need assistance into the boot and if you do wreck the 0.25Cd drag factor with a roof box you should be able to access it easily. But yeah, for good or ill, a roof height of 1,392mm (100mm lower than an RS6) does mean this is a low-slung car. How is it for those in the back? A bit dark and lacking in legroom. The front chairs are big and dominant in your view, but the Sport Turismo does at least benefit from an extra 36mm of headroom compared to the saloon. Two people will fit, the third will complain. And you'll be able to hear them because it will come as no surprise to learn that this is a very quiet and refined car. It's beautifully built and attractively designed and laid out inside. Advertisement - Page continues below Does the driver have the best of it then? Emphatically. It may be an estate, but this is still a Porsche - it's all about the driver. The GTS comes with Race-Tex Alcantara upholstery as standard. Have it, it's great. Lovely driving position, small, tactile steering wheel, you sit low and feel snug. On the whole the screens are good to interact with. The dash display is operated logically via the steering's clickwheel, while the twin-stacked central screens don't bury things too deep in the menus. Which means less jabbing to disable the speed bongs and lane keep. And you'll want to do that as Porsche's lane keep isn't that impressive. Can you have paddles? Funny you should ask, because yes, post-facelift you can now option paddles in a Taycan. No gearbox obviously, they're there to adjust the regen braking. At last. Until now Porsche has always insisted braking should be done with the brake pedal, but has now relented. And charged you £394 if you want it.
Top Gear
19-05-2025
- Automotive
- Top Gear
Skoda Kodiaq Interior Layout & Technology
Boot space with all seven seats in place rises much more notably to 340 litres, which is broadly what you get in a VW Golf . A small gain in overall size seems to have yielded a larger leap in practicality. The Kodiaq has grown marginally in length over its predecessor but retained the same 2.8m wheelbase. Which means rear legroom for second-row passengers borderlines on absurd, as per the Skoda standard. The rearmost seats still feel best suited to kids or a brisk run back from the pub for grownups, although headroom has increased everywhere. That climbs to around 900 litres as you flip down the third-row seats – or it's there all the time if you've stuck with a five-seater – and rises to over 2,000 litres with the middle row folded. Wowee. Go for a hybrid and the figures all take a hit, but 745 litres with the middle seats up and 1,945 with them folded is hardly shabby. What about quality? Skoda has gone big on sustainable materials, with many of the fabrics made of recycled plastic bottles. Choose leather and its tanning process has been done via coffee bean waste in place of nasty chemicals. But rather than plunge the interior into the prosaism of Skodas past, it lifts the atmosphere yet further. These materials look cool, feel intriguing and bring a new and welcome ambience. Skoda has made good quality interiors for years, but they've occasionally felt like a dark cave of black plastic. With the right spec flourishes, it's a lot airier in here. Optional massaging seats lift the mood again, as do the standard 'smart dials' mentioned earlier. Sitting ahead of where the gear lever used to be, these intuitively toggle through (and then adjust) air con temperature and fan speed, heated and vented seats, audio volume, map zoom and drive modes (if you've specced DCC+). You can choose which functions they contain via a touchscreen menu, ensuring they're as comprehensive or simple as you like. How does it compare to a Tiguan? It feels a cut above, truth be told. We already preferred the Kodiaq in this segment and the gulf has perhaps widened further. Skoda's pragmatism has extended to a steering wheel just like that of later Mk1 Kodiaqs, with buttons and scrollers ensuring you'll operate all core features with nary a flick of your eyes from the road.
