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Nissan QX60 SUV

It wasn’t long ago that the first SUVs entered the marketplace, then virtually exploded in sales to dominate the industry.

The never-ending question remains, would you rather drive a car or an SUV? – a question that seems to be more difficult to answer, as the two extremes seem to be moving toward a merger in the middle someplace.

Infiniti is among those who have made a bold move or two to streamline its SUVs as the prestige brand of Nissan, and I found myself more than just a little confused when I recently had the opportunity to drive the all-new QX60, an SUV that has decidedly sleek lines and shape. It might be my favorite of the many SUVs in the Nissan-Infiniti lineup, because it is big enough but not too big, and it performs and handles like the sports car of SUVs.

Shortly after spending a week with the QX60, the redesign upon which Nissan is pinning great responsibility for immediate profit,  I got the opportunity to drive the new Infiniti QX55. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but when it arrived at my North Shore home in Minnesota, I realized it was even more of a sporty SUV than the QX60.

Lower, sleeker, and seemingly more performance oriented, I liked it even better than the more luxuriously appointed QX60.

To avoid confusing us, Nissan has always kept its vehicles to itself, and allows Infiniti to do the same, and its nomenclature always was easy to follow: If the vehicle was basically a car, its name began with a G, so its impressive sedans would be G-something, and if it had all-wheel drive, it would ne GX-something; if it was an SUV, it would begin with a Q, so with all-wheel drive we’d have QX-something, with the following numbers having to do with engine size.

I might have guessed the QX55 was really a sporty sedan, but the name alone leads me to believe it is sup-posed to be an SUV.

When you put the two of them together, though, it seems that you might buy one of each – if you could afford it – and consider the QX60 your SUV and the QX55 your car.

The QX60 was swift and powerful, as it should be, with Nissan’s slick 3.5-liter V6 under the hood, operating all four wheels through a 9-speed automatic transmission.

It puts out 290 horsepower and 270 foot-pounds of torque, and it also has a towing capacity of 6,000 pounds, and comes equipped with a tow hitch, trailer sway control, a wiring harness for your trailer, and a transmission oil cooler.

QX55

Nissan builds an array of impressive engines, and the 3.5 V6 is the same one that powers the legendary Nissan 350Z sports car, so we know it can go, and with AWD can give us a dose of sporty-car performance.

Inside, the seats are impressively luxurious, covered with leather, while all the seams fit well and all materials first-rate.

The audio is a Bose 17-speaker unit, and virtually every convenience and safety item is included, from predictive warnings front and rear for parking, adaptive lighting, auto leveling, lane departure warning and prevention, blind spot warning and intervention, rear automatic braking and cross-traffic alert.

Price for the QX60 is $63,945, off a base price of $63,250, but it is loaded. The leather captain’s chairs in the rear have a removable console, a nice touch. and along with parking assist, it has ProPilot wit Navi Link, with assists you with steering, speed-limit changes, and intelligent cruise control.

Meanwhile, Nissan’s most recent marvel of an engine is a 2.0-liter 4-cylinder, augmented  with variable compression ratio. As an amazing bit of mechanical wizardry, the guys at Nissan came up with a means to have the usually-fixed compression ratio swing from a low of about 8-1 to a high of about 14-1.

Ordinarily your sedan might have a compression ratio of between 8-1 and 10-1, while your high-performance sporty car might have a 10-1 or 11.5-1 compression ratio, and need premium fuel.

The variable valve timing now popular on many high-tech cars adjusts the valves to operate at peak efficiency under load, but Nissan’s engine leaves the valve timing alone and adjusts the compression ratio to rise up and meet the demand for hotter fuel operation, or ease back down and fulfill all the demands of more docile driving.

The QX55 had that 2.0 variable-compression engine boasts 258 horsepower (up from 236 in the Altima sedan) and 280 foot-pounds of torque (up from last year’s 267), with that power distributed to all four wheels.

It is not surprising that the smaller 4 has considerably lower horsepower than the 3.5-liter V6, but what is surprising is that the variable compression ratio gives the small 4 more torque – which provides low-end power for acceleration – than the V6, which has almost twice the displacement.

Beyond that, while both vehicles are totally enjoyable to drive, the lower and sportier QX55 sounds a lot like a Trans-Am race car from the early 1970s. I wouldn’t buy a car for only its engine sound, but let me tell you, stepping hard on the “go” pedal gives you a very neat little thrill every time you do it.

The QX55 lists at $53,425 after a couple thousand dollars of options, and it comes with just about all the creature features as the QX60, which is about $10,000 more.

None of this is to be critical of the QX60, however. If your family wants a bit more room in the rear seat, or larger storage capacity, or you’ve going to be towing a trailer, the larger QX60 is the perfect ticket.
If you still have traces of “boy racer” coursing through your veins, you might prefer the QX55, which may not be the perfect ticket, but can easily threaten to provide you with some tickets.