The Petrol SUV Face-off, Honda meets Mitsubishi

The traditional SUV has strong road presence, loads of space and a diesel engine. However, there is a niche market for smaller petrol-engine SUV’s whose easy-to-drive nature and car-like feel is what attracts buyers.

These small SUV’s are required to roam city streets and climb the occasional park hill while keeping their owners comfortable. Refinement and loaded interiors to tackle the urban grind also helps.

The Honda CR-V has dominated this niche segment but what about Mitsubishi? Mitsubishi positions the Mitsubishi Outlander in the same segment as the Honda CR-V. A look at the spec sheet reveals that the Mitsubishi Outlander and Honda CR-V have a lot in common. 2.4-liter petrol engines with almost –identical power outputs, four-wheel drive, five seats with high driving positions, lots of equipment and price-tags that are not much different.

A fight between these two was just waiting to happen. What better rink than us testing grounds for this epic battle?

Park these two SUV’s side-by-side and the contrast in design philosophies couldn’t be more obvious. While the Mitsubishi Outlander follows a conventional SUV template, Honda has deliberately made the CR-V look more car-like, the intention being to state its on-road rather than off-road credentials. In fact, the Honda CR-V doesn’t look much of an SUV. The tailgate is not side-hinged and opens upwards like a hatchback. The spare wheel too sits under the body. The curved D-pillar is meant to give the Honda CR-V a coupe-like look to complement its relatively low-slung stance. We are not sure if it works well though and the radical styling, especially the fussy-looking front, is bound to polarize opinion.

The Mitsubishi Outlander is clearly the better looking of the two. Though it could do with more visual drama, the proportions are spot-on and there are lots of neat touches that make the Mitsubishi stand out. The Mitsubishi Outlander’s nose has appealing elements. The two-part grille, the shapely headlamps, and big silver skid plate give it impressive presence in other cars’ rearview mirrors. The LED lights at the rear are stunning and really grab your attention. The rest of the body is quite conventionally shaped except for the D-pillar, which tapers inwards. Though the Mitsubishi Outlander’s upright stance and huge ground clearance (215mm to the Honda CR-V’s 185mm) makes it look taller.

Like the Honda CR-V, the Mitsubishi Outlander gets electronically controlled real-time four-wheel drive. In addition, it has a lockable center differential (50:50 power split between front and rear).

There’s a two-wheel-drive only mode you can opt for if you want to help fuel economy. The Honda CR-V has a full-time four-wheel-drive system, but no lockable differentials, which limits its off-road ability.

Both the Honda and the Mitsubishi are build on car platforms. The Mitsubishi Outlander, which is shared with the Mitsubishi’s GS platform, which is shared with the Mitsubishi Lancer and Evo-X. The Honda CR-V may not have a rally car as its base, but its donor platform, the Honda Civic, isn’t a bad start either.

Both these SUVs have fully independent suspensions. In the front, both use MacPherson struts but the Mitsubishi Outlander has an added brace, further proof that the Outlander is the more serious off-roader. At the rear, the Honda CR-V uses a double wishbone arrangement while the Mitsubishi Outlander has a multi-link set up. High-tensile steel is used in both cars to keep weight down and the Mitsubishi Outlander gets a lightweight aluminum root as well.

Both the Mitsubishi Outlander and Honda CR-V come with twin-cam 2.4-liter engines producing similar power and torque, Mitsubishi’s MIVEC engine is an all alloy unit and a good performer by itself but the busy CVT transmission doesn’t allow it to achieve its full potential. To get the best out of the Mitsubishi Outlander, you have to leave it in ‘D’ and keep your foot mashed on the throttle. The electronics and the CVT will figure out how to get you to 100km/h in least time, which is 11.4 seconds. Still, the Honda CR-V, despite its 7 less horsepower, beats the Mitsubishi to the 100km/h mark. This is because of the weird runner-band effect of the Mitsubishi Outlander’s CVT transmission, which gives you a feeling that the engine is revving without a corresponding increase in speed.