UK Gets New CR-V. How About Us?

Honda UK have released pictures of the new fourth generation Euro-spec CR-V which will be built in the factory in Swindon, Wilshire. The new car will follow the trend of Europe’s (and the world at large) tightening legislation and offer greater efficiency while maintaining practicality, refinement and quality. Let’s not forget that the new CR-V has already been on sale in Japan since December 2011 so let’s just first state that the eventual SUV to reach Malaysia will be based on that, not the Euro-spec. In any case, the exact price, in-depth specification and technical details will only be made available closer to its October launch, near a full year after the Japan sales debut.

The UK CR-V will come in either (petrol) 2.0 i-VTEC or 2.2 i-DTEC diesel engine. Also, for the first time in the UK, the CR-V can either be front-driven or AWD (though applicable only for the petrol variant). While designed to be a global car the UK-spec CR-V boasts some changes: a revised front bumper together with LED daytime running lights and LED lights at the rear. Also missing in the Japan-spec vehicle is the powered tailgate for convenience.

Note the left-side steering. So the UK factory will also export to other European countries, then.

As seen in the new Civic recently launched in Malaysia, and in the all hybrids here, Eco Assist and Econ Mode are standard feature. On the other hand, the Malaysian bound CR-V is very unlikely to come with the 6-speed  manual gearbox, which means that Idle-Stop technology won’t be bundled together since it is a manual box-specific feature, as proven by the UK-spec.

The 2.0 litre i-VTEC engine produces 153bhp and 192Nm of torque while CO2 emission has fallen to 176g/km from the previous 195g/km (automatic gearbox). The two wheel drive version will see CO2 emission drop further to 170g/km. A trickle effect of increasingly stringent regulations naturally favour less complicated and lighter powertrain packages, hence why across Europe up to 51 per cent of petrol powered compact SUVs are all two-wheel driven.

This is how the Japan-spec interior looks like.

New to the CR-V are a list of safety technologies including Hill Start Assist, Hill Descent Control and Honda’s Advanced Driver Assist (ADAS). The latter consists of Lane Keeping Assist, Adaptive Cruise Control and Collision Mitigation Braking System.

Since first introduced in 1995, Honda have sold over 5 million units of the CR-V across the world. So when is it Malaysia’s turn for the 4^th generation CR-V? Hopefully, soon.

This is how the 4th generation Japanese-spec CR-V looks like. Click on gallery below for other angles of interior and exterior of both types.