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What's the difference?
Yes, you can drive your Bentley and keep your family. It's called compromise, or the Bentayga, Bentley's SUV.
The Bentayga my family has been living with is the Azure grade which promises to be even more comfortable and pleasant than the rest of the range.
Comfort is important and we'll cover the Bentayga's lavish details in time, but our mission first and foremost is to find out if the Bentayga makes a good family SUV.
The EV brand has blazed a trail for every other mainstream and premium car manufacturer to jump on the electric bandwagon, and today they’ve still got the biggest batteries and most impressive range ratings, while also having the most extensive extensive network of charge stations made up of Superchargers and destination chargers, covering every state and territory.
They’re not perfect though, often displaying niggling build quality issues and production delays for upcoming models. There’s also a degree of uncertainty bred by a founder who flits between the modern-day space race, manufacturing flame throwers and offering to send miniature submarines to rescue stranded children.
But there’s no questioning the overall impact Tesla has had on the automotive industry, along with the incredible brand awareness and aspiration it’s generated from non-enthusiast Joe Average consumers around the world.
The Model X is also rated to tow, with a decent 2250kg braked rating and an integrated tow bar that folds out of sight when not in use, which both fits its SUV character and encourages you to give it a go.
The Bentley Bentayga Azure may look a bit awkward and it surely isn't great value for money, but it is a true Bentley and a very good family SUV that not only provides terrific practicality but superb performance and comfort.
After nearly 700km of testing with both cars, it’s fair to say that the Tesla is indeed a capable tow vehicle, provided you keep the distances relatively short and plan around charge station locations.
Overall average - Penrith to Bathurst to Penrith
Fuel and energy consumption will always depend on the driving conditions, which is why we chose different routes for each leg of our testing.
Averaged across the two legs, towing the caravan with the Model X used 101 per cent more energy than without, or halved its driving range, which sounds a bit scary.
The LandCruiser by comparison added 63 per cent on average, which is still a big difference, but matters less in the real world when its big fuel tanks would still give you about 760km of driving range, which can be refilled quickly at any diesel-stocked servo.
So you could do a weekend trip with the caravan from Penrith with one supercharge in Bathurst, but it would’ve been highly unlikely to manage the extra 55km if you were leaving from Sydney CBD.
The bottom line is that there’s plenty of things - like smaller camper trailers - lighter than our caravan that will help the Tesla to do the towing job better right now.
Compared to the ‘Cruiser, the Tesla is a lesson in the benefits of a lower centre of gravity and road-focused handling.
As always, bigger batteries and more recharge points will go a long way to rectifying the Tesla’s towing shortcomings, and I'm sure we'll get there eventually.
But no matter what, its acceleration performance under load is simply excellent.
Thanks to our friends at Avida for making this test possible with the use of the 17-foot Avida Wave Tourer Electric Pop-Top single-axle caravan. They can also be reached on 1300 428 432.