Haval H6 2018 review

Until recently, the Haval H6 definitely offered truly good value for money. At launch it arrived with a base price of $31,990 drive-away for the entry-level Premium and $34,990 drive-away for this Lux version. But since then, there has been a lot of new model activity in the medium-SUV segment, and some hallmark players have added kit and dropped prices to boost sales and maintain relevance.

The Lux scores 19-inch alloys and xenon headlights over the Premium base-spec car.

The Premium comes with 17-inch alloy wheels, fog-lights, auto headlights and wipers, laser puddle lights, heated auto-folding side mirrors, tinted glass, roof-rails, cruise control, mood lighting, stainless-steel scuff plates, electric driver’s seat adjustment, fabric seat trim, dual-zone climate control, keyless entry and push-button start, and an 8.0-inch touchscreen multimedia unit with Bluetooth phone and audio streaming and USB input. 

The Lux adds a panoramic sunroof, heated front and rear seats, power-adjustable passenger seat, fake leather trim, its sound system gains a sub-woofer, and it has better headlights - xenon units with auto levelling - plus 19-inch wheels.

There are seven colours to choose from, six of which are metallics that attract a $495 premium. Buyers can even choose between a range of different coloured interiors; the Premium has the choice of black or grey/black, while the Lux has black, grey/black or brown/black, as you see here.

You'll get fake leather trim on the Lux, but sat-nav isn't standard in any spec.

And there are deals to be had. The H6 Premium can now be had at $29,990 drive-away with free sat nav (usually $990 more) and a $500 gift card. You’ll get the Lux for $33,990 drive-away.

The H6 doesn’t have sat nav fitted as standard in any spec, and Apple CarPlay/Android Auto phone mirroring technology isn’t available at all. 

Safety kit is respectable, if not class-leading, with a reversing camera, front and rear parking sensors, six airbags, dual ISOFIX child-seat attachment points (and three top-tether hooks), and blind-spot monitoring included in both variants.

It doesn’t look very much like the other models in Haval’s range, and that’s a good thing. The H2, H8 and H9 all have the rounded edges of yesteryear, where the H6 is sharper, smarter, more sophisticated. It looks more European than Chinese, to my eye.

The H6 is sharper and smarter in design than its Haval stablemates.

The proportions of the Haval H6 are quite fetching - the brand, cheekily, labels it the H6 Coupe in its home market. It has lines in the right places, a shapely silhouette and a pert backside, all of which combine to give it a certain presence on the road. It is more stylish than a few of its class compatriots, that’s for sure. And the Lux model rolls on 19-inch wheels, which certainly help in that regard.

The interior, though, isn’t as amazing, despite looking inviting. There’s a lot of fake wood and hard plastic, and it doesn’t have the ergonomic intelligence of the better SUVs in the class. The swooping roofline makes for difficult rearward vision, too, with a letterbox rear windscreen and thick D-pillars. 

The Haval H6 doesn’t set any new standards in terms of cabin space and comfort, but nor is it a bottom-feeder in the segment - there are some older cars from better-known brands that assume that mantle.

The good bits include decent storage - four door pockets that are big enough for water bottles, a pair of cupholders between the front seats and two in the back in the flip-down arm-rest, and the boot is decent, too. Plus you’ll easily be able to fit a stroller in the back if you have kids, or pushbikes if you’re that way inclined, and the opening is wide, if a little high when you’re placing heavy items in. There is a space-saver spare wheel under the boot floor, a 12-volt outlet in the boot and a pair of netted cubbies. The rear seats fold down almost flat in a 60:40 fashion. 

You'll easily be able to fit a stroller in the back.

The rear seat is comfortable, with a long seat squab making for good under-thigh support, and plenty of space - even for taller adults there is plentiful legroom and decent headroom. Because it is a front-wheel-drive vehicle, it doesn’t have a big transmission tunnel eating into floor space, making sidewards slides pretty simple. The back seats recline, too.

There's decent head and legroom in the back seat.

Up front, the button placement isn’t as logical as you might find in some of the other SUVs. The large volume wheel between the seats, for instance, and the array of buttons that reside down there, are out of your line of sight. 

The digital information screen between the dials in front of the driver is bright and has a fair few things to look at, but crucially - and annoyingly - misses out on a digital speedometer. It will show you the set speed on cruise control, but not your actual speed.  

And the chimes. Oh, the dings and dongs, the bings and bongs. I don’t need the cruise control to do a warning beep every time I adjust the speed by 1km/h… But hey, at least there are six mood light colours to choose from, using a rather innocuous button between the seats (the colours are: red, blue, yellow, green, pinkish purple and orange). 

If the tech were more user-friendly and the plastics a little more special, the H6’s cabin would be a much nicer place to be. For roominess, it ain't bad. 

There is only one engine available in the Haval H6 line-up - a 2.0-litre turbocharged petrol four-cylinder with 145kW of power and 315Nm of torque. Those figures are good for its competitive set - not as strong as a Subaru Forester XT (177kW/350Nm), but more than, say, a Mazda CX-5 2.5-litre (140kW/251Nm).

The 2.0-litre turbocharged four cylinder produces 145kW/315Nm.

It has a dual-clutch automatic transmission from Getrag, but unlike plenty of its competitors, the H6 only comes in front-wheel drive.

Haval claims fuel use of 9.8L/100km, which is high for the segment - in fact, it’s about 20 per cent more than most of its rivals’ stickers suggest. 

In our testing, we saw even higher than that - 11.1L/100km over a mix of urban, highway and commuting. Turbocharged engines in some rival models find a better balance of performance and frugality, which the Haval just doesn’t quite have yet.

Not great… 

I could just leave this review at that. But here's the justification.

The engine is decent, with a nice amount of zing once you’re off and running - particularly in the Sport mode, which ekes the most out of the turbocharged mill. 

But getting away from the line is sometimes a stumble, with a bit of hesitation from the transmission, coupled with mild turbo lag, making for frustrating motoring at times. Cold starts aren’t its friend, either - at times it feels as though there's something wrong with the drivetrain, such is the chug factor. The refinement on offer just isn't what it should be.

That’s not the worst part, though, I also found the steering to be very hard to judge. At times the electric power steering system would load up, almost for no apparent reason, making roundabouts and intersections a bit of a guessing game. On the straight-ahead it is lacking meaningful feel, too, but it is easy enough to keep in its lane. When you're getting around back alleys and the like, the slow steering rack makes for plenty of arm-work - at least at really low speeds the steering is light enough. 

It's hard to get a comfortable driving position for six-foot-ish tall adults, too: the reach adjustment doesn't quite reach far enough towards the driver.

The front-drive underpinnings struggle to harness the torque of the engine at times, with notable slip and squeal in wet conditions and some torque-steer under hard throttle. 

The brakes lack the progressive pedal travel we’ve come to expect of a modern-day family SUV, with a woodenness at the top of the pedal, and they don’t pull up as strongly as you might hope, either.

The 19-inch wheels and confounding suspension setup makes for unsettled progress in many situations - on the freeway the suspension can rebound a little abruptly, while around town it isn't as comfortable as it could be. It isn't harsh or uncomfortable, but nor is it plush or well resolved.

There hasn’t been a crash test done on the Haval H6, but the company will be hoping it can mimic the score set by the smaller H2, which managed five stars in a 2017 test.

As for safety items, the bare essentials are there, such as six airbags, a reversing camera, parking sensors and electronic stability control with brake assist. Daytime running lights are standard, as is blind-spot monitoring.

It also has hill-start assist, hill-descent control, tyre-pressure monitoring and a seatbelt warning system - in our early build test car, the rear-seat warning lights (housed in the bottom of the auto-dimming rear-view mirror) stayed illuminated at all times, which was really annoying at night. Apparently that has been fixed as part of a running change.

Haval says further safety tech is on its way, with an update due in the third quarter of 2018 set to bring the addition of forward-collision warning and auto emergency braking. Until then, it’s a bit behind the times for its segment.

Haval hit the market with a five-year/100,000km warranty, which didn't redefine the class, and it backs its buyers with the same duration of roadside-assist cover.

Your first service is due after six months/5000km, and from then on the regular interval is every 12 months/10,000km. The brand’s Service Price Menu runs out to 114 months/95,000km, and the company’s average cost per service over that entire period works out to be $526.50 - which is expensive. I mean, it’s more than what a Volkswagen Tiguan costs to maintain (on average).