Toyota Highlander V-6 AWD Review

Toyota Highlander V-6 AWD Review

Like the 1986 film Highlander, the Toyota SUV that offers its name is a group pleaser that neglects to rouse enthusiasm among commentators. After more than 190,000 Highlanders moved off merchant parcels a year ago, Toyota's fair size hybrid SUV entered 2017 with a large group of changes gone for fulfilling the masses and savants alike. 

Toyota Highlander V-6 AWD Review

Toyota Highlander V-6 AWD Review

Prominently, all Highlanders, from the base $31,590 LE to the highest point of-the-line $48,840 Highlander Hybrid Limited Platinum, now come standard with a pre-impact cautioning framework with passerby discovery and computerized crisis braking, in addition to path takeoff cautioning, path keeping help, versatile voyage control, and programmed high-pillars. Our everything wheel-drive $43,184 Highlander XLE test auto likewise stuffed blind side checking, a component inaccessible on the lower-level Highlander LE and LE Plus. 

Going with the 2017 Highlander's various wellbeing frameworks is the most recent variation of Toyota's 3.5-liter V-6 motor. The six-chamber is standard on everything except the base front-wheel-drive Highlander LE—which keeps on utilizing a weak 185-hp inline-four—and joins a large group of present day innovations, including an immediate and port fuel-infusion framework and a redesigned valvetrain that enables the motor to keep running on the more effective Atkinson cycle. Evaluated at a sound 295 drive and 263 lb-ft of torque, the reconsidered V-6 makes 25 more horses and an extra 15 lb-ft contrasted and the past unit. Efficiency is up, as well, with the front-wheel-drive 2017 Highlander V-6 gaining an EPA-appraised 23 mpg joined; all-wheel-drive models accomplish 22 mpg. Both figures check a 2-mpg change over a year ago's Highlander and put the hybrid inside 1 mpg of the four-barrel Mazda CX-9's consolidated mileage figures. 

Toyota's 2GR-FKS six is a diamond of a motor that fabricates control as far as possible up to its 6800-rpm redline. At the track, this Highlander shaved 0.3 second off of its ancestor's zero-to-60-mph and 30-to-50-mph times, hitting the imprints in 7.0 and 3.8 seconds, separately. Shockingly, the 2017 Highlander's 5.6-second 50-to-70-mph taking a break was both moderate for the class and almost a moment behind that of its avoid. Accuse the new eight-speed programmed transmission's reluctance to downshift. Notwithstanding, the updated Highlander's V-6 offers a lot of snort in most true driving circumstances. Much appreciated to some extent to our test auto's programmed stop-begin framework, we dealt with a sensible 21 mpg amid our time with the hybrid, 2 mpg superior to anything what we got from a Mazda CX-9. 

The Element of Crossover 

On the off chance that the 2017 Highlander's V-6 powertrain is what might as well be called Highlander's beguiling Juan Sánchez Villa-Lobos Ramírez (played via Sean Connery), at that point the hybrid's redone outside plan is much the same as the film's good looking however forgettable hero, Connor MacLeod (Christopher Lambert). New front and back belts, refreshed headlamps, and an alluring arrangement of LED taillights give the Highlander a more durable, SUV-like appearance. In any case, despite everything we wouldn't put it very on an indistinguishable level of engaging quality from the butch Dodge Durango or the shapely CX-9. 

Not at all like the outside, the Highlander's inside has been left to a great extent untouched. Toyota added four more USB ports, conveying the aggregate to five—three in front and two in the back. The cockpit highlights various helpful stockpiling alcoves, including a rack that traverses the lower dashboard and a monstrous focus comfort receptacle that can oblige almost a cubic foot of incidental things. Ergonomic deficiencies incorporate hard to-hold temperature handles for the atmosphere control framework and a touchscreen that is too far from the driver. 

Toyota Highlander V-6 AWD Review

While base-level LE and LE Plus Highlanders accompanied a standard second-push seat situate, the XLE, SE, Limited, and Limited Platinum grades accompanied commander's seats in the center. (The seat is a no-taken a toll alternative on the XLE, Limited, and Limited Platinum.) Space is ample in the second column, yet we found that our seven-traveler test auto's basin seats were mounted too low for ideal solace. Still, the Highlander's sliding and leaning back second-push seats resembled a couple of La-Z-Boy chairs contrasted and the thin and shaky 60/40 split-collapsing third-push seat. Legroom in the wayback is only 27.7 inches, an entire six inches less than what the Volkswagen Atlas' rearmost line offers. In the event that you routinely pull enough travelers to justify visit utilization of the third column, consider the Atlas, a Honda Pilot, or a Ford Flex. 

Shadow of a SUV 

Disregarding the Highlander's carlike unibody development and low stride in tallness, this moderate size hybrid's dealing with helps us to remember an antiquated body-on-casing SUV, as its delicately sprung suspension permits unnecessary body come in turns. On the in addition to side, the suspension retains street inconsistencies with nary a shiver, and the electrically helped directing is moderately fast and for the most part all around weighted. 

At 4560 pounds, our everything wheel-drive Highlander test auto was no lightweight, and the overabundance mass made itself known while applying the brakes, as the Toyota required 181 feet of landing area to prevent from 70 mph—11 feet more than a 161-pound-lighter all-wheel-drive GMC Acadia Denali. 

With an as-tried cost of $43,184, our Toasted Walnut Pearl Highlander XLE donned $2244 in choices. All-wheel drive includes $1460, which additionally brings minimal mud folds, slope drop control, and a show setting inside the 4.2-inch gage-bunch screen that shows torque dissemination among the Highlander's four wheels. A $1810 raise situate diversion framework was the most costly alternative, while $434 purchased floor tangles and body-side moldings. Standard things included route, a vicinity key with push-catch begin, and a sunroof, and in addition previously mentioned elements, for example, a blind side observing framework and calfskin trimmed first-and second-push seats (Toyota upholsters the third column in vinyl). 

Toyota Highlander V-6 AWD Review

Toyota Highlander V-6 AWD Review

While the Highlander's dormant taking care of and cramped third line keep on curbing our energy for the Indiana-assembled hybrid, the refreshed 2017 Highlander's not insignificant rundown of standard security and accommodation highlights, all the more effective and fuel-proficient V-6 motor, and enhanced outside styling will keep on attracting crowds of customers searching for an agreeable and sensibly valued medium size hybrid SUV.

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