Toyota: Ghost of driving past

Few changes were made during Aurion's mild facelift - a new bumper, grille and rear headlights are easily overlooked - but the Bluetooth is handy. Photo / Jacqui Madelin

Last week I drove Toyota's clever little iQ. This week, the brand's dinosaur; a large car with little to recommend it but its engine. Perhaps I exaggerate, but I did find myself asking whether this Aurion could improve our road toll - because it's not fun to drive it briskly.

That said, it was an unassuming companion during its stay. Few changes were made during last year's mild facelift; a new bumper and grille design and new rear headlights are easily overlooked.

What is useful is the Bluetooth system now installed, in this AT-X operating only the phone, though you wouldn't know it from the manual's pages of Bluetooth audio instructions aimed at the higher-spec cars.

Tap the steering wheel-mounted button (also new), wait briefly, then use the fascia controls to scroll through menus to link your phone. I've seen more efficient processes, but it's easy enough.

Otherwise the $47,490 Aurion retains its cleanly laid out and comfy-if-unimaginative cabin.

There's a 3.5-litre six under this bonnet, with 204kW 346Nm on tap. That's more power and torque than Nissan's front-drive Maxima 3.5, and the 3.0-litre but similarly priced Holden Commodore Omega I recently drove.

If it's power numbers you're after, you'd buy the Toyota.

Trouble is, few people are just after numbers. In this case they also get a pleasant cabin and relaxed performance delivery. But they get an unrewarding drive experience, too.

A press-on approach brings out early understeer, while the rather vague steering feel is a further discouragement to lift the pace. Despite the impression imparted by its rear spoiler, Aurion is a cruiser - fortunately the ride's plush, though insufficiently damped over bigger bumps.

But I did wonder why you'd buy this car over the Camry it's largely based on. If you want the boasting rights of a bigger engine, you could buy that Maxima - or whichever of the Ford-Holden options you like best.

Ford's Falcon and Holden's Commodore take the lion's share of the large car market, with 186 and 196 sold so far this year - or 37 and 44 per cent. Aurion is best of the rest with 30 sales, ahead of Maxima on 22.

Those proportions roughly reflect last year's result, in a rapidly shrinking bracket. One has to wonder why Toyota stocks a large front-drive car when it doesn't have the character, the frugal thirst or the dynamic skills to compete.

TOYOTA AURION AT-X

We like
Now with Bluetooth

We don't like
Vague steering, overly-relaxed handling squanders power advantage

Powertrain
3.5-litre six, 204kW at 6200rpm, 346Nm at 4700rpm, six-speed auto drives front wheels

Performance
0-100km/h not available, 9.9l/100km (claimed)

Safety
ABS, stability control, six airbags

What it's got
Bluetooth hands-free phone, air con, cruise control, single CD

Vital stats
4825mm long, 504-litre boot, 70-litre tank