2012 Scion iQ: First Drive

With a starting price of $15,265, the 2012 Scion iQ "micro" car will join the likes of other miniscule people movers the Fiat 500, Smart ForTwo and more expensive Mini Cooper when it begins a gradual U.S. rollout in California this December. Scion expects it to hit the East Coast and Midwest last, by March 2012. Ahead of a more detailed review to come, below are some first impressions from my drives of two test models in Detroit.

I like the iQ's dimensions — or perhaps I should say proportions — on practical grounds. When sitting in the iQ's front seat, it feels like a small car, but not a dinky one, unless you turn around and see the rear window so close to your head that it recalls a roadster. At 120.1 inches long, it's longer than the ForTwo but shorter than the 500 and Cooper hatchback. However, it makes no sacrifice in width, measuring 66.1 inches, putting it on par with the Cooper and a few inches wider than the other two.

2012 Scion iQ Starts at $15,265

When it goes on sale this October, the Scion iQ will not only be the smallest four-seater on the market, it will be one of the most affordable. Starting at $15,265 before $730 in destination charges, the iQ is one of the least expensive cars with an automatic transmission besides the 2012 Nissan Versa sedan ($12,760) and the 2011 Smart ForTwo ($12,490).

The iQ’s continuously variable automatic transmission is teamed to a 94-horsepower engine and gets an impressive 36/37 mpg city/highway and 37 mpg combined, which beats the ForTwo’s 36 mpg combined figure on premium gas and the Versa’s 33 mpg combined figure. That’s also the combined figure for the Ford Fiesta and Hyundai Accent with automatics.

The iQ comes well equipped with standard air conditioning, power windows, keyless entry, Bluetooth for phone and streaming audio, USB input, four-speaker Pioneer stereo, steering-wheel-mounted audio controls, 11 airbags, stability control, 16-inch steel wh1eels, folding side mirrors and trip computer.

Related
What's the Most Affordable New Car?

What's the Most Affordable New Car?

Used-car prices are going up, and gas prices remain high.

That makes new small cars with good mileage even more attractive to car shoppers. However, low starting prices under $15,000 don’t really translate to the transaction price most buyers face when you include equipment that’s almost a prerequisite today, such as an automatic transmission and power windows.

Over the 2011 and 2012 model years, more than a dozen new small cars will, or have been, released. They range from the traditional — like the Ford Fiesta and Hyundai Accent — to the quirky Fiat 500.

We decided to add another factor into this comparison that we haven’t included in the others: the cost of gas. For each model, we also included a year’s worth of gas to the total cost of the car — 15,000 miles’ worth of traveling in a mix of city and highway at $3.96 per gallon.

Toyota Recalls iQ Small Car Overseas

Toyota is recalling 135,000 iQ subcompact cars in Japan and Europe because of a fault in its steering software. The iQ will go on sale in the U.S. under the Scion brand next year.

The company says there have been incidents reported of the power-steering warning light illuminating when drivers crossed roadside rumble strips.

While the recall doesn’t sound significant in scope or severity — no accidents have been reported — we’re pointing it out because some of the issues involving recalled Toyotas in the U.S. were diagnosed in other countries before being recalled here.

Toyota recalls 135,000 cars over steering fault (Financial Times)

A Look At Scion's New Lineup

There are few car brands that can turnover their lineup with new models at just one auto show. But that’s what Scion did at the New York International Auto Show earlier this month, exactly eight years after it debuted its first concepts under Big Apple spotlights. For the 2011 model year, the Toyota spin-off brand debuted an all-new mini-car called the iQ, a fully redesigned version of its best-seller the tC coupe and a slightly refreshed version of the boxy xB. Its fourth model, the xD remained untouched, but three out of four is still an impressive feat.  

2011 Scion iQ

Jack Hollis, vice president of Scion, joked at his New York auto-show press conference that the Scion iQ is a "Minier and Smarter vehicle," which makes it pretty clear what the iQ will compete with. It's about as wide as the Mini Cooper, but taller — roughly as tall as a Smart ForTwo. From bumper to bumper, it's between the two at 120.1 inches. The ForTwo is 106.1 inches and the Cooper 145.6. In person, if you look at it from certain angles, the iQ looks sizable. Must be the height and width.

Crossovers Get Smaller as Category Grows

Several introductions at this year's New York International Auto Show certified that the class of compact crossovers is getting larger — with models that are getting smaller. Powered as much by increasingly stringent fuel-economy regulations as by customer demand, automakers are rolling out models that further blur the lines between crossovers and cars.

Models such as the top-selling Ford Escape, Honda CR-V and Toyota RAV4, which J.D. Power and Associates classifies as compact crossover utility vehicles, combine the height, hatchback versatility and optional four-wheel drive of SUVs with the greater fuel and space efficiency of cars; this explains why their popularity has grown. According to J.D. Power, the compact "CUV" category made up 2.3 percent of the market in 2000. In 2005, it had grown to 6 percent, and despite declines in overall market volume in 2009, compact crossovers have reached a 10.5 percent market share.

Ironically, one of the auto show's highest-profile crossovers came from Mini, purveyor of one of the smallest cars on the market. The 2011 Mini Cooper Countryman crossover, which will hit U.S. dealerships in February 2011, is 15.7 inches longer than Mini's base car, called the Cooper, and 6.3 inches longer than its extended model, the Cooper Clubman. It's a few inches taller than its siblings and has the raised look of a crossover, as well as optional all-wheel drive. Though it's large for a Mini, the Cooper Countryman is relatively small as crossovers go, with roughly 12 cubic feet of cargo volume behind the backseat and a total of 41 cubic feet once the backseat is folded flat. This puts it in league with cars such as the Mazda3 four-door hatchback, as well as two other downsized crossovers introduced in New York, the Mitsubishi Outlander Sport and Nissan Juke Sport Cross.

2011 Scion iQ Video

Scion brought a production model of the 2011 iQ micro-subcompact to the 2010 New York International Auto Show, and Cars.com senior editor Joe Wiesenfelder was on hand to take a look. With a price tag below $16,000, the iQ comes fairly well equipped, as you’ll see in this video. Watch it, if for nothing else than to see if Wiesenfelder can fit into the tight “+1” of the iQ’s 3+1 seating scheme.

2011 Scion iQ at the 2010 New York Auto Show

• Competes with: Smart ForTwo
• Looks like: Scion’s version of the Smart ForTwo
• Drivetrain: 90+ hp, 1.3-liter four-cylinder, CVT
• Hits dealerships: Early 2011

Here it is. The very short but long-rumored Scion iQ. This is no concept car any longer, and with an all-new tC, restyled xB and the xD, the iQ helps revive the brand’s entire lineup.

The iQ is 120.1 inches long, more than a foot longer than the Smart ForTwo. It also packs two extra seats in a unique 3+1 configuration that you'll have to see to understand. But the +1 is suggested to accommodate a “dog.” No, really. Scion says that’s how much room there is. Paris Hilton-sized pup most likely.

But it’s unlikely the iQ will be carrying four often, dog or no. This micro-subcompact is meant for efficient driving and features a small four-cylinder engine with continuously variable automatic transmission that the company says should get in the high 30s in terms of gas mileage.

Standard equipment includes USB and auxiliary audio ports and steering-wheel audio controls. It also comes with stability control and 10 airbags standard, including a rear-window curtain airbag and an airbag for the driver’s seat cushion.

Check out more photos below and let us know if you would consider such a small car.

Scion iQ Concept Video

Americans have proved they’re willing to give microcars a chance with the Smart ForTwo. That’s left Toyota considering the introduction of the Scion iQ. Cars.com reviewer Joe Wiesenfelder checks out the iQ in this video from the 2009 New York auto show, where he finds that the littlest Scion could have some advantages over the ForTwo, if Toyota decides to let it compete.

Scion iQ Concept: Up Close

The iQ Concept works. On one level it works because it's just audacious enough to attract the young buyers to whom Scion has always catered — the demographic that found appeal in the brand's early xB and xA despite their small size, modest power and distinctive styling. But it also works because of what it represents to any American buyer: a car that doesn't give up too much in exchange for its small size and presumptive fuel efficiency.