Hands on with the Outlander GT

Since the Outlander Sport wasn’t powerful enough for me, Aaron, the manager at Quality Mitsubishi though the Outlander GT with its 3.0 V-6 might be a better fit. 

It’s a slightly bigger vehicle and slightly more powerful.  It comes standard with a third row of seats, although I can’t say I would want to sit in them for a long road trip.  For hauling, the third row seats fold flat, however, the back row doesn’t.  This is an issue I currently fight with in my Explorer and have seen in many other vehicles as well.  It definitely limits what you can carry in the back which can be frustrating.

Overall, the interior felt virtually identical to the Outlander Sport.  The dashboard still feels enormous and the stereo is too integrated into the dash for each after market integration.  The seats felt like higher quality than in the sport, but still very boxy and not as nice as what I currently have.  Although the model we took out didn’t have one, a power panaromic sunroof is available.

Driving the Outlander GT was indeed more my speed than the Outlander Sport.  It still had a nice tight turning radius which is helpful when parking but it was still slower than I would like from 0-40 mph.  Especially compared to my Explorer Sport,  but was pretty peppy between the 40-70 mph range.  Passing wasn’t an issue… at least the cars I chose to pass while on the highway.  But, as I said, it was still slower than what I currently drive and not quite as comfortable.

I think if you drive mostly in the city or the suburbs, the Outlander Sport is probably enough of a vehicle and will get you better gas mileage.  However, if you travel on the highway at all, I think I would recommend the GT as the better model.  Regardless though, the Outlanders just aren’t the vehicle for me.