Dacia Duster
The Fast Fleet’s odd one out leaves us with its head held high
UNLIKELY LONG-TERM TEST CARS HAVE long been part and parcel of evo Fast Fleet folklore. In the early days of the magazine I remember running a Subaru Forester Turbo (complete with Prodrive tweaks) and becoming completely smitten by its combination of plain looks, improbable pace and impressive practicality.
Some years later the magazine ran an early Skoda Yeti, which was another smash hit. Especially after it was fitted with Dunlop Direzza trackday rubber. Lapping the Nordschleife in it with three mates and all our luggage is one of the more amusing things I’ve ever done.
The Dacia Duster is the latest improbable, yet highly endearing Fast Fleet loaner. Originally secured by editor Gallagher as the real-world foil to his Aston Vantage long-termer, his plan was quickly thwarted when I ‘borrowed‘ the Duster for a week or two and never got round to giving it back.
For some of you it simply won’t compute to see evo running a Dacia of any description. To be honest, were it not a Duster I would take some convincing that a bargain-priced 115bhp diesel-powered 4x4 estate car has any place in a magazine dedicated to The Thrill of Driving. But. Given the magazine has been advocating the ‘faster doesn’t mean better’ perspective for some years now, what better way to put that to the test?
OK, so my heart sank at the colour. Especially when I encountered other Dusters in far classier hues of metallic blue or gunmetal grey, but try-hard ginger and glitzy alloys aside, our Dacia was admirably unpretentious. If you’re used to Audis or Mercs then the look and feel of the interior would be a challenge, but much like flying Easyjet instead of BA, or shopping in Aldi rather than Waitrose, when you take a step back you realise all the things you need are there.
Besides, plain doesn’t have to mean poor. Points were scored for simple, hard-wearing cloth trim, intuitive touchscreen infotainment with Apple Carplay (read this and weep, Aston DBX owners), plus a refreshingly honest approach to affordable everyday motoring. Put it this way, I’d far rather live with a Duster than some average, anonymous, anodyne hatchback.
I never got a chance to try the more potent diesel Duster, nor the petrol-engined model, which is a shame as the 115 DCI powertrain lacked refinement and was a bit hobbled by mismatched gear ratios. First gear should really be labelled as some kind of low ratio, such was its lack of reach. Thankfully some lateral thinking led me to pull away in second, thereby making a bit more sense of the ratios. It also effected an instant, cost-free conversion from annoying six-speed gearbox to more tolerable five-speed complete with dog-leg first.
If the engine/gearbox betrayed humble origins, the chassis had surprising sparkle, with plenty of poise, modest grip and a supple ride. In a funny sort of way the Duster helped me rediscover the joy of roads that had long since been lost to rampant progress in performance. Where top-end hot hatches can dismiss lumpen A and B-roads at three-figure speeds, the Duster could be happily hustled onto its door handles without any sense of recklessness.
Rain or shine, it put a smile on my face and spared me the lingering fizz of speeder’s remorse.
I also did plenty of long days pounding the motorways and never found the Duster wanting. It would sit happily at a realistic outside-lane pace, but never generated that stress you get when driving cars that can happily cruise all day at 120mph. In so many ways it was like therapy, each trip providing further opportunity to find fun in not going fast.
My time with the Duster also happened to coincide with moving house. A planned hiatus living in rental meant shipping all our worldly chattels piecemeal from home to storage, with only the largest items reserved for a manic two days in a rented Luton-bodied Mercedes. With seats folded flat, the Duster proved to be an excellent van, shifting countless boxes and smaller pieces of furniture without complaint or any lasting scuffs on the hard-wearing interior. In those stressful few weeks it became less a car, more a dependable life-saver.
I can’t speak for the quality of my local Dacia dealership as I didn’t cover enough miles for the Duster to require a service. What I can say is it only needed one modest top-up with oil, averaged 43mpg, hadn’t developed any interior rattles or squeaks and drove as well when I handed it back as it did when I first took it home.
Would I have rather run an Audi RS6 or some bigger, ballsier ‘premium‘ SUV? At times, yes, but I’m honest enough to say that most of those moments had more to do with my ego and worrying about what other people might think of me than any shortcomings in the Duster. The longer I lived with it, the less I cared about projecting some kind of high-roller image, and the more I came to enjoy the fact I was once again enjoying driving as I did when I first passed my test.
If you’re looking for a humble yet well resolved car that fulfils every aspect of family life, delivers plenty of harmless fun and possesses a genuine element of cult appeal, then you’d find a four-wheeled friend in the Dacia Duster.
‘In so many ways it was like therapy, each trip providing further opportunity to find fun in not going fast’
Date acquired January 2020 Duration of test 10 months Total test mileage 5581 Overall mpg 43.0 Costs £0 Purchase price
£20,355 Value today £14,200