Jaecoo 5 review

Abject, unfortunately. Something that will dawn on you within yards of setting off.
You won’t believe how little information the steering wheel gives you. It’s not just numb, it’s stone cold. Which means you have to drive it in a reactive way, as opposed to calm and fluid.

As mentioned there’s loads of dead travel off centre, so wrestling the car around roundabouts and out of junctions is a constant challenge. Navigating a twisty back road? Good luck putting the car exactly where you want it. Especially when traffic’s flying the other way.

Then there’s the throttle response: nothing wrong with the pedal itself, it’s the engine and gearbox that are on entirely different wavelengths. Driven oh so gently, the Jaecoo 5 just about trickles along without fuss, but even minor power use means twiddling your thumbs while the seven-speed auto ponders a down-change.

So you’ll plant your foot… and kickstart an almighty racket from the engine. Moderate acceleration genuinely feels like you’re mistreating it. Someone ring the RSPCM (Royal Society for the Protection of Motorcars) immediately.

There are Eco, Normal and Sport modes, but they don’t appear to do anything. Hill descent control is buried in the screen, but are you ever likely to use it in a car like this? In stop-start traffic the 5 struggles with crawling, so you’ll creep away initially but then lurch forward. Several times over.

Oh dear. And you said before it’s not comfortable…

Nope. Because the car is so wayward you have precious little control over its attitude around bends; bad news if you’re prone to travel sickness.

But more than that, the suspension affords relatively little protection from imperfections in the road surface, crashing through potholes with marked force.

At low speeds it’s not too bad, but anything even vaguely taxing is beyond the Jaecoo 5’s skillset. Motorway cruising kicks up a lot of road noise from the tyres.

Can you say anything good about it?

Hmm. The body doesn’t wallow or pitch too much – this isn’t one of those overseas cars that’s sprung like a 20-year-old mattress because that’s what the domestic market prefers. And if you can put up with the bedlam from under the bonnet, the Jaecoo 5 will hold its own exiting a slipway. 0-62mph in 10.2 seconds is hardly quick, but 141bhp is enough. Even with the family in tow.