7-passenger Suv 5.6l Bluetooth Sunroof Nav Third Row Seat Cd 4x4 Black Obsidian on 2040-cars

Auto blog

2023 Infiniti Q50 gets small price bump and Premium Care

The Infiniti Q50 sedan continues for 2023 without the support of its coupe sibling, the Q60. There are just three small changes on the way, one being the addition of Infiniti Premium Care. Expanded to every Infiniti sold or leased in the U.S., Premium Care is a regular maintenance program for items like oil and filter changes, tire rotations, and inspections for up to three years. The second change is a higher price, the Q50 starting at $43,725 including the $1,075 destination fee, a $610 increase over 2022. MSRPs for the three trims next year and differences from 2022 are: Q50 Luxe: $43,725 ($610) Q50 Sensory: $49,425 ($400) Q50 Red Sport 400: $57,575 ($600) The last change is the availability of a Saddle Brown interior, which used to require stepping up to the Sensory. Rear-wheel drive is the standard layout, all-wheel drive can be optioned to any trim for $2,000. The twin-turbo 3.0-liter V6 hold steady at 300 horsepower and 295 pound-feet of torque for the Luxe and Sensory, or 400 hp and 350 lb-ft for the Red Sport 400, shifting through a seven-speed automatic no matter the output. It's possible there are more people who want to know where the Q50 is going than want to buy the car. The brand sold 8,482 Q50s in the first half of 2021, but just 3,717 units in the first half of this year. The high point came in 2016 when 44,007 units moved that year, two years after the sedan went on sale, and the model heading into 2023 has been hanging on for 10 years. The brand talked about a potential new electrified platform for the sedan in 2018, but come 2021 Nikkei Asia reported parent company Nissan would be ending development of all sedans in Japan excepting the Skyline. The Q50 seems like it's doing circles in a product cul-de-sac, knowing there's no point in revamping the current generation or developing a new one. But the car on sale is just bringing down values; unlike much of the rest of the market, there's real money to be saved on a one- or two-year-old Q50. Perhaps when the electric revolution has some power behind it in 2027 or 2028, we could see a return to the hot Infiniti sedans of yore.   

Mystery shoppers love Infiniti, hate Tesla

Infiniti, followed by Lexus tied with Mercedes-Benz took the top two spots for best sales experience according to mystery shoppers from the latest Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index, while EV manufacturer Tesla recorded the lowest overall score. Not surprisingly, premium brands dominated the top ranks. Including the three already mentioned, luxury brands occupied seven of the top ten spots and included Audi, BMW, Porsche, and the only American brand to crack the upper echelon, Cadillac. Toyota, Volkswagen, and Nissan rounded out the first ten positions. The news for domestic automakers isn't good. Aside from Caddy, the only other star-spangled automaker to score above the industry average is Chrysler. The rest of FCA, most of GM, and all of Ford fell below the line. But Pied Piper's mystery shoppers handed Tesla the biggest walloping – the company is ten full points below the next lowest brand, Volvo, and its score of 86 is 17 below the average of 103. It's baffling, considering the company's touted direct-sales model. "Tesla leaves me scratching my head," Fred O'Hagan, Pied Piper's president and CEO, told Wards Auto. "They own all of their stores, so you would think each one would be doing the same thing. But they're not. Tesla is consistent in its inconsistencies." O'Hagan added that there's a "huge variation" in Tesla's store-to-store effectiveness, and that in some cases, shoppers found showroom workers that acted more like "museum curators," Wards Auto reports. It might be popular to call Tesla the Apple of the car world, but based on Pied Piper's work, the brand has a long way to go to emulate the uniform shopping experience of an Apple Store. The news might be bad for Tesla, but even for the brands that scored below average, there's cause for celebration. Only Tesla and Mini lost points in this year's rankings, and only Mercedes and Lincoln held steady. Every other brand, including Infiniti, which topped the index for the first time, gained at least one point. The biggest improvements belong to Porsche, Land Rover, and Mitsubishi, which all jumped five points. Pied Piper's annual Prospect Satisfaction Index uses mystery shoppers – over 6,100 this year – from across the country to assess dealers and generate rankings from over 50 individual factors. News Source: Pied Piper via WardsAuto Green Audi BMW Cadillac Chrysler Infiniti Lexus Mercedes-Benz Nissan Tesla Toyota Car Buying Car Dealers study

Infiniti Q50S getting G37's hydraulic steering for 2016

Sometimes, new technology doesn't make things better. Take the march of power steering technology as an example. Electrically assisted systems are in vogue at the moment for their ability to increase fuel efficiency, but tuning them to offer good feedback remains something of a dark art. Some automakers get it, but most don't. The previous hydraulically assisted setups just seem to be inherently more communicative when driven with enthusiasm. And it looks like Infiniti might be learning this lesson the hard way.
In talking with Keith St. Clair, the luxury brand's head of product planning, Car and Driver has learned that the Q50S is probably going to ditch its standard electrically assisted steering in favor of a hydraulic system derived from the old G37, a model soon to be renamed the Q40. The system should make the sedan more engaging behind the wheel, but it still won't help those who tick the option box for Infiniti's controversial Direct Adaptive Steering drive-by-wire system.
According to St. Clair, Infiniti's engineers have heard the complaints of critics and previous G37 owners about the Q50S model's electric steering system, and wanted to see what they could do. They didn't have to go far to figure it out - all it required was taking the steering rack off of a G37 and putting it onto the Q50S. After a little tweaking, "the car is a blast to drive," St. Clair reports. Now, the company is said to be fast-tracking the switch, and it could be ready for the 2016 model year.