X-Trail AWD

Kevin said:

The older Xtrails (at least) stopped power to the rear wheels when reaching 40klm/hr - useless!

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I wouldn't go as far as saying that they were useless! I put about 220,000km on a 2003 X-Trail. Yes, the 4WD cut out at 40km/h which may not be ideal. However, I only ever got bogged once and that was because of relatively low ground clearance. After that I got a small one inch life and travelled Fraser Island, North Stradbroke Island and Moreton Island without getting bogged once. I think that there is still a bit of forward momentum at 40km/h. Enough to keep my out of trouble anyway!

I only got rid of the X-Trail as the engine was about to die. I will be testing my Forester out soon on the beach and am sure I will be even happier though.

You will be much happier with the Foz on sand.
My x-trail comments are based on a Simpson crossing and especially Big Red where one of our Subie club members with an x-trail had many many attempts to climb a steeper section of Big Red, even unloaded the car to no avail (this was very funny to see all the stuff stacked at the bottom of Big Red!). As it reached the peak you could see the front wheels spinning and no drive at all from the rear. It was the only car in our group to not make it up. I was researching the possibility of making a lock-up switch for it when the owner decided the car was not fit for their purpose and traded it on a Ford Ranger.

I was once on a trip between Wee Jasper and Tumut and one of the members had an X Trail. I was ahead of him and over the radio came the call they had stopped halfway up a hill. I was amazed- it was a hill a 2WD car could easily negotiate. The car was running a CVT or something and the oil overheated. If it does that n a 2WD road, I don't think much of it fas an off road car.

Mates Xtrail did fine on a soft beach, 2wd definitely couldn't have gone there. Maybe the Xtrail 4wd disengages when on a steep up hill like the CRV one does.

We have Xtrails and Ford Territorys at work. The Xtrails have the cvt and they drop out of 4wd at 40 km. I just appreciate getting back into the Foz at the end of each day.

I didn't do any big hills or anything like that in the X-Trail but certainly for beach work I was impressed. My model didn't have CVT and I am pretty sure it wasn't an option then. Once I got it lifted the only only isssue I had was on a fairly extended soft sand session as the tide was high and the sand very soft. The system eventually over heats, a warning light goes on and it reverts to front wheel drive. This might have been after 15 minutes of heavy going. I had only ever had this happen once. I ended up just parking for a few minutes and took off again without problem. So I think that this is probably more of a concern than the 40km/h cut out for beach driving. Maybe not for climbing big sand hills though!

Not ideal but once again for what I did I was very happy with it and it was a good all round vehicle.

Fairly certain the CVT came in in 2007.