saw a pic of the turbo diesel last night, have put my name down to trade my x240 for one when its available mid next year….they look fantastic and if they can price the TD in at the sub 30k range they are going to clean up.

Spoke to the GWM sales man last night and sales are doing much better than expected here in WA for both x240 and the utes.

Yes i stand corrected the fuel cap does infact lock.

Another thing i realised is that the roof racks are not load rated so my dealership has been selling the cars without them incase of damage or injury. All the x240s in their yard have had the racks taken off.

People look at my car on the street and ask me what on earth it is, a couple of ppl have stopped me at petrol stations to enquire about it.

done over 2000kms now and no issues. Did 1000 kms of country driving and its fine.

Still very very happy with my x240

Well I have done 700 ks in my new x240, and for what my family needs we couldn’t be happier.
When I get back to work and enjoy the power of my 4 litre ute I’m sure it will be a welcome feeling.
With my 3 yo and 8 day old boys and Wife (to be )in the car I have no need for speed.

It drives fine, smooths out the bumps that my 06 navarra let you know were there, fuel ec seems fine, and we feel very safe and secure in our new vehicle.

Only time will tell if it is a long lasting product, but for now I couldn’t imagine paying 15 or 20 more thousand for a similar, or inferior product.

Long live the Great Wall

(Ok guys I have pretty decent experience with all sorts of cars from building porsche 911s to racing Nissan GTRs. I bought a GWM x240 about 1 month ago this is my honest take):

Styling – excellent, reminds me a bit of a merc CDI with the upward slanting chrome window finishes. The look of the car (and price first attracted me to it).

Interior carpets – very nice (does not come with floor mats – i had to buy some)

Interior seats – leather is cheapish quality but still leather.

Sound system – Good sound system and decent quality sound. takes a while to flip to the next track but I am impressed, nice and bassey, it aint so Nakamichi deck but it will do 99.9% of buyers fine!

Cupholder – flaw (if youve got a drink in the cup holder it inhibits your ability to put the car in 1st gear without sliding you hand lower on the shifter. Design error or whatever. Its silly.

Cupholder – propensity to break (I got my dealer to fix prior to deliver so just be easy on them when fliping them out, dont let them spring out hard and it should last)

Bonnet release lever – mine is fine but i saw one broken on a demo model. So maybe just go easy on these.

Interior (more info) Has got window tint, elec windows, elec driver seat. Passanger can also lock/unlock doors from their side which is a good safety thing or a pain if youve got a girlfriend who likes locking the doors when you like to drive with them unlocked.

Door locks – these feel flimsy to me and i will be going easy when manually operating these. Although, you shouldnt really need to becuase the doors lock when the car is son and doors are closed, although to unlock when the car is operational you either press unlock button (prefered) or manually pull the flimsy feeling door lock flap.

Airconditioner – good except you cant ‘block or turn off’ the passanger air vents (you can only divert them)

Body finish – I noticed some little imperfections in the paint and chrome grill. i have painted cars etc before so I have an eagle eye for this type of stuff. If you were none the wiser you probably would not realise. Also the front tips of my quarter panel were dented (near where it meats the headlight) so i asked the dealer to take these dents out prior to purchase. I am not sure if it was dented in transit or it comes with dips near the tip of the panel near the headlight, anyway it was fixed prior to delivery.

Chrome outer door handles – I have noticed a few little marks on a chrome door handle (maybe QC) isnt as strict as Merc but to be honest this mark is about 1 mm in diameter and most wouldnt even realise.

Boot – you have to shut this with a fair bit of force to close it and the rear out hatch handle feels flimsy, it will last but I suspect it is an item you would go easy on.

Tyres- they decked my car out with good quality Kumhos prior to purchase, tyres are pretty impotant so thats good. Any tyres fitted would need to pass Aussie standards anyway.

Brakes – I havent had to brake hard but looking forward to changing to Bendix etc when I need to, just like the korean motorbike Hyosung the pads that come with these cheaper toys are often lower quality than a replacement you would get here. Anyway I have had no dramas so far.

Fuel cap – the silly thing is that my cars fuel cap has a slot for your key but it doesnt actually lock. I cant figure out if the slot is just for looks as there is no locking mechanism.

Roof rack – only aethetical (but proper ones are coming apparanetly)

Battery – mine came with a Narva batter which is a good thing

Brake lines – dual brake lines which is good

Discs – probably a little small but what do you expect … 6 pot brembos.

ABS – havent had a chance to try it yet, will take it to a skid pan in the wet come winter.

Dash styling – looks a little cheapish (just the finish on the edges, not a deal breaker though).

Rear seat fold mechanism – no complaints and works well.

Drivers side air bag cover – I noticed in the heat mine wrped a little so that you almost had to give it a slight push back into shape…could get annoying if you have to keep doing that or you could just leave it.

Gears – Trans is ok, a little stiff into 1st but as I do more kms I think it will loosen up.

Reverse sensor – very good will give a constant beep when you are about 12 inches away from an object. Also picks up onjects to the rear sides so you dont scrape the edge of your bumpers (if you can’t park).

Noise from bonnet – my bonnet makes a squeeking noise if I drive over a bump. you can’t hear it when driving but If i push up and down on the closed bonnet or front bumper I can hear a slight squeek. When I drive with no music and coast (no engine noise) I can hear slight whistles etc but not enough to drive you mad, unless you were on the brink.

2wd/4wdlr/hr – good electronic transfer via knob. Haven’t done any serious off roading in this but I did play around in a gravel lot. Low ratio seems like it would have enough guts to do what most of us need, it aint no hummer but I think it is suffiicient. It takes a little whicle for the electronic transfer to occur, sometimes you need to drive forward slightly.

4wd button position – would be better if its away from the passanger incase you have one of those idiot friends who like to touch buttons and knobs. You could do some damage if switched on at high speed or on sealed road. Also the knob doesnt have much resistance so it could be turned accidentally if something brushed past it.

Paint – decent quality metallic (mine is black)a few imperfections (1mm in size) Ive probably got 4 all over the car.

Number plate block – to fit aussie plates to the front a disgusting plastic block is fitted to the lower front bar, it is crap, looks cheap and I am going to ditch it eventually and do something else.

Head light fog lights – good visibility, adjustable up and down (depending on load in your car) could do with some spotties on the roof rack (a la jeep wrangler) if you do some serious country driving.

Great wall door sills – as youd expect the car sometimes slips up and reveals that it is a cheaper chinese car. the door stepper sills look great but you can see a tiny bit of glue where it had oozed out from between the steppers and the sil. I am going to finely cut it off with a stanley but it is an example of how something silly can let you remember it was a cheap car.

Trans – back on the trans I am unsure but I heard they may be a borg-warner, if thats the car thats a good thing. I am totally unsure have not made any inquiries and dont intend to.

Engine – yes its has got an underpowered Mitsu 2.4 litre. Honestly I have driven everything from a 600hp 993twin turbo to a 1960s centurion tank. This car IS underpowered. You would need to slip the clutch if you were towing a heavy load at capacity from an uphill start especially with the a/c on.

This did not stop me buying this car, once you are going it is acceptable but this is not a fast or quick car. For me that was not a deal breaker as I was after a respectable conservative car. But when you first drive it it will be noticable unless you step out of a toyota hilux 18r then you may think its a rocket.

Alarm – a bit dissapointing that the car does not comne with an alarm (thats a chrissie project for me). A Chin aalarm wouldn tmeet our requirments anyway so GWM probably decided to stay in their price band and not get them fitted in Australia).

Engine bay – when you lift the hood it is a bit pedestrian. You can see everything was manuafactured in China. A cable tie holds my throttle cable to an intake pipe. there is no plastic stealth looking cam cover like most euro cars have nowdays. But it looks neat and is acceptable.

Spare parts – I beleive parts for these are available, many engine parts would be Mitsubishi and I am sure supporting and ancillary parts are in stock in Australia or can be sourced from GWM. It is comforting to know this car is sold elsewhere like it Italy and has been for some time so there is some sort of support commitment by Great Wall.

Speedo – I have not confirmed this but I have a feeling my speedo reads slightly high (about 2-3 kms at 60-70km) may be if Jumho tyre specs were different to what the speedos were calibrated on.

Fuel economy – is calimed at approx 10.4l per 100 km. I am getting slightly more economy. Its is ok.

Overall – Bang for your buck! Looks great, some have told me to de-badge it but i am going to keep the badges cos I am proud cos overall it is a respectable car!

Would I recommend – If you want a 4wd for rock crawling or serious deep river fording, if you want to tow a big caravan or a big boat do not buy this it is too underpowered. Otherwise, yes I highly recommend this car.

BTW – I wanted one now but a turbo diesel is rumoured to be avaialable mid next year, that would be very interesting and may shut alot of critics up.

Marc Maglione