Nissan makes new Juke longer and more upscale

Nissan has toned down some of the design quirks on its Juke for the latest generation. The automaker is also taking the small SUV more upmarket to better compete with rivals.

Nissan released details and pictures of the Juke on Tuesday. It will go on sale in Europe starting in November.

When the Juke launched in 2010, it redefined sales of small SUVs and crossovers in Europe, turning what was until then a niche market into a hugely popular segment characterized by high-riding small cars with lots of design personality.

Nissan lost the lead of the segment after 2014 as other automakers developed rivals with bigger interiors, more features and better driving characteristics.

The Juke was Europe's 14th top-selling small SUV/crossover in the first half with sales down 14 percent to 33,533, according to data from JATO Dynamics market researchers. The Renault Captur led the segment with its volume up 1 percent to 120,638 units.

With the new model. Nissan expects to increase sales to just under 100,000 a year, similar to 2017’s figure for the current car, said Adrien Chaintreau, the executive in charge of marketing the Juke in Europe.

The new Juke has grown in length by 75mm to 4210mm. It is 18mm shorter than the latest Captur, with which it shares Renault-Nissan's CMF-B platform.

The Juke's wheelbase is 105mm longer.

The change addresses two weakness of the current model – lack of room in the rear, and the poor luggage capacity, said Matthew Ewing, head of development, at Nissan’s UK-based European technical center.

The Juke's rear knee room has increased by 58mm while trunk space has grown 20 percent to 422 liters.

The Juke has a sportier design than the current model. The SUV's signature driving lights that climbed over the hood in the current car are now slimmed down and curved around the side, but the car keeps the separate round headlights.

A black strip separates the cabin and the roof at the rear pillar to give a ‘floating roof’ look. Nissan says it helps give the car a coupe-style design.

Nissan Europe Design Director Matt Weaver said the Juke looks robust but also very agile. He called it "a little ball of muscle."

Previous interior design elements of the outgoing Juke such as the center console shaped like a motorcycle fuel tank and door armrests inspired by scuba-diver flippers have been muted in the replacement.

“Toning these things down allowed us to play up the interior stitching and materials usage,” Weaver said. The quality of the interior has taken “two jumps in premiumness” he said.

The focus of the dashboard is an 8-inch infotainment screen that can comes with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto to enable customers to mirror their smartphone screens. Nissan’s ConnectServices app is available to allow customers to check on the status of the car such as tire pressures, and remotely unlock the doors.

The Juke is available with a range of active safety and semi autonomous technology, including adaptive cruise control that can bring the car to a stop in traffic, and a blind-spot warning system that will steer the car back into lane if detects that a lane-change would bring it into the path of another car.

The Juke will be sold initially with a 1.0-liter, three-cylinder turbocharged gasoline engine making 115hp. Further engines, including the possibility of a plug-in hybrid drivetrain that Renault plans for the Captur, are under discussion, Ewing said.

Nissan has no plans to replace the outgoing diesel model.

Customers will have a choice of a six-speed manual gearbox or a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic.

The body-in-white uses around 50 percent high-strength steel (also known as hot-stamped steel) to increase rigidity but help lower weight by an average of 23kg over the current model, Nissan said.

Nissan will continue to build the Juke at its factory in Sunderland, northeast England.

Production starts in October focusing mainly on European markets. Outside of Europe Nissan has shifted its small SUV strategy to the Kicks model, which is now on sale in the U.S. in place of the Juke.

The Juke will start at 17,395 pounds (19,000 euros, $20,850) in the UK, rising to 25,395 pounds for better equipped models.