2001 CHEVROLET MALIBU
Responsive, But Scary
When I looked at the shattered plastic and twisted metal that minutes before had been my Saturn, I knew that a new vehicle was in my future. What I didn't know was that the insurance company would insist on repairing this hulk of fused parts and stick me in a rental vehicle for 72 days. That's right, 10 weeks to repair the car that they claimed wasn't totaled. The only upside was that my rental coverage brought me to a 2001 Chevrolet Malibu LS with 10 miles on the odometer. If you're going to destroy your primary means of transportation, you might as well drive a new car for a while.
Driving The Chevy Malibu
The Malibu slightly hesitates on initial acceleration, but soon rockets down a highway. There are 190 foot-pounds of torque available on a chassis that weighs the same 3,000-3,100 pounds as other models in its class. You do the math. The big 3.1 liter V6 GM put in the Malibu makes a driver forget that they are in a family sedan. The ride itself is glacier smooth and Arctic quiet.
Various reviews have called the Malibu's suspension "significantly firmer than prior models" and "soft". I'll go with Arctic glaciers despite never having been to the poles. One reason for the smooth ride is an independent rear suspension that allows the vehicle to compensate when one tire is on a different type of a surface than the other.
Strictly for comparative purposes, imagine that you are an average family man who has just turned around while driving and mentioned something to the angelic children about being less noisy as they fight over their GameBoys. Such an action could result in the vehicle straying slightly from the paved portion of the roadway and entering what automotive experts typically refer to as the "shoulder" with lots of road kill, gravel and other bumpy stuff to hinder the smooth ride.
The Malibu easily handles such activity and allows the driver to return to the paved road without their coffee being jostled. Even my neighborhood's speed bumps, which resemble some of the smaller foothills of the Alps, presented no challenge for this vehicle. Forget the hyperbole momentarily and understand this. Our street's residents routinely direct visitors to drive out of their way so that they only endure two rather than three of these gargantuan speed bumps. Taxi drivers sometimes turn in their seat to look at me and say, "What is that?" The Malibu handled those speed bumps as well as any vehicle I've ever driven. By contrast, leaning into a curve at speed with my wife's brand new Santa Fe threatens the driver with an immediate example of a pin wheeling demonstration best left for rabid Consumer Reports writers and stunt drivers.
The one thing that the Malibu is missing is traction control. That would help the ride even more. Simply put, traction control changes the speed of a wheel's rotation when the wheel does not have good pavement purchase. By slowing the rotation, the car is able to get a better grip on the road surface and is less likely to skid or otherwise lose control. Many cars in this class come equipped with traction control and its absence here may have been a GM attempt to lower the MSRP.
Cornering is easier than in a Taurus because the Malibu is a good 7 inches shorter than its competitor. In fact, it is only an inch longer than a Honda Accord and two inches longer than a Toyota Camry. The wheel base and turning radius is similar on each, and while the name Malibu may translate to some Baby Boomers as "Giant Lumbering Beast", that same age group would never think the same of the Camry or Accord, both of which are frequently considered nimble.
The opposite end of acceleration and speed is braking, and the Malibu does an adequate job here. Specs are tough to find on the 2001 model, but prior models ran about 142 feet for 60 to zero braking. My own experience showed that the Malibu's standard brakes didn't lock control, but worked quickly to slow the vehicle. Four-wheel ABS (anti-lock braking system) brakes are standard on the Malibu. ABS is an important feature because the system rapidly pumps the brakes when you are standing straight up on them. That is the feature that prevents the skid. ABS is all about controlling the car, much like the traction control mentioned earlier, and not about slowing the car down.
The Malibu's Safety Ratings
Drivers may experience a feeling of invulnerability, similar to SUV euphoria, when tooling down the road in a ton and a half of Detroit iron that was actually built in Delaware and Oklahoma. Surprisingly, the Malibu has not done as well as others in its class in various crash tests.
Tests done by the Highway Loss Data Institute (HLDI) ranked the Malibu eighth in a class of twelve and cited the vehicle's bumpers and restraints as potential trouble spots. Most vehicles in this class did poorly in head restraint design with only four of the twelve receiving acceptable or better ratings. The Malibu was also rated marginal in this area.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the federal government agency responsible for vehicle safety, continues to give the Malibu low ratings for side impact collisions, citing in particular danger to the front occupants. I take notice when government agencies flag a vehicle's thoracic trauma index as unacceptable. While I understand that no one lives in cocoons, I have no desire to suffer serious injury because I wanted a 3.1 liter engine in a vehicle that cost less than $17,000. To be fair to Chevrolet, NHTSA's rating has climbed from 1 to 2 stars in recent years, but the agency uses a five point scale, so judge accordingly.
Chevrolet Creature Comforts
Putting an ignition key into the dash cluster instead of the steering column reminds a driver that you're in an American boat. This bit of nostalgic whimsy is actually very user friendly and much more intuitive than the ignition key placement of the past two decades. Once the driver and passengers are settled into the car, they will notice that there is plenty of room to spare, again a land boat hallmark, that returns to the 21st century.
But there are plenty of new creature comforts that update this design. Auto-on headlights were very sensitive and worked equally well in rain and parking garages. The lights also remain on when exiting the vehicle, a nice nighttime safety feature. The radio also remains on when the ignition key is removed until the doors are opened. Yes, you can now shut off the engine, but still catch the time, temperature or traffic without filling your garage with deadly fumes.
A very small cup holder, more like a can holder, is hidden along the driver's left side. This unusual placement and small size was a nifty gee-whiz feature at first, but the holder is so small that I didn't even spot it for the first several hundred miles. I honestly thought it was an access panel mounted high and had made plans to pop off the cover to see what had to be maintained at knee level when I found the cup holder.
The front console is a bit rickety and will not sustain much family-level abuse. Hidden below the console is an area with notches for cassette tapes or CDs, freeing up the hollow armrest for other items. The door's map pockets were shallow and the sharp plastic edge rewards any sudden movement into its confines with a slight red scratch. That combination of poor design and bad assembly is one of the little irritants that make or break a vehicle's success.
The Bottom Line
Despite its little foibles, I would have recommended the Malibu without hesitation to anyone looking for a responsive mid-sized sedan until I saw the crash test results. Family sedans are built for safety, and the Malibu simply doesn't offer enough protection to justify its purchase.
