My rental

Author: Pyrofenix

I was taking a few days to get out of town and needed to rent a car for the trip. I picked up a 2007 Dodge Caliber from my local Enterprise.  I was somewhat surprised to receive an SXT rather than the base SE model.  At first sight, I was repulsed by the “khaki” color that adorned both the exterior and interior.  The color does not help the shape and angles that from my checking out of photos only looks good in a few colors.  In addition to the color, was the presence of many hail dents that the agent hadn’t noticed until I pointed them out.

ENGINE:
My rental was equipped with the 2.0L rather than the stock 1.8L which is definitely adequate at propelling the 3000 lb. Caliber.  The engine is somewhat noisy under somewhat heavy throttle.  If I were buying my own, I would opt for the 2.4L which produces an extra 14 hp over the 158 that the 2.0 has available.  It was comfortable motoring along at 75 mph all day long and my return trip home averaged a tad over 27 mpg.  I would really like to see a diesel version available here in the US.

TRANSMISSION:
Upon driving off of the lot, noticed an odd response from pulling away at stop signs or lights.  There seemed to be an initial surge and an obvious gear change as I sped away.  This seemed odd considering the car was equipped with a CVT (continuously variable transmission).  I assume that this was intentionally done by Dodge in the computer controls of the transmission as early CVTs were often felt to be for low power cars as drivers expected the feel of a gear change.  If almost feels as if there are two ‘gears’ in the CVT - one for low speed (under 25 mph).  Once at freeway speeds, the car is incredibly smooth and offers a unique experience when passing cars as there is no downshift.  Were I purchasing my own Caliber, I’d opt for the manual transmission instead of the CVT.

INTERIOR:
The interior is the biggest flaw of the Caliber.  Hard plastic surfaces as far as the eye can see!  I’d love to see the door panels and/or dash use a softer feeling plastic - particularly where your elbow rests on the window sill.  Initially, the utility of the  Caliber seems bountiful.  There are storage areas everywhere.  There are at least 8 spaces to put your crap within reach of the driver: 1 in each door, a space to the left of the gauge cluster, in the center console, center dash, and 2 glove compartments in front of the passenger!  While all these spots are nice, many of them are small and/or shallow and made of the same hard plastic as the rest of the interior which causes whatever does fit in them to fall out on the first corner you take.  A rubber bottom of the center cubby under the radio as that is where I had placed my ipod while it was connected to the AUX input.  The seats were quite comfortable and my ass never complained during the 4 hr journey from Atlanta to Nashville.

One minor annoyance was the lack of a manual hatch release in the car, instead you must use the key fob built into the key to unlock the hatch.  There seemed to be plenty of rear seat legroom given the size of this car.  With the financial troubles that all the domestic automakers are going through, I don’t expect to see better quality interiors in the caliber anytime soon but I still hope they will make this a consideration.

PERFORMANCE:
The model I was driving can’t be considered a performance machine but didn’t have trouble getting out of it’s own way and braking was adequate from what I experienced (never had to do any panic stopping).  Just outside of Chattanooga, TN on Hwy 24 the road becomes curvy and mountainous which provided a chance to get a feel of the handling of the car.  It has a decent amount of body roll while cornering but at speed the car feels well planted.

THINGS TO KEEP IN MIND:
The base price starts at about $14k but if I were purchasing one, make sure you check that box that adds the larger displacement engine and if you want to have lots of fun driving and can afford it - go for the SRT-4!  Also, make sure you are comfortable with the rear visibility as it isn’t great.  I played with my rear view mirrors a bit to get them so I was more comfortable that nobody was behind me on the driver side.  I hadn’t initially intended on doing a ‘review’ of my rental caliber and I am NOT a car reviewer, just an auto-enthusiast so if you disagree - keep it to yourself!