Dacia News

The Romanian car manufacturer, Dacia, will assembly, starting this year, engines that will have Euro5 pollution standard and will power the existing Logan range and other models from Renault, Nissan and Renault Samsung.

Until now, the Dacia Euro5 engines were imported from Renault factories. Dacia produces in the Mioveni factory three Euro4 engines: the 1.4 liter and the 1.6 liter on gasoline and the 1.9 liter diesel. The new engines will be produced in the new production line that was assembled in the Mioveni factory.

Las year, in the Dacia factory were manufactured 273.559 engines of 1.4 liter and 1.6 liter on gasoline and 1.9 liter diesel. Dacia sold 311.282 vehicles last year, more with 20% than in 2008.

The Dacia factory in Mioveni celebrates the production of 300.000 units of Logan MCV. The model celebrates 4 years from its official launch and proved to be extremely popular on the Western European markets. The MCV is the second member of the Logan family and was launched in October 2006, immediately after the official presentation on the Auto Motor Show in Paris.  The Logan MCV range was restyled in October 2008 and has four equipment versions: Ambiance, Preference, Laureate and Prestige. All four versions of equipment are available in two configurations – with five and seven seats.

The Logan MCV unit number 300.000 has a red color, is powered by an 1.5 dCi engine, it is a version with five seats and will be delivered to a customer in Italy.

In Romania the cheapest Logan MCV cost 8.400 euros with all taxes included. The most expensive version of Dacia Logan MCV is a Prestige version and has a price starting from 12.900 euros, has seven seats and an 1.5 dCi engine.

Dacia brand was ranked second in a survey of satisfaction made by JD Power and the German magazine Auto Test on vehicle owners in Germany. Dacia was ranked second in this top along BMW with 836 from 1000 points.

Dacia and BMW were surpassed by Mercedes with 838  points in the study that measured the levels of customer satisfaction based on four key criteria: vehicle attractiveness (performance, design, comfort), quality and reliability, the maintenance cost (consumption, insurance policies, costs of repair) and the quality of services by  approved repairers.

Dacia Logan was ranked second in the small class models category with 839 point. In the first place of this top was Nissan Note with 846 points and on the third place was Toyota Yaris with 833 points.

The study was conducted during January and March 2010 and was based by 16.330 online interviews by customers who have owned a car for about two years. The models evaluated came from 25 brands and covered all car classes.

Since the launch on the German market in 2005, Dacia sold 150.000 vehicles in Germany until may 2010.

The professor Dan Marinescu from the University of Pitesti launched a new project called Dacia Hamster Hybrid Electriway, after last year he presented another project called Dacia Grand Sandero Hybrid Utility.

Dacia Hamster Hybrid is a study of the Research Center of Automobile Engineering University from the University of Pitesti , as part of an environmental program for the developing of a car with only 99 g/km CO2 emissions.

Dacia Hamster is a 4×4 model based on Dacia Sandero platform with a hybrid diesel-electric propulsion (EcoMatic Hybrid System).

Source: Promotor

The number of registrations of new Dacia cars in France grew more that three times in May, compared to the same period last year to 10.258 units registering the best performance of the local market.

Dacia is also placed in second place among the brands present in France in terms of number of new cars registered in May, being surpassed only by Volkswagen with 11.752 new registrations, according to the French Committee of Car Manufacturers.

The Romanian car manufacturer is also second among the foreign brands depending on market share, which advanced during the analyzed period, from 1.6% to 5.5%. The first position is occupied also by Volkswagen with a market share of 6.3%.

Renault will start to expand their influence in Russia, after they bought 25% of the famous Russian car manufacturer Lada the automotive symbol of the former Soviet republics. The French manufacturer will try to reorganize the Togliatti factory, where wore assembled the Fiat models and since 2001 the General Motors cars.

The importance of the Lada factory was underlined by Putin himself, the Russian prime minister, who has approved a loan of 930 million euros and bought a Lada Niva model to show his support. He then made pressure on the Renault-Nissan alliance, who reached an agreement with the local government to produce a new model in the Togliatti factory. It is the low-cost Dacia Logan which will be assembled under the Nissan logo.

Currently, the Logan is sold under the Nissan brand in Mexico, where it is sold as the Nissan Aprio.

Dacia prepares the launch of a small class model with four-seats, called Dacia City, with a price of 5.000 euros, according to the German magazine Auto Bild.

"We are thinking at a model of 3.5 to 3.6 meters long" said Vincent Carre, the global marketing director of Dacia in the Renault Group.

Dacia-Mini will have four seats and four doors, and will take elements from Logan and the second generation of Renault Clio. The reduced price of the new model is due to the design and the use of components from other models.

"Dacia is not just a brand, is a philosophy. The objective is to obtain low costs at each stage of the production"said Carrie.

Dacia City will be powered by an 1.2 liters engine from the Renault Twingo.

Dacia manages to make history in France, where only Honda and Mini customers are more satisfied with the models they purchased. According to a survey realized during the last six months by Auto Plus, 32.000 customers of the brands sold in France  decided that Dacia has third place in the top customer satisfaction after Honda and Mini.

The ranking was determined on the basis of the degree of satisfaction of customer expectations, and other criteria like: manufacturing quality, reliability, problems encountered and the time of immobilization of the car in case of repair. Another important criteria to consider in the French study was that the customer has expressed regret or not that bought the car or if he will buy a new car from the same brand in the future.

In the ranking resulted from the survey leads Honda (92.5% customer satisfaction), followed by Mini (87.5% customer satisfaction) and Dacia (86.1% customer satisfaction). After the Romanian car manufacturer were ranked Audi (85.1% customer satisfaction), Skoda (84.5% customer satisfaction) and BMW (the Bavarian brand fell from second to fifth position from 2009 to 2010). The top 10 brands that have satisfied the French continues with Mazda (81.7% customer satisfaction), Mercedes (74.1% customer satisfaction), Toyota (70.9% customer satisfaction) and Ford (70.3% customer satisfaction).

In the models top customer satisfaction, Sandero has succeeded to be ranked sixth overall, with 87.6% degree of satisfaction of customers. In front of Sandero are: Toyota Prius (1 place, 96.2% customer satisfaction), Honda CRV (second place, 92.7% customer satisfaction), Honda Jazz (third place, 92.3% customer satisfaction), Honda Civic (fourth place, 90.6% customer satisfaction) and BMW 1 Series (88.2% customer satisfaction). The Logan model that helped Dacia to have a real success in France, ranked 18th  (with 82.2% customer satisfaction) in front of other models like Skoda Octavia (ranked 23), BMW X3 (ranked 24) Citroen C5 (26th place), Toyota Avensis (ranked 33), Volkswagen Passat (37th place) and Ford Mondeo (place 42).

The French car manufacturer, Renault, has confirmed that will sell Dacia cars in Ireland, and the first model that will enter the Irish market will be the first Romanian SUV – the Duster, according to the Irish Times.

The Dacia cars produced  in Romania will be sold exclusively through Irish Renault dealers, that will be selected by the French car manufacturer.

The announcement about the launching of Dacia cars in Ireland came just weeks after the Chinese car manufacturer Great Wall has confirmed it will enter the Irish market with their small budget cars.

After it will be launched on the European markets under the Dacia logo, the new Duster will move to the South American markets under the Renault logo. If in the case of Sandero, the small hatchback that was first launched in Brazil and then in Europe, Dacia officials decided to launch Duster in Europe and then in South America.

The Renault version of Duster will be produced at the Envigado factory in Colombia, where Renault invested 20 million euros for training and adaptation of the assembly line of an SUV. On the Colombian factory will be produced 20.000 Duster units which will be sold in Colombia and other countries in the area like Mexico.

At the moment Renault sells in Colombia models like Clio, Megane, Scenic, Grand Scenic, Kangoo and Koleos and Logan, Sandero and Sandero Stepway from Dacia.