The Skoda Yeti was unveiled for the first time in India at the 2010 Auto Expo held in New Delhi. This is Skoda’s first ever SUV that has gone into production. Skoda Auto aims to increase its current portfolio of cars worldwide. The Yeti that will be sold in India will be a 100% CKD and the car will be assembled in the company’s Aurangabad plant. Later on, the company plants to localize some of its parts. The Yeti will be officially launched sometime in the first couple of weeks of November. The bookings of the Yeti had started a few months ago and the company claims it to be difficult to meet all the current orders till this year end.

Skoda named its SUV the Yeti which is basically the Abominable Snowman found in the Himalayas, similar to the Big Foot monster found in North American hills. Will this Big Foot be able to able to set a footprint in the Indian SUV circus? We uncover the mystery in our first drive.

The Skoda Yeti has been designed by Jozef Kaban, the man who was the chief-designer of the Bugatti Veyron and currently the chief of Exterior Design at Skoda Auto. The Yeti is the Abominable Snowman, but its overall design is completely unlike its name. This SUV doesn’t look big neither does show any signs of aggression; it looks more like a life stylish vehicle. Skoda aimed to design a utility vehicle which is capable of doing some serious off-roading and something which will be a good city car as well. So they built a compact SUV which will fulfill both the criteria’s. This is Skoda’s first hand at building a SUV and they have achieved to make what they had perceived.

The Skoda Yeti’s front end gets the new age Skoda front grille and hood, seen on all the new Skodas (the Fabia facelift will follow the similar design lines). Apart from that, there is nothing Skoda like in the design to spot the similarity between the Yeti its other siblings. This markedly sharp radiator grille (Skoda’s tongue) is surrounded by four headlamps to which the designers in Skoda claim to be the synonym for fun.

The side profile of the Yeti is very unique, with blacked out A, C and D pillars while the B-pillar gets the body colour. The shallow green house, the roof rails also add to the uniqueness of the utility vehicle. While the roof rails on the Yeti we drove were all black, the Yeti will receive silver roof rails when it is finally launched. The low front and rear overhang suggest that the Yeti is a capable off-roader, as the chances of the bumpers scraping on uneven surfaces are less. The flat rear-end design of the Yeti suggests practicality.

The Skoda Yeti has great build quality and the results say it all. It scored a maximum of five-star rating in the EuroNCAP crash test. The Yeti scored 92% in occupant protection test; this is basically the test for the protection of the passengers sitting inside the car. For the child occupant protection, the Yeti scored 78% and for the pedestrian safety, it scored 46%.

Step inside the Yeti and you will feel very much at home if you have/had previous owned a Skoda. Most of the interior bits have been picked up from its sibling the Laura. The Yeti will be made available in two trim levels, the base variant is the Ambiente and the one with all the frills is the Elegance. We had the Ambiente and this had leather upholstery and in-dash Swing mp3 player with eight speakers as standard. The Elegance trim gets the touchscreen Bolero audio system, with six-CD changer which plays music through 12-speakers and even wooden finish on the dash. Skoda chose leather upholstery as standard, as leather is easier to clean than fabric, which would absorb a lot of dirt and muck, which is bound to happen if you do take it off-raod to the beach or your farm.

Skoda has maintained the plastic quality and the fit and finish of the Yeti. The overall feel and the build quality of the Yeti may not be superior to its competitors, but is definitely at par with them. The doors shut with a solid thunk and you feel isolated from the outside world, once you get in the car.

The Yeti gets beige and black dual-tone interiors. The beige colour makes the inside looks bigger and airy; however, we wish the Yeti came with black interiors. The Yeti being an off-roader will get dirty more easily when people move in and out of the car on off-road patches. It also gets a twin-dial instrument cluster with chrome surrounds. The digital information system gets squeezed in-between the dials. Our press demonstrator was the Ambiente trim, so we had the Swing in-dash single mp3 player. The Ambiente doesn’t have climatronic control; it rather gets the regular air-conditioning which can be controlled by three-knobs. The Elegance even gets audio controls on the steering wheel, which again goes missing on the Ambiente.

The Skoda Yeti can comfortably seat five passengers. Both the rows have ample of headroom and legroom, where five six-footers can sit without any squeezing. The VarioFlex seating system has increased the practicality of the Yeti. Each of the three rear seats on the Yeti can be folded individually and each one can be removed as well. These seats can be removed by detaching the seat from the frame by moving a couple of levers. This flat bed has a whooping volume of 1760 litres which is massive indeed. Even the regular boot has 415 litres of space, which is the best-in class. Apart from this, the Yeti gets under-seat storage space under the co-driver's seat and enough storage in the doorpads.

Get into the driver’s seat and you can easily get comfortable with the mechanical seat adjustment and the telescopic steering wheel, which can be adjusted for the rake and reach. These leather seats are well bolstered and both front seats adjust for height. To our dismay though, even the Elegance variant doesn’t electrical seat adjustment. One worry that people generally have with a SUV is parking in tight spots. With the Yeti being compact in size, things are far easier. To make things even simpler Skoda has given reverse parking sensors as standard in both the trim levels and the top-of-the line gets parking sensors at the front as well. The Yeti gets side view mirrors that have to be folded by hand rather than the electrically retractable ones since they feel it's better in off-road situations where the mirrors could get damaged by being pushed the wrong way.

Talking about safety, the Ambiente variant gets two airbags and the Elegance gets six-airbags. All the three rear seats get three-point seatbelts, with the centre seat getting its seatbelt from the roof, rather than a regular two-point lap-belt.

Different Types of rear seat positioning in a Skoda Yeti (VARIOFLEX):

All Seats Down

All seats removed

Centre seat folded

The two side seats can be brought closer by removing the centre seat, making it more comfortable for four.

Engine:

The Skoda Yeti gets a 2.0-litre common rail diesel engine from the Volkswagen family which is currently being used on the Skoda Laura automatic and Skoda’s flagship model the Superb. This engine develops 140bhp of power and 320Nm of torque. We loved this engine, when we drove the Skoda Laura L&K last year which then had Pumpe Duse. Later on, we adored the same engine with the new common rail injection which was upgraded on the Skoda Laura to meet the Bharat Stage-IV norms.

This oilburner has a bit of clatter on start, a typical Volkswagen diesel engine characteristic. Later however it becomes quiet when the engine warms up. The engine’s response is very linear and there is enough power offered by the engine even before the turbo kicks in. Once the turbo kicks in, all the 320Nm of torque pull more strongly. As this was a first drive, we couldn’t do a performance run on the Yeti. In our performance run, the Yeti sprinted to the 100kph mark in 11.6seconds.

Transmission:

The Yeti gets a very slick shifting six-speed manual transmission to transfer power to all the four wheels through a fourth-generation Haldex Traction multi-plate clutch. This is the same system which is used on the Skoda Superb V6 to transfer power to the rear wheels, whenever the front tyres run out of traction. In this system, 95 percent of the power is sent to the front tyres. On detection of slip, about 90 percent of power can be sent to the rear wheels, depending on the conditions.

The six-speed manual gearbox on the Yeti is slick and the shifts are positive. One can do lighting quick shifts thanks to the design of the gearbox and the size of the gearknob which just seems to be perfect. The gearing is good enough for city and highway driving. As we had mentioned earlier, the engine has enough grunt to pull even before the turbo starts spooling. This makes gear shifting easier, as you might not need to downshift to overtake in most of the cases.

Fuel Efficiency:

ARAI claims the fuel efficiency of the Skoda Yeti to be about 17kpl, which is closer to the figure it has suggested for the Chevrolet Cruze. With a mix of city and highway driving, we got a mileage of 12.96kpl, with a best figure of 18.24kpl which was only highway driving and a worst figure of 9.5kpl during our performance run, which was all pedal-to-metal driving.

The Skoda Yeti has been designed on Volkswagen’s A5 platform which is the VW first design with for A-platform cars with all independent suspension systems for the front and the rear. This A5’s PQ35 design is shared by Volkswagen Jetta and the Skoda Laura as well. The Yeti sports the McPherson at its front and multi-element axle at the rear which are tweaked for decent ride and great handling. The ride on the Yeti can get a bit harsh on bumpy stone roads, as it has stiff suspension for better off-roading and even for better handling.

Even after being a SUV, the Yeti handles like any other Skoda car. It is definitely one of the best handling utility vehicles in its price range. Dive into tight corners and the Yeti takes up almost anything thrown at it, if you fail to control, the ESP will take charge and get things under control. Yes, the Yeti gets an ESP which is a great aid for the driver, which is reassuring if he/she misjudges a corner - more so in bad weather conditions. The steering wheel of the Yeti is like any other Skoda, light at low speeds and weighs up well as the speed increases. We have always loved the way the feedback we get from a Skoda steering system inspiring confidence to a higher level every single time we drive a Skoda.

The Skoda Yeti gets disc brakes even at the rear and these brakes bite progressively. The Skoda Yeti Ambiente gets 215/60R16 tyres, with our press demonstrator running on Continental ContiSportContact 2. These run with five-spoke alloy wheels. Another feature that we love on the Yeti is its turning radius which is a merge 5 metres. This is definitely one of the best in its class and makes parking in tight spots very convenient.

Even though the Yeti has a ground clearance similar to that of a Laura, its underbelly doesn’t scrape as it has a long suspension travel, which increases wheel articulation making it a capable off-roader. The underbody gets lots of composite-plastic protection to prevent the mechanicals from getting damaged.

Skoda is yet to make an official price announcement of the Yeti, but we predict it to cost somewhere between Rs 17-18lakhs. Considering this pricing, the Yeti with all the bells and whistles, Skoda’s build quality, styling and practicality and off-roading capability is a great deal for every buck. The Skoda badge is considered to be a prestigious one in the Indian car market and there's no doubt that the Yeti will only add to Skoda's brand image in India. Being a compact SUV, the Yeti is easy to drive in city and more importantly to park as well. Skoda India seems all set to dig in its foot deeper and increase their presence in the car market with Yeti’s launch. We think the Yeti will be money well spent and makes an excellent case for itself, not just as the capable lifestyle SUV that it is, but as an everyday car that does it all!