SHAH ALAM, May 24 — In the midst of the ground-breaking news of Geely buying a 49.9 per cent share in Proton and buying up all of Proton’s 51 per cent share in Lotus, the company people are still working hard at making Proton cars better – today we were at Proton’s factory in Shah Alam to check out the ‘Iriz Refinement’ project – principally a product rationalization exercise to incorporate into the Iriz the good features that are in the recently launched Persona.
According to a presentation by Proton’s technical team, the Iriz refinement is a necessary part of the product cycle enhancement and they seek to create market excitement through product improvements such as improving Noise, Vibration and Harshness (NVH), and address feedback on customer concerns learned through customer feedback sessions.
The Iriz refinement exercise is two-pronged – the first being external and internal features that customers can see and touch, the other being items that are not visible, such as ride and handling, NVH, drivability improvements, noise insulation and overall comfort.
Externally, the Iriz gets a black roof, two-tone colour skirting, a black grille and the new Proton logo. On the inside, the Iriz gets new fabrics for the seat materials, Keyless entry (for the premium models only), a new interior finishing colour, and an ‘eco indicator’ that tells you how you are doing in terms of economical driving.
The unseen bits are improvements to NVH through the adoption of 3-point mountings, additional noise insulation for cabin comfort, and re-tuning of the ECU (Engine Control Unit) and TCU (Transmission Control Unit).
We had a go at the refined Iriz at Proton’s test track within the plant in Shah Alam, and generally the media felt that there was an improvement, especially in the drivability and NVH levels.
No prices are announced as yet, but we expect that it will not be too much, considering how ‘soft’ the market is today. However, the silver lining may be that the Iriz would be in a better position to make an impact in China, considering that it was a pretty good car to start with, and Geely’s network in China could mean great synergy for not only the Iriz, but for the whole range of the recently launched Proton models.
