Impression of Petrol Ghibli

[keith]

My car is in at HR Owen for a few days for a warranty issue, and I've been loaned a petrol model. This is the first opportunity I have had to try a petrol Maserati, with the much praised Ferrari sourced engine.
Also as a new car it has the updated MTC+ and revised control s for climate control etc.
In this respect the infotainment system is broadly similar but with a bigger screen and more functionality, including an increase in voice commands, and the ability to show full music library information wirelessly from your phone. The updated HVAC panel is easier to use but perhaps not as stylish in appearance than the first gen hidden till switched on set up. The same I would say for the switches and panel around the gear selector.
Turning to the main difference, the engine, and in my use today - local driving and a bit of motorway, the alarming fuel economy, or lack thereof. In thirty or so miles the car is averaging 16 mpg!! My diesel Ghibli would have shown easily mid to upper twenties mpg. That said the performance of the petrol engine is clearly way ahead of my car by a similar margin.
The final and for me the most interesting point was the famed Ferrari sourced exhaust sound, and regrettably I remain a little disappointed. In my car if I want a bit more excitement I can push the Sport button, and get an albeit fake and electronically produced V8 style rumble, but when in normal or ICE mode, when warmed up, everything is very quiet, particularly on the motorway. In the case of this standard petrol engine Ghbili, motorway cruising is accompanied by a continual background drone sound from the exhaust.
I know for many on here, the Ferrari heritage and aural accompaniment that this brings is part of owning the car, but maybe coming from the likes of Jaguar's (six over twenty years), interspersed with dare I say, a hybrid Lexus GS, has turned me into the proverbial 'old man'!
To sum up, the petrol engine car has great performance, but I am happy I saved the five grand and got the 'heresy diesel'. Still has reasonable performance, but a lot cheaper, and more suited to what is after all a mid sized executive car, to take on the likes of the 5 Series and E Class.
Whilst I am not looking to change, I await with interest to see the new plug in hybrid Ghbili, with the in-house sourced engine due later this year.

 

[Oneball]

Isn’t it the Chrysler/Alfa V6 in the petrol Ghibli 3?

I really like my V6 diesel Merc it just does everything effortlessly.

I’m with you on the quietness thing. The variable exhaust on my old Alpina went a few years ago, took me a while to work out what it was but what was going through my head was that it was really annoyingly noisy.

 

[outrun]

My petrol Ghibli did upper 20s mpg in mixed driving. And the sound was unleashed by an X-pipe which deletes the centre mufflers. Great noise considering it's not a v8, especially on cold start up. And no speaker trickery required.

I liked the diesel too, just preferred the petrol. I just don't do the mileage to justify the compromise for a few mpgs. The 2nd hand values seem to be showing this too with petrol around 4k or so more than the equivalent oil burner. Perhaps also because there are 2 diesels to each petrol and some of those diesels are low spec, ex-lease car which drag down the rest.