By Rick Popely
Cars.com National January 7, 2000Vehicle Overview
Infiniti celebrates its 10th year in business with an anniversary edition of its flagship Q45 sedan. The anniversary package includes wood interior trim, a leather and wood steering wheel and body-color door handles.
Infiniti is the luxury division of Nissan, and the rear-drive Q45 is its most expensive model. Main rivals include the Lexus LS400, Mercedes-Benz E-Class and S-Class and BMW 5 Series and 7 Series.
A redesigned Q45 with more dramatic styling is due to debut early in calendar 2001 as a 2002 model.
Exterior
The Q45's last redesign was for 1997, when it lost a couple of inches here and there and a couple of hundred pounds. At 200 inches bumper to bumper, it is a few inches longer than the Lexus LS400. A prominent chrome grille is flanked by twin round headlamps enclosed in a rectangular frame.
Interior
Seats for five are standard in the leather-clad interior, but the center rear passenger seat straddles the driveshaft, making it impractical for the long haul. Trunk space is a modest 12.6 cubic feet.
Standard amenities include eight-way power front seats, automatic temperature control, a power-operated rear sunshade and an eight-speaker, 200-watt Bose audio system with an in-dash CD player.
Under the Hood
This sedan comes two ways, as the standard Q45 and the Touring model (Q45t), and both have a 266-horsepower 4.1-liter V-8 engine (now with 100,000-mile spark plugs).
The Q45t comes with 17-inch wheels and tires (the base model has 16-inchers) and an electronically adjustable suspension with Sport and Auto settings.
Safety
Active head restraints for the front seats are newly standard. The head restraints move upward and forward in rear-end collisions to reduce the chances of whiplash injuries. Side-impact airbags that protect the heads and chests of front-seat occupants, anti-lock brakes and traction control are standard.
cars.com From the cars.com 2000 Buying Guide |
Additional Reviews
Cars.com Expert Reviews
| Rick Popely | Cars.com National | January 7, 2000 |
Affiliate Reviews
| Warren Brown | washingtonpost.com | May 14, 2000 |
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