2005 Mitsubishi Endeavor Sport Utility Vehicle Reviews & Ratings

Endeavor offers a roomy cabin. Front legroom is good (41.4 inches), comparable to other mid-sized SUVs. The XLS driver's seat with standard adjustable lumbar support is comfortable and well bolstered. The premium fabric is nice, and appears quite durable. Big mirrors offer a good view rearward.

Rear legroom is very good, with 38.5 inches. That's more than you'll find in the middle seat of the Pilot (37.0) or Highlander (36.4). The rear seat is quite comfortable, and has a center armrest with two cupholders.

Getting in and out is easy. Ingress and egress is especially good, with wide door openings. The step-in is low, which is one of the advantages to a car-based unibody frame, as opposed to the truck-based body-on-frame.

The 60/40 rear seats fold totally flat with the touch of a finger. Cargo capacity behind the front seat is 76.4 cubic feet for Endeavor, which is a little less than the Highlander and Pilot. The cargo area has enough length and width to fit a 4x8 sheet of plywood, although it would rest on the small wheel humps. There are no less than 10 hooks on the floor and side panels so things can be secured with bungee cords or nets, and one power outlet. The temporary spare tire is mounted under the cargo floorboard, which is easy to raise; a full-sized spare is optional.

That word "geomechanical" pops up again in Mitsubishi's description of the Endeavor interior design. What they say looks like a cascading waterfall, the vertical center of the instrument panel, we would describe as looking more like the top half of a robot, including a small rectangular LCD screen as eyes and protruding vents as shoulders. The panel background is finished in faux titanium, and the top of the dashboard is a rubbery-feeling matt black plastic.

Functionally it's fine. The big knobs and dials are easy to push and turn. The instrument cluster is a unit of three gauges that are easy to read, lit at night in a moody ice blue. There's a new climate control system efficiently combining heat and air conditioning with one blower. The compass that appears in the LCD window on XLS and Limited models is confusing, though.

The small LCD screen displays a menu of programmable functions, including the timing of interior lights and intermittent wipers.

A big glove box offers storage space along with the cushioned armrest console between the front seats with a removable tray, ideal for cell phones, that increases its capacity. With the tray in place, however, you have to lift two lids to get to the deeper storage area. There are two 12-volt outlets within the console, and another one accessible from the rear seat.

A hard drive of about 30 miles took us down a narrow, bumpy, twisty road to an isolated surfing and windsurfing spot called Jalama Beach on the central California coast. The all-wheel-drive Mitsubishi Endeavor XLS felt steady. We cornered hard and the rack-and-pinion steering was responsive. It turns in nicely for corners. There's some body lean but it's very stable. It's free of the tippy feeling that used to plague SUVs. You have to drive it pretty hard before understeer sets in. Endeavor uses an independent suspension and 17-inch wheels with Bridgestone Terranza 235/65R17 road tires.

We drove the Endeavor over all kinds of surfaces, and it has a nice ride. It's smoother than most truck-based SUVs and comparable to that of some of the car-based SUVs. The only crack in the Endeavor's ride appeared in the sharp ridges, those pitches upward that you feel in the pit of your stomach.

The unibody chassis appears to be very strong. Mitsubishi says virtually every inch of it is either reinforced, corrugated, triangulated or doubled up. The longitudinal rails are octagonally shaped for strength, with no welded beads, and there are five lateral crossmembers.

Put it in Drive and the four-speed automatic transmission does a decent job. It also features a manual Sportronic mode, which allows the driver to change gears; put it in the manual mode and it only shifts when the driver shifts it. We prefer that over the manual modes on many automatics that won't hesitate to override the driver when it doesn't like the driver's decisions. Shifting manually is awkward, however; because of the size of the center armrest console, you have to cock your elbow in the air to grab the lever, which puts an awkward angle on your wrist and hinders manual shifting enough to take the fun out of it.

The engine's drive-by-wire throttle system is very responsive. Mitsubishi says the 0 to 60 mph time for the LS FWD is 9.5 seconds, which is reasonable but sets no records. Our all-wheel-drive XLS was 300 pounds heavier than the front-wheel-drive LS. The 3.8-liter V6 is rated at 225 horsepower and 250 pound-feet of torque, the latter at 3750 rpm. We felt the need for more torque in second gear, where the transmission wouldn't shift down for sharp acceleration. At the other end of the power curve we had the opposite transmission problem: too much shifting down. Peak power comes at 5000 rpm and redline isn't until 6000.

We also got some miles in the front-wheel-drive Endeavor, on steeper and rougher roads that included gravel and loose dirt over asphalt. We were less impressed with its handling; it understeered, torque steered, and was sprung more softly. We would suggest going with the all-wheel drive Endeavor unless you live in some place that's always flat and dry, and you never leave the pavement.

Mitsubishi Endeavor is available either as front-wheel drive (2WD) or all-wheel drive (AWD). Each configuration comes in three trim levels: LS ($25,399), XLS ($28,799), and Limited ($31,699); LS AWD ($27,699), XLS AWD ($30,299), and Limited AWD ($33,199).

All are powered by a 3.8-liter V6 making 225 horsepower. It's mounted transversely (sideways), and mated to a four-speed Sportronic automatic transmission with manual shifting capability.

LS AWD includes a 140-watt sound system with single-disc CD player, five-spoke alloy wheels, intermittent rear window washer, roof rails, steering wheel controls, remote keyless entry, remote tailgate release, and mud-and-snow tires.

XLS adds premium cloth seats, power driver's seat, 315-watt sound system with six-disc CD, a five-inch color LC display with time, temperature, compass and programmable function readings, crossbars for the roof rails, a cargo cover and chrome bumper caps.

Limited adds leather seating surfaces, heated front seats, sunroof, side airbags, rear seat climate controls, an anti-theft system, fog lamps and body-colored bumpers.

Safety features on 2005 models include dual-stage frontal airbags and front seat-mounted side-impact airbags. Curtain airbags are not available. Anti-lock brakes (ABS) with electronic brake-force distribution (EBD) are standard on all but the LS 2WD. AWD models get the active safety benefits of all-wheel drive. Mitsubishi Active Skid and Traction Control, an electronic stability control system, is available for the Limited AWD model. The 2005 Endeavor comes standard with a tire-pressure monitor. New Car Test Drive recommends getting all of the optional safety features, but more important urges you to wear your seat belts as they are your first line of defense in an accident.