The Evo was originally intended only for Japanese markets but demand on the ’grey import’ market led the Evolution series to be offered through limited type-approval in the United Kingdom and in various European markets from around 1998.
The Evolution I was introduced in 1992 to compete in the World Rally Championship. It used the 2.0 L turbocharged engine with a 4WD drive train from the original Mitsubishi Galant.
The Lancer Evolution X features a newly designed 2.0 L turbocharged, all-aluminum inline-4 engine.
The car has also a new full-time four-wheel drive system named S-AWC (Super All Wheel Control), an advanced version of Mitsubishi's AWC system used in previous generations. The S-AWC uses torque-vectoring technology to send different amount of torque to any wheel at any given time.
When John took me out in the car I had done my research and thought why. Why does Mitsubishi always go into every little detail of engineering vastness when they build an Evo road car, is it really necessary.
Its one thing reading about all this SAWC and full time 4x4 stuff and going, “ohh, cool” but experiencing it is something else. When we were out in the car John demonstrated the SAWC by hoaring it round a mini roundabout, (Not like an idiot, but this is the proper way to demonstrate the system) He put his foot down in second and when the car started to under steer it sorted itself out, I thought John was breaking but this wasn’t the case. He then turned off the SAWC and did the exact same test. The car started to under steer a lot sooner and eventually John had to give up and stop. We did 40 mph (and I’m not joking) going round a mini roundabout which a jeep would struggle to get round without carrying out a 40 point turn, and with the SAWC off we struggled to do 20mph.
Its all fine and well saying I can go round roundabouts and 5 million mph but when it really matters, it works !!!!!
When demonstrating the car John took me down the clydeside, and as we came over the crest of a hill an absolute tool had stopped for no reason in the stupidest place in the world. John slammed on the brakes and the car started to veer across the road into the path of an oncoming lorry, then I felt the car working, it balanced itself out and in an instant we were back under control. In this 3-second event I now know why Mitsubishi go into such detail. I swear, if we were in any car someone would have been writing my obituary on this keyboard and not this review, trust me, it really is necessary.
That’s something I love about the new Evo, the car is associated with speed and control, it is sometimes frowned upon by the public as a boy racers dream car. This may be the case but something that is monumentally overlooked is how safe this car is. Its not all about the speed for Mitsubishi, this car has to be safe. It is insanely fast but it is without question one of the safest cars on the road.
The Evo x is amazing and the styling is also fantastic. Some say that it has lost its personality, it isn’t totally discreet but it has moved on, the first person I saw driving it was a old middle aged businessman heading into the Hilton for I imagine some sort of boring marketing conference. The next one I saw was a doctor’s, doctors!! You could never imagine this with the evo 9. But this hasn’t killed the appeal, 3 days later I seen a friend of mine with his, he traded in his Evo 8 for the ten, this is the third lancer he has had from new, he is without doubt a member of the Evo faithful, and on that basis I feel that the Evo X hasn’t lost their main customer, I think they have made the car appeal to a whole new breed.
