ArcaMax

Even though Nissan has done an admirable job in terms of rendering the bigger (longer, more wheelbase, etc.) 2015 Sentra lighter at the curb than the smaller, previous-generation Sentra, it still weighs a pretty startling (for a compact) 2,822 lbs. And that's before the driver gets in.

One 190 pound driver (me) and the car is already over 3,000 lbs. Put two 190 pound passengers in there and the Sentra's curb weight will be in the neighborhood of 3,200 pounds. This is not far from the curb weight of my vintage '70s muscle car - which compensates for its curb weight with a huge (7.4 liter) V8 under the hood. That's literally five times the engine, by the way.

It's asking a lot of a 1.8 liter, 130 hp engine to get 3,000-plus pounds moving - particularly when you want to move quickly.

Easing around, flat roads, stop-and-go, the Sentra keeps pace as well as other cars in this class. But there is very little in reserve and this becomes painfully clear when you mash the accelerator in the hopes of acceleration. Very little is forthcoming. You can literally hold it to the floor for 30 seconds straight and not quite broach the highest legally allowable highway speeds in the U.S.

The sense of powerlessness is magnified by the CVT, which spins the poor little 1.8 to its 6,000 RPM redline and holds it there as long as you hold the pedal to the metal.

It's internal combustion Gitmo, a four-stroke waterboarding.

The Sentra's CVT does have a Sport (as well as an Eco) setting - but I'd rather have a clutch and the ability to launch a little quicker and cull the drivetrain racket once rolling - even if it cost me three or four MPGs. I hugely recommend going with the six-speed manual transmission for this reason. I understand why Nissan is hard-selling the CVT. But it wouldn't be necessary if the Sentra didn't weigh so much. A 2,500 lb. Sentra could probably hit 42 MPG without the CVT. Then it would be fuel-efficient - and still fun. This one's not.

The new Sentra is an appliance, a Transportation Unit - like the Corolla. That's apparently the target competition now - not sporty newcomers like the Mazda3 - which appear to be taking over the slot the Sentra used to occupy. And from a business point-of-view, that probably makes sense - because Transportation Units are the volume sellers. It's where the money is.

AT THE CURB

The Sentra edges ever-closer to being a mid-sized car - especially as regards backseat legroom.

Nissan probably decided to build a bigger Sentra for two important reasons. First, to pitch the Sentra as a plausible family car and - second - to put more distance between it and its value-priced sibling, the Versa.

Note that the previous-generation Sentra's interior specifications were virtually the same as the Versa's and in one area at least - backseat legroom - the Versa actually had more room than the Sentra. Buyers were probably more willing to overlook the previous Sentra's slightly cramped interior when the Sentra had more engine and more personality. But now that the Sentra has the same downsized 1.8 liter engine as the Versa? Doesn't offer better performance than the Versa? Time to upsize!

Thus, the new car is about two and a half inches longer than the old model and rides on a longer 106.3 inch wheelbase vs. 105.7 inches previously. This makes it look more substantial - and allows for a substantially roomier backseat area: three inches more legroom than before (37.4 inches ) as well as a mid-sized car's trunk: 15.1 cubic feet vs. 13.1 cubic previously. Also bigger are the front doors.

Actually, they're huge relative to the rest of the car - and relative to other cars. I got out my tape measure - 44 inches from edge to edge. For a "compact" car, that's a big door. Some perspective: I happened to have a Buick Verano sedan the same week I had the Sentra. The Verano - Buick's entry-luxury sedan - is a bigger car than Sentra - 183.9 inches end to end vs. 182.1 inches for the Nissan. But the Buick's front doors were three full inches shorter than the Sentra's.

Of course, a big door can be used to create the illusion of space. One that's sometimes dispelled when you actually sit inside the car. That's not the case here, though. The new Sentra's got slightly more front seat legroom than the bigger-on-the-outside Buick (42.5 inches vs. 42 inches) and more backseat legroom than its big (and mid-sized) brother, the Altima (36.1 inches). But what's really important is that the '15 Sentra's got three inches more backseat legroom than the old Sentra (34.5 inches).

The rest of the Sentra's interior has also been updated.

The old car's high-mounted shifter console is gone. In its place, a conventional center console and floor-mounted shifter - available with wood trim covers rather than carbon fiber or brushed metal. Also gone are the previous Sentra's optional accessory gauges - which had been mounted, 370Z-like, on top of the dash and canted toward the driver.

On the other hand, the LCD screen for the GPS is bigger now. An amusing touch is the new car's 160 MPH speedometer - vs. 140 MPH in the old model. The old car would get into the 100s without too much trouble. The new one is pretty much done by 90.

THE REST

It's pretty obvious the trend toward smaller, less powerful - and more economical - engines is upon us. Nissan's just bowing to the inevitable - and trying to make the best of it.

Still, an optional engine would definitely help the Sentra's image. Maybe even a diesel (or hybrid) option. The Civic and Cruze offer one - or both (you can also get a natural gas-powered version of the Civic).

Also, three years is a long time these days. Newer models like the Mazda3 and even the new Corolla make the Sentra seem older than it is, just by dint of the picked-up pace of changes in the industry, generally - but especially when it comes to electronic gadgets. When the current Sentra was being designed back around 2011, it was designed with what was then the "latest" stuff in mind. But today you can get stuff that wasn't even on the horizon back in '11 - and which other (newer) cars now offer. In-car WiFi, for instance. Automated parallel parking. Google Earth view GPS mapping. And how about the '16 Cruze's eight-speed transmission?

THE BOTTOM LINE

In most respects, the current Sentra is an objectively better car than the model it replaces. But it's also blander and much less of a counterpoint to the Corolla than it is an attempt to be a Corolla. And Toyota still does that better.

The new crop of crossovers, meanwhile, offer the allure of much greater practicality and close-enough fuel-efficiency to be an existential threat to sedans like the Sentra - and the Corolla.

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www.ericpetersautos.com or EPeters952@aol.com for comments.