Last day with the QX70 and I think it’s going to be a split decision. On the one hand, the bold looks and sumptuous interior make it feel every inch as good as the Range Rover Sport cabin.

On the other, the Infiniti has twitchy handling on all but the smoothest of road surfaces, the diesel engine lacks punch and the rest of the petrol range is incredibly expensive to run.

The steering is sharp and responsive but I think the majority of people will find the firm ride not to their liking. You have the option of ‘sport’ or ‘normal’ suspension settings but the adjustment feels minimal.

So, if you like the fearsome looks and exclusivity of the QX70, I think it would be easy to overlook the other issues. However, I imagine many people will compare it with a BMW X5 and realise the German car is a cut above in every respect…

My neighbour, the Land Rover specialist, has just put a new exhaust on my ancient Series III. A die-hard Range Rover fan through and through, even he was impressed with the sinister face of the QX70.

He’s right – the SUV looks like the Devil’s own chariot when it appears in your rear view mirror. That huge front grille and squat stance are a monster presence.

A cross between a Porsche Cayenne and the old Hyundai Santa Fe, the curvy, bulbous shape is easy on the eye, if slightly dated by modern standards.

The styling of the Infiniti has grown on me. It certainly turns heads – just what you’d expect for a car costing almost £50k…

The days of washing you car on the driveway every Sunday have (fortunately!) long gone. A friend of mine recently told me she had no idea that you were supposed to wash and polish cars on a regular basis to protect the paintwork – her BMW hadn’t seen soap for nine months!

Perhaps Infiniti’s self-repairing paint was designed especially for people like her. It was developed by scientists at parent company Nissan about eight years ago.

A special top layer of highly elastic resin is applied to the bodywork that gives the paintwork flexibility – allegedly ‘healing’ 80 per cent of surface marks.

Now this doesn’t mean that if your Infiniti is keyed by an oik during the night that it will miraculously look perfect again in the morning. However, it does should like the Scratch Shield technology could be another nail in the coffin of car car products – and Sunday mornings polishing on the driveway…

Every car – and I mean every car – has an Achilles’ Heel. It’s the annoying lack of high grade fuel pumps if you own a Ferrari, the tyre noise on a Porsche 911, or the poor side support in the seats of the Mercedes SLK.

The Infiniti has one very painful feature and UK buyers will cringe every time they use it. The tailgate beeps like a reversing lorry when you press the remote opening button!

Yep, it’s a nanny state and the QX – targeted at accident prone/I’ll sue you in the morning Americans – suffers more than most. I can’t seem to override the auto opening feature either and it’s driving me mad.

WHY do I need to be told my boot is opening when I have pressed the button? It opens at about 1mph and is hardly going to give you a serious head injury? Can somebody please tell me the bloody point?

Whether the QX70 receives a good review or not seems to depend on which side of the Atlantic it was written. American motoring journalists are much more positive – UK hacks give the SUV an ‘average’ rating at best.

The reason for this great divide appears to revolve around fuel economy. With cheaper fuel in the US, it’s less of an issue but here, well, that different! Even the normally sober What Car magazine claim ‘the huge costs involved make the QX70 prohibitively expensive to run’.

While even the diesel we’re testing today incurs the maximum rate of company car tax (225 g/km), I’m still achieving more mpg than last week’s hybrid Lexus 450h. 30mpg seems OK to me and the Infiniti is good fun to drive too.

The seats are low, which adds to the sporty feel, the standard, seven-speed auto gearbox shifts smoothly and that V6 diesel sounds quite fruity under the bonnet.

After reading a raft of negative reviews, I’m pleasantly surprised by the Infiniti. It may be a poor man’s Porsche Cayenne but it’s all the better for it…