Fire up the.... Suzuki Swift Sport (again)

THE Suzuki Swift Sport isn't perfect and it's a car of few superlatives, but it is brilliant.

That’s exactly the verdict I reached two years ago when I last drove the Japanese firm’s addictively entertaining junior hot hatch, and just about the only thing I could find to mark it down on was that it lost a little of the Mk1 version’s edge by becoming a little better in just about every other area. It was – and still is – a superb little streetfighter of a car which punches well above its weight.

Why then, the need to test it again?

Put simply, Suzuki has opened doors to anyone previously put off by the sprightliest of the Swifts. In true pocket rocket tradition, the Swift Sport has until very recently only been available as a three-door hatchback, a configuration which benefits its aggressive stance and suits the model’s youthful target market perfectly, but it means plenty of keener drivers with families to look after have had to look elsewhere. That’s why it’s great to see Suzuki finally offering the Sport with the full five-strong compliment of doors, as you can get throughout the rest of the Swift range.

Happily, the £500 translation from three-door to five-door hasn’t affected the aesthetics – true, a five-door is never going to look as single-mindedly sporty, but you still get the deep double grille at the front, a cheeky spoiler, a twin helping of exhausts at the back, and some added practicality in the middle.

Anyone looking for a polished all-round supermini isn’t going to find the Swift perfect –with the best will in the world, it’s starting to show its age – but keen drivers will forgive it because of the consistently smile-inducing way it craves corners and the revvy demeanour of its 1.6 litre, 136bhp engine.

There’s a wonderfully old-school charm to its handling and the whole car begs you to take it by the scruff of its neck and make the most of its petite dimensions. It is, to all extents and purposes, a sort of Greatest Hits compilation of all the best characteristics of the classic hot hatches of the 1980s, and all the more loveable for it.

It’s just that, with a £14,499 price tag, five doors and a very 2014 helping of safety clobber, it’s vaguely sensible too.

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Fire up the... Dacia Sandero 1.2 Access

THE Nokia 3310 is one of the world’s best selling mobile phones.

There was a time when everybody seemed to have one, and in a way I miss its simple, unpretentious charms. Why spend a fortune on a slick, 4G-guided piece of smartphone technology which can shoot movie footage and let you play Angry Birds simultaneously which you need to charge up every few hours? What was wrong with a cheap, no-frills phone which does nothing other than call your mum and text your mates, but lasted four days on a single charge and was practically indestructible? 

The same argument goes for cars too – there are far too many motors these days with radar-guided cruise control and iPod connectivity, but not nearly enough which offer the four-wheels-and-a-roof simplicity plenty of today’s recession ravaged drivers are looking for.

Which is where Dacia’s £5,995 entry-level Sandero – drumroll please, Britain’s cheapest new car – steps in.

For your fiver short of six grand it’ll have to be the base Access version, which manages to contradict Henry Ford by coming in any colour you like as long as it’s white, with some black bumpers and 15-inch steel wheels to let passers by know you’ve opted for this Nokia 3310 of cars.

Not surprisingly, it’s deliberately deprived of many of the luxuries you’d expect from a new hatchback in 2014, with the windows firmly of the wind-up variety and the cheap, plastic dashboard lacking the plethora of buttons you’d get in most other supermini offerings. However, you really can’t deny that in terms of offering a brand new and reasonably well built family car for as little as possible it hits a bullseye; the days of Britain’s cheapest new car being badly thrown together Eastern Bloc obscurities are long gone. 

The  Sandero masters offering four seats, four doors a roof and reliability but little else besides. The 75bhp 1.2 litre petrol engine, for instance, isn’t especially refined and feels gutless compared to other offerings of its size. There is an innate ability hidden within the Renault-engineered hatchback’s handling, but the harshness of the noise and vibrations mean it’s not something you’d particularly enjoy using on a longer journey.

More worryingly, I’m not even convinced that it particularly excels at being value for money. Throw in even basic equipment you’d get as standard elsewhere and the price quickly stacks up – for the sake of an extended warranty, a spare wheel and a CD player the Sandero I tested became a £6,245 car – and heavy depreciation means most of the money you save initially is unlikely to be recouped when you sell up. That’s before you get to the intelligent question of warranty, because while Kia’s entry-level Picanto might cost two grand more than the Sandero, you get a far more modern design with a seven year warranty as standard.

The prospect of having a brand new car on your drive for less than six grand might sound pretty tempting, but I’m struggling to make the sums add up.

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Nissan spices up the Micra with new limited edition

NISSAN is now offering the Micra with a choice of two-tone paintjobs in order to give the supermini a more youthful vibe.

The limited edition Micra, imaginatively called the Micra Limited Edition, costs £12,300 and is available with three different colour combinations – white and red, blue and white, and red and black.

Based on the existing Acenta trim level, which comes mid-way through the Micra in terms of gadgets and equipment, the Limited Edition follows a number of its supermini rivals in offering contrasting roof and mirror colours, notably the MINI One, Vauxhall Adam and Citroen DS3.

The new model, which comes with 15-inch alloy wheels, air-conditioning, cruise control, and a roof spoiler among other niceties, is available to order now.  

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Vauxhall launches the smartphone-on-wheels

A LIMITED edition hatchback billed as ‘a smartphone on wheels’ is Vauxhall’s latest offering for fashion-conscious motorists.

Just 250 of the new versions of the ADAM supermini, called the ADAM Black and the ADAM White in honour of their distinctive paintjobs, are being created, and are designed to be fully compatible with the latest versions of the iPhone to help make it easier for buyers to use them on the move.

The new model, which is powered by a 1.4 litre petrol engine good for 87bhp, is available now and costs £14,995.

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VW's electronic nannying makes me want to rage against the machine

IT’S a debate that 21st century philosophers ought to be debating. Is it right to reprimanded by your car?

I was thinking this last weekend, when – having successfully navigated 65 miles across two different counties – the electronic brain of the Volkswagen Polo I’d borrowed decided to give me some help with parking. Help, incidentally, that I hadn’t asked it for.

“LOOK!” the digital readout on the dashboard screamed. “SAFE TO MOVE?”

The Polo might have gained a bit of girth over its 40 year career, admittedly, but it’s still what I’d call a small car. Even Maureen from Driving School could master it. Yet the Polo’s electronic brain, in its better wisdom, decided it needed to remind me anyway that I need to look before I back into a parking space.

It gets worse. Germany’s supermini of choice also decided that the last thing I needed while backing up a small hatchback was music distracting me from the job in hand, so it automatically turned the radio down and steadfastly refused to let me turn back up again.

Katy Perry’s roar, it insisted, would be a distant hum for the duration of the parking. Drivers with tasks as dangerous as a bay park deserve not the dulcet tones of Russell Brand’s ex-wife!

I got out of the Polo a bit peeved, wondering whether I’d somehow annoyed it earlier on with a fluffed gearchange or a cheeky overtake, and it’d decided I was an idiot and therefore needed all the help I could get. Despite it being a sturdily-built, family-friendly package that’s blessed with tidy handling and restrained good looks, my overall verdict on the Polo is that it’s never good for a car to be patronising.

True, drivers too stupid to put on their seatbelts deserve the book – and some safety beeps bonging out of the dashboard – thrown at them, and even I’ll grudgingly admit the high pitched whine almost every modern motor makes when you forget to turn the lights off has saved me the occasional flat battery. When I’m driving, however, I’m the boss and I’ll reverse however I choose to. If I prang an L-reg Fiesta in the process – and, in five years of driving, I’ve never yet come close – then that’s my lookout.

I suspect that, hundreds of miles away, in a bunker in deepest Wolfsburg, some VW engineers decided to instil the Polo with its annoying Nanny State tendencies in a bid to avoid Polo owners going to Claims Direct in about ten years’ time because they’ve reversed into pedestrians. Maybe it’ll become compulsory in the distant future, and for someone who takes pride in how they drive, that worries me.

Given the choice between cars which constantly tell you what to do, and Katy Perry, I know which I’d pick.

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You don't have to be a woman to appreciate the Ford Fiesta

FORD’S Fiesta is one of my motoring favourites – and, judging by the stash of awards it’s been showered with, quite a lot of you like it too.

So you might have missed that the clever EcoBoost version has just been crowned Women’s World Car of the Year. I still can’t quite get my head around - and I know I’m probably going to get a few sexism bells ringing straight away – the idea of a motoring award judged entirely by women. Surely, what makes it excellent engenders it to either gender?

In the same way that a MOWO Awards would provoke no end of controversy in the music world, a Men’s Car of the Year would get every member of the Germaine Greer fan club on the organisers’ case, asking how they could dare to disregard the needs of 50% of the world’s population. But as far as I can tell, WWCOTY is pointless because the ladies like the Fiesta for exactly the same reasons as everybody else does.

The women on the panel are all experienced motoring hacks and raved about the Fiesta because it crams fun, feistiness, eco-consciousness, safety and – dare I say it – sex appeal into a small, value-for-money package – pretty much exactly the same reasons I love the current Fiesta. In fact, with the possible exception of Peugeot’s 208 I reckon it’s still the best supermini, five long years after it was launched.

Women’s World Car of the Year though, I reckon, reinforces by its very existence the urban myth that women don’t know as much about cars as men do – something which is, of course, complete cobblers. There are plenty of women who I’ll happily ask for an opinion on for a matter of motoring, particularly because there’s quite a few of them who actually know aspects of the subject better than I do!

 If it were a case that all motoring awards panels were stuffy, gentlemen’s club affairs which hadn’t moved out of the 1950s and genuinely thought women’s opinions weren’t worth considering, than I’d understand. But I grew up in a post-Thatcher era of Girl Power where Vicki Butler-Henderson’s views on cars meant as much as Jeremy Clarkson’s did. Female opinions on motoring matter too much for them to be sidelined into their own gender-specific awards.

Ford’s Fiesta is just a brilliant little car, full stop. You don’t have to be a woman to know that…

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Fire up the... Vauxhall Corsa 1.4 SRI

LIKE garnishing an omelette with a helping of jalapeños, Vauxhall’s hoping that treating its supermini to the sporty SRI treatment will give the Corsa some added spice.

While it’s not the hottest Corsa on offer – that honour going to the track day fan’s favourite, the VXR Nürburgring – this SRI screams potential, thanks to the 17-inch alloy wheels and the bodykit inspired by its leerier big brother. But before I can find out whether it’s as enticing to drive as it to behold, it’s time to get a confession out of the way. Over the past few years I’ve driven a couple of Corsas – primarily the 1.0 litre Ecoflex and the 1.2 petrol versions – and haven’t exactly heaped praise on them.

Happily, things get off to a good start with the SRI once you hop inside – the red stitching on the steering wheel and the scarlet seat surrounds immediately give you the air of being inside something a bit special without straying into boy racer territory, and it’s more than comfortable and amply equipped for its £15,600 price tag. It suffers from the same enormous blind spots as its Corsa siblings, but that aside it’s somewhere you’ll enjoy being on even the longest of trips.

Thanks to its clever variable valve timing system the 1.4 petrol engine offers up plenty of punch without resorting to turbocharging, but because the real oomph’s only to be discovered above 3,000rpm it’s a car that encourages you to drive it by the scruff of its neck – probably the reason why I only managed, despite my best efforts, to get a shade over forty to the gallon in it. It’s great for rev-happy blasts along country lanes, but effortless motorway overtaking really isn’t the SRI’s strong suit.

It’s a similarly mixed bag when you get to the corners too, because while it handles with plenty of aplomb the steering is nowhere near sharp enough to encourage a keen driver to start enjoying it. The SRI is keenly priced, handles well and is still one of the best looking superminis on the market – particularly after Ford’s not entirely successful facelift of the Fiesta – but in every other respect it’s comprehensively outclassed not just by the Fiesta, but by Peugeot’s 208 as well.

 It’s got plenty to offer, but until Vauxhall’s new Corsa comes on stream next year I couldn’t really recommend it.

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So you want a secondhand supermini...

AN OBSERVATION about first cars. All the sensible people I know, having chucked away their L-plates, go for something sensible that’ll start up first thing on a frosty morning. The petrolheads don’t. 

There’s a lot to be said for making for your first car an automotive adventure in itself, which is why my first car was a 1983 Mini. Despite being held together largely with gaffer tape and string I loved driving it but even I’ll concede it wasn’t exactly an everyday car, because every day was a new and exciting way for it to entertain you with a breakdown. Whisper it softly, but during my first stint as a reporter in North Wales my “everyday car” was a borrowed Vauxhall Corsa! 

So I understood completely when a friend asked for a few car buying suggestions, not on some crusty old Sixties sports car, but a sensible, cheap secondhand supermini that’d actually be capable of getting her and her clobber up to a new job in Northumberland. She also bought a Mini as her first car, and while she’d rather sell her right arm than her pride ‘n’ joy I can understand why she’d want a more sensible automotive sidekick for the long trips to the North East. 

There’s plenty on offer - even in these days of spiralling insurance, it’s still possible to buy, insure and tax a decent set of wheels for less than a grand – but if it were my money I’d be looking at Peugeot’s 306, VW’s Lupo, Skoda’s Fabia and the earlier, funkier versions of Toyota’s Yaris. They’re all usefully younger than my trusty old Rover, should eake out a few more miles to the gallon and – by virtue of being younger – have plenty of life left in them. The Peugeot, in particular, would offer you more smiles per gallon too because it’s always been a fine handler – perfect if your other car’s an old Mini and you’ve got some Northumbrian country roads to play with. 

But, when it came down to sealing the deal, it wasn’t a 306 she went for, or a Yaris, Fabia or Lupo for that matter. In fact, she’d gone for the supermini you can pick up for buttons these days because everybody owned one and as a result there’s still millions to choose from. The supermini I’ve driven on countless occasions and always secretly enjoyed because it rides and handles so well. The supermini, in fact, that I passed my driving test in and which – had I not decided to go for that infernal Mini – probably would’ve been my first car. 

The supermini I’d completely forgotten about. Ladies and gentleman, I give you the Ford Fiesta!

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Why the Dacia Sandero could be my sort of car

THIS WEEK I’ve mostly been waiting to find out which of my favourite foods is laced with horsemeat. Given some of the shocking stuff sat in the icy depths of my freezer, it’s almost inevitable.

I can’t be the only person in Britain who isn’t especially bothered, though –surely a bottom-of-the-range spaghetti bolog-neighs wouldn’t taste any better even if it didn’t have horsemeat in it? As long as it’s cheap, tastes vaguely nice and doesn’t instigate a trip to the doctor, I really couldn’t care less. All of which brings me to Dacia.

The company is Renault’s recession-busting riposte to all those credit-crunched UK motorists who want a cheap new car and nothing else – and, given all the non-petrolheads I know who simply want to get to work for as little as possible, that’s quite a few of us cash-strapped Brits. It’s not the first time you’ve able to buy a Dacia in this country – off-road enthusiasts with particularly long memories might just about recall the original Duster 4x4 of the 1980s variety – but the brand’s reintroduction here, having proven a hit on the continent, couldn’t be more perfectly timed. Think of it as Renault’s “Everyday Value” range.

It’s the sort of car my mate Tom, who’s just bought a Kia solely because it’s cheap and generously equipped on the warranty front, would get in an instant. None of this Taste The Difference motoring malarkey I go for – in the same way I’m not going to spend over the odds on a Marco Pierre White burger, he’s not going to stump up a car with GTI on its rump. In fact, a Dacia Sandero GTI would be a bit of an automotive oxymoron.

I’ve yet to drive the Sandero but of all of 2013’s new arrivals it’s one I’m particularly keen to try, partly because a) with no sign of an economic revival any time soon, Britain’s cheapest new car couldn’t be more relevant, and more importantly b) it looks like the kind of car I’d enjoy. Not only is it utterly unpretentious in just about every way, but because it’s small, light and unspoilt by unnecessary gadgets it could be just as much fun as the Citroen C1, the Toyota IQ and the Suzuki Swift Sport. Small cars are fun, so I’m looking forward to the Sandero.

But what particularly brightened my day when checking out Dacia’s website was discovering just what you get for your £5,995. In particular, the section on the Sandero’s spec sheet entitled “Comfort and Convenience”, which reveals exactly what the entry-level model’s buyers will get for their – wait for it – comfort and convenience. They will get winding rear windows. They will get a heated rear windscreen. And that’s it.

Still doesn’t stop me from wanting to test drive it, though.

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Can new the new Clio spark a revival for Renault in the UK?

What links the Espace, the Laguna, and the Wind? That’s right – they’re all models the French firm’s quietly dropped from the UK because they hadn’t proved a hit with buyers on this side of the Channel. 

That’s why they’ve put so much effort into the latest version of what’s been their supermini staple for more than two decades – the Clio. We’ve already looked at the potent 2.0 litre Renaultsport 200 Turbo version but chances are that it’s going to be its less manic little brother, which goes on sale at dealerships across the UK at the end of the month, that’ll be so crucial to the company’s fortunes in this country.

It’s certainly got the looks style-savvy supermini shoppers crave – check out those Alfa 156-esque rear doors, for instance, cleverly designed to disguise the fact it’s the first Clio in the model’s 22 year history that’ll be offered only as a five door.   

More importantly, depending on which version you pick it’ll be around 100kg lighter than the car it replaces, which makes it kinder on fuel (great for when you’re not belting it around like a boy racer) and quicker off the mark and more nimble (great for when you are).

Thanks to the prospect of a £10,595 starting price, fine looks and the prospect of gadgets like an in-car tablet, I reckon the new Clio might well be good enough to make it fourth time lucky for Renault.

I’m looking forward to finding out whether the new Clio goes as well as it looks.

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Fiat 500: The brilliant small car I completely forgot about

WORD reaches me from north of the border that my sister’s looking to treat herself to a festive gift of the four-wheeled variety

.

It’s a straightforward enough challenge; she’s looking for something small, good looking, reliable and easy to run, for around the four grand mark. Not that she’s going to take any advice off her car nut brother – it’s Life On Cars tradition that whenever someone actually asks me for advice on cars, they listen dutifully to whatever considered opinion I can come up with, pause reflectively for a moment, and then ignore it and buy the car they had their heart set on anyway. This explains why so many people I know own a Vauxhall Corsa.

Then again, my suggestions were slightly more sensible than my sister’s other half’s, who being even more of a petrolhead than I am pointed me in the direction of a Lancia Beta Spider (Google it) which could be under your Christmas tree for just £1,650. A beautiful Italian roadster which would be fine for a classic car bore like me, but hardly the sort of thing you’d rely on to get you in and out of Glasgow on a daily basis!

Trying to keep things as sensible as possible, I went for the original Ford Ka, Toyota’s Aygo, the Citroen C1 and – whisper it softly – the new MINI, with the Peugeot 106 GTi as the wildcard I secretly hoped my sister would go for.  All of which are reliable enough to survive life tooling around a city centre for days on end, small enough to squeeze into even the tightest parking spaces and – most importantly for my sister, someone who’s far more stylish than I am – blessed with the sort of chic and sense of fun that, say, a Nissan Micra just isn’t.

I was quietly pleased with my carefully selected shortlist, right up until the point when my sister mentioned the one small car I’d forgotten about; the Fiat 500. Her argument is that it’s far cuter than just about any other small car on the second-hand market (as long as it’s bought in the right colour), it’s got perfectly good underpinnings (which is true, given it’s a former European Car of the Year), and there’s enough of them around for her to pick up a decent one. For what it’s worth, I think the mechanically identical Panda is the better small Fiat, but for what my sister wants the 500’s perfect. I’m just annoyed I didn’t think of it earlier.

To be fair, I agree with her. If you can think of a better suggestion, feel free to send them in to the usual Champion address. Although – in true Life On Cars tradition – she’ll only ignore it anyway. Merry Christmas.

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Fire up the... Peugeot 208

PEUGEOT'S back on the ball, if the new 208 is anything to go by.

The French firm's built up a fine reputation for building feisty hatchbacks with a sense of fun - as anyone familiar with the 205, 306 and 106 will surely testify - but to my mind at least the more recent models, particularly the 207, never really caught the imagination in the same way. Deep down, I reckon that's why Peugeot's pulled out all the stops to get it right with its latest supermini contender.

For starters, it looks good, with a sharply-sculpted shape and carefully chosen proportions which at a stroke render the old 207 a bit blobby and comparision. It's the same story on the inside too, with interior fabrics and plastics which owe plenty to its big brother, the 508 saloon. The main thing which strikes you is the unusual way the controls are laid out - you look over the steering wheel to see the dials, rather than through it - but it's as intuitive as it is innovative. Same story goes for the tablet-style computer sitting atop the centre console, although I suspect having an actual iPad dock there instead might have been a smarter move.

But the best thing about the 208 by far is the way it drives. You'd expect that the 1.6 Feline version I tried wouldn't be lacking in pace - at £16,895, it's holding the warm hatch fort until the eagerly-anticipated GTi version arrives - but where it really shines is in the fluidity of its handling and in its natural agility in the sort of low-speed urban darting in and around town.

For the past three years I've always argued the Fiesta is the best of the superminis but the 208 is now a better looking, more entertaining and technologically superior package to Ford's finest. After a couple of years in the hatchback wilderness, Peugeot's got its mojo back and produced one of the best cars I've driven all year.

Now all they need is for the 208 GTi to be an absolute belter.

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Can the Peugeot 208 GTi really be as good as the 205 GTi?

AN Eighties hot hatch icon is back!

Well, sort of, if Peugeot's claims about the new 208 GTi are anything to go by. I was going to spare them the trouble of having their latest souped-up supermini compared with what enthusiasts rank as one of the greatest drivers' cars of all time, but the French firm have compared the new arrival to its iconic ancestor by saying it "regenerates the values of the iconic 205 GTi".

Question is: will it?

Until someone's driven it hard on a bumpy, windy British B-road the jury's out but the signs are good - not only does its 1.6 litre petrol engine deliver a 200bhp punch, but it comes with more rigidity and sportier suspension than the hatchback it's based on, which means on paper at least it's making all the right noises to hot hatch fans (i.e people like me). It's also, at less than 1,200kg, lighter than the car it replaces and equipped

More encouraging still however is the precedent set by models which don't come with those three little letters on the bootlid - if efforts like the 508 are anything to go by, Peugeot is back on form when it comes to making motors that steer and handle properly. In particularly, the agonisingly pretty RCZ coupe I drove two years ago is a cracker to drive - perhaps not as polished as, say, a VW Scirocco, but it's still a car in which you look forward to a tight corner.

Will the GTi stack up to the almost impossibly tall order as being as good as the 205 GTi? Fingers crossed I'll get a go, because I'd love to let you know...

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An open letter to Adam Vauxhall

DEAR Adam,

I thought I'd use my motoring column this week to write you, the new Vauxhall that's being pitched squarely at the MINI and the Fiat 500, an open letter.

Your creators have given you a human name to make you a bit more cute and cuddly, as though you're a beloved family friend rather than a tonne of metal on the driveway outside. You're emphatically not ‘the Adam'. You're just Adam, which I suppose saves people having to come up with their own pet names for you.

A couple of car fans I know have already been a bit cruel about you - why, they ask, have your creators broken into Ford's offices, cheekily photcopied the designs for the original Ka, and then tried to hide the crime by adding a couple of styling cues from other Vauxhall models? There's also the motoring press wondering how you'll compete with the cachet of the MINI Cooper and the Fiat 500, surely your closest competitors when you arrive in the showrooms next year. But, more than anything, it's your name that's got people flummoxed.

It's alright, I understand. On the continent you're sold as Adam Opel, which means you're named in honour of the man who set up one of Germany's oldest car companies. It's a bit like that time when millionaire hedonists were offered the chance to buy an Enzo Ferrari a couple of years ago, but the problem is that there never was a Brit motoring pioneer called Adam Vauxhall. In this country at least, the historical reference is completely lost on buyers.

Does it matter? Not, I reckon, if you offer your potential new owners the trick MINI, the Fiat 500 and Alfa's MiTo make their schtick; solid underpinnings dressed up in stylish clothes and garnished with a fun-to-drive feel. A trendy title is only half the story, which is why Chrysler's PT Cruiser left us cynical Brits, looking for substance to match the style, a bit cold. The new MINI, on the other hand, would still be brilliant even if it looked like a fridge rather than a ripoff of a cult classic. It offers an awful lot more than an evocative badge and a pretty face.

It's a shame, Adam, you weren't given a cooler-sounding moniker, but I look forward to finding out soon what you can bring to the small car table.



Best regards,


David Simister, Life On Cars

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