Andy M3

Ok. Not your first choice i am sure, but at the moment i am renting a 1.3 CDTI in a SXI 5 door guise, and i have to say i am very impressed. If you are in the market for a cheap compact diesel it is worth a nosey. The car packs a hell of a punch and is geared very well for the power. The car has an obvious lack of sound proofing and is noisy over 60mph, but the chasis is good and ride firm but not crashy. With good use of the gears and maintaining 1500-3500 rpm the car will zip a long very nicely indeed. As I said the car is not designed for speed and reads 85mph on the speedo @ 3500 rpm. I think it is insurance group 3 or 4, and if you went to vauxhall with £7k they would sort you one out with a/c and free insurance no doubt. Whether you are buying for your son/daughter, or want a 2nd/3rd car for city use it gets my vote.The best bit i thought i would save until last. Service Interval. 30000 miles Warranty. 3 years / 60000 miles ...


Tech spec

1248 cc
4 Cylinders
70@4000 bhp
125@1750-2500 lb/ft
Emissions Class
EU4
CO2 Emissions
122 g/km - (Man)
Maximum Speed 102 mph - (Man)
0 - 60 mph - 13.5
Combined mpg - 62

8/10

brickboy

70bhp is pretty good in such a small shell ... 125lb-ft is more than most reps' 1.8 Mondeos and Vectras!

NotoriousREV

My sister had the older 1.7DTi engine and the power/torque specs were identical. Amazing how technology has moved on to produce the same figures from a 25% smaller engine.

It went quite well, but the handling was awful, felt like it was understeering at parking speeds.

Andy M3

The 1.3 is not too bad around the bends although you can tell it has a heavy diesel lump in it. The 1.0 12v was a cracking little car when i had a loaner from the dealer. Once you were up to speed you could keep it flat out lol. A real hoot.

They still do the 1.7 varient but now 100hp - 170 lb/ft (ish) a 'hot' version i believe !

Paul_M

Hmm that torque sounds useful but the 0-60 is scarily slow. I know it's not an ideal indication of real-world performance but when you're trying to pull onto a busy road from a junction then you do need decent acceleration unless you want to either wait ages for a massive gap or force people to brake for you.

It's one of the things I hated about my 2.0 Audi I was using as a runaround for about a year. You do adapt your driving style to suit but it can be very frustrating at times.

David_Wallis

Yeah your not kidding, my mondeo diesel is that slow doing 0-60 I keep a calendar in the car..

I adjusted my driving style.. its I dont give a ****, move or loose.

I get a lot of people waving and flashing me to say Hi!!

David

Paul_M

LMAO

I assume it's the older 1.8TD variety? That is the ultimate slug, drove one as a company car a while back. Absolutely no power off boost, slightly better on-boost but only between 2-3000 RPM, and horrendous turbo lag . I have no idea how they managed to get such massive lag from a turbo that produces so little power. Nor how you get the gearchange lag on a diesel with no throttle!

Doing overtakes was fun, you always had to do a gearchange mid-way because the power band is so narrow, and you had to keep the pedal planted during the gearchange otherwise the lag left you with no power while the turbo had a quick coffee break

Don't know if that particular car was just shagged, but it certainly was entertaining for all the wrong reasons