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CAP Blog > CAP Blog > Martin's Blog
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Jul
14
Written by:
Martin Ward
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
This week’s manufacturer news
KIA – The new Soul Echo model is now on sale priced at £13,995 on the road. Available with a 1.6 litre 124bhp petrol or 1.6 litre CRDI 126bhp diesel engine, it comes with the following standard features: air conditioning, leather upholstery, 18” alloy wheels, rear parking sensors, Bluetooth connectivity and privacy glass.
MAZDA – The Takuya special edition models in the Mazda2, 3 and 6 ranges are now on sale. Prices start at £11,915 on the road for the Mazda2 Takuya, £15,780 for the Mazda3 and £19,845 for the Mazda6.
NISSAN – Has announced that the 370Z coupe and roadster is to be offered with a 2 year interest free finance deal. A minimum of 25% deposit is required and customers will have the option to pay off the remainder of the car’s value after 24 months. Interest free monthly repayments start at £299 for the coupe and £349 for the roadster.
 PEUGEOT – Has released some details on the new 508. It will be available in both saloon and SW estate body styles and the engine range will feature e-HDI and hybrid4 technology. Both body styles will be revealed to the public in October at the Paris Motor Show. The 508 is expected to go on sale at the beginning of 2011.
First driving impressions – Skoda Fabia VRS, UK press launch, Kenilworth
The original Fabia VRS was launched in 2003 and has had a reasonable following in the UK from hot-hatch enthusiasts who want the power, but at a sensible price.
 The new VRS is powered by a 1.4 litre TSI, 4 cylinder petrol engine that produces 180bhp, making it the most powerful engine offered in the Fabia range. The supercharger and turbocharger in this engine work hand-in-hand to provide seamless power delivery across the engine’s rev range. After driving the VRS on the Prodrive circuit and on the road, it is easy to see why Skoda chose and developed this engine for a small performance car, as it really is quick and the amount of power does seem endless.
All of this power is coupled to a 7 speed DSG automatic gearbox as standard. There will be no manual gearbox available and this is where I think Skoda has made a mistake. Quick, smooth and reliable the DSG box may be, but there will be many, especially the younger customers, who will not consider a Skoda automatic gearbox as it’s just not cool. Other manufacturers mainly offer manual gearboxes as standard on their hot-hatches and they have proved very popular over the years, so why would Skoda (and Seat) try and change customers’ buying habits? When the Fabia VRS hits the used car market, will it be as desirable as a manual hot-hatch?
 There is very little competition in this sector, with just a handful of cars available. These are the Renault Clio RenaultSport 200, Vauxhall Corsa VXR, Peugeot 207 GTI, Ford Fiesta S1600, Seat Ibiza FR and the recently introduced Citroen DS3 Sport. However, all of these competitor models have varying power outputs ranging from 115bhp to 198bhp and prices vary quite dramatically. The CO2 range also goes from a low 134g/km to 195g/km (the Fabia is 148g/km) and the 0-62mph figure is also very different depending on the model, ranging from 6.8 seconds to 9.9 seconds (the VRS is 7.3 seconds). So they may all be classed as hot-hatches, but this is where the similarity ends. A VRS estate is also available, which widens the similarity further as none of the other manufacturers offer likewise.
 The exterior has been modified so that the VRS stands out from the rest of the Fabia range. It has bespoke front and rear spoilers with integrated LED lights, 17” ‘Gigaro’ alloy wheels, red brake calipers, twin exhausts and tinted windows.The interior is also different on the VRS, with height adjustable sports seats, three spoke leather steering wheel and paddleshift for the DSG gearbox.
The new Fabia VRS now has an XDS system fitted as standard. The XDS system is an electronically-controlled slip differential to improve the handling of the car when driving quickly. When cornering, XDS works by gently applying the brakes to the unstressed wheel on the inside of the corner and transmitting this force to the outside wheel that is doing most of the work. XDS also reduces under steer, increases traction on bends, provides improved directional stability and maintains an ideal line even when the car is being driven quickly.
The VRS hatch is priced at £15,700 and the VRS estate at £16,495.
Test car – Honda CR-Z Sport
 Every now and again, a manufacturer will produce a car that just has the ‘wow’ factor. The usual reasons why it possesses the ‘wow’ factor are as follows: it will look great from every angle, it will attract the level of attention where people just drool over it, it will be full of good ideas, it will be high in quality and attractively priced. Then there are cars that are launched and you wonder why the manufacturer ever bothered to make it, as it seems pretty pointless and borders on the ridiculous in terms of style and the package it offers. The CR-Z definitely fits into one of these categories.
The CR-Z has a hybrid badge on the boot lid. Honda has been developing hybrid technology for over twenty years and call it IMA (Integrated Motor Assist). However, this hybrid is different in many ways to every other on the market as it cannot be run solely on electric power. The Lexus hybrid models can, the Toyota Prius and Auris HSD can and the forthcoming Peugeot 3008 hybrid4 can. Many more models that are in the pipeline will be able to do so, but not the Honda. It is difficult to explain to neighbours and colleagues that the hybrid aspect of the car means that an electric motor simply gives the petrol engine a boost when accelerating. The 1.5 litre petrol engine produces 114ps and the electric motor 14ps, giving a total of either 124ps or 128ps, depending on which bit of the technical sheet you read. The CO2 figure is 117g/km.
Honda say the CR-Z is a 2+2, but the two seats in the rear would barely manage to fit in a couple of tiny toddlers and getting them in and out would be very difficult. They are also, for some reason, covered in a different material and are a different colour to the front seats.
Honda has tried to create a very modern, unique looking rear but in reality all they have managed to create is a car where rear view vision is almost zero. A few times whilst driving the car, I felt it was bordering on dangerous. A van has better rear view visibility.
 The interior has vastly improved on the CR-Z, but could still be improved further. The plastics are hard and look cheap; it’s not the sort of quality you would expect on a Japanese car in 2010. The dash is very fussy and has more lights than Blackpool in October; a lot of them seem to be unnecessary. There is a lot of reflection on the windscreen and the three buttons for Sport, Normal and Eco, which are on the edge of the dash, all have blue lights that can be clearly seen in the door mirrors at night and this is quite off-putting. You think you are being followed constantly by a blue light vehicle.
Honda has their own start/stop system, that in the early days of green vehicles was almost unique, but today just about every manufacturer offers it mainly as standard, so the niche position they had has gradually been eroded. The start/stop on the CR-Z works fairly well as it is quick, quiet and efficient, but it only starts when you put it into gear with the clutch still pressed down.
The official fuel consumption figure is 56.5 MPG, but during the time we had the CR-Z it achieved an average of 48.2 MPG. This isn’t a bad result for a 1.5 litre petrol engine, but nowhere near as good as many diesels on offer today. It only has a 40 litre fuel tank, so the range is not brilliant.
 Honda could have done so much more with this car. Maybe it should have been a two-seater convertible, like the new Renault Wind, which incidentally manages more MPG than the CR-Z. Maybe it should have been a bit bigger with two seats that are semi-usable like the Peugeot RCZ, or it should have been a sportier open top two-seater to compete with the Mazda MX-5. It should have been a lot of things because a hybrid 2+2, with debateable design quality and a fussy dashboard is not what the world is looking for. New sales will no doubt prove me wrong, but will it have any desirability when it hits the used market? The style had a resounding thumbs-down with just about all of those who passed a comment while I had the car.
Prices start at £16,999 for the S model and the car we had on test costs £17,999. The top of the range GT model is priced at £19,999.
Test car – Citroen C5 2.0 HDI Exclusive
 Citroen sent this car to me as I had a meeting at PSA HQ near Paris and what better way to test a car than to drive one of their own 505 miles there and 505 miles back? The Exclusive model is fitted with Citroen’s own Hydractive 3+ suspension and is not to everyone’s liking – mine included. I had only driven for around 16 miles and not even reached the M1 when I felt the desire to go back home to get another car, or nip over to Manchester airport; it really was that uncomfortable. It was like riding on a lilo on the sea with a small wave on the water as it just never settled down. However, I continued on and after a few miles on the motorway the sea-sickness began to subside and I did begin to feel better – only another 950 miles to go to be back home. The ride did improve as we went along though, either that or we just got used to it, but in the end we had a brainwave – to call into a French supermarket, fill the boot with cheap beer and wine, and that should help stabilise the car’s suspension. One hundred and sixty one Euros later and the ride was so much better because the weight helped dramatically. It became a very useable car that had a few bottles clinking away in the boot, but we can cope with that.
The C5 Exclusive is full of standard features including trip computer, satellite navigation (which we needed) and some very luxurious leather seats, but all this comes at a fairly hefty price of £23,095.
 The car is powered by a 2.0 litre HDI diesel engine that produces 160bhp, goes from 0-62mph in 9.1 seconds and has a top speed of 130mph. The all-important CO2 emissions figure is 139g/km. In France the speed limit is slightly higher than the UK and we stuck to their limits for most of the journey through France. The car was just great at these speeds, being very comfortable on the smooth roads and with the added weight, the C5 turned into a completely different car to the one we drove in the UK.
The C5 is a saloon car so it has a boot lid as opposed to a hatch. It is not as useful as its direct competitors, but I suppose it is trying to join the elite German four door saloons. The boot is a good size and the rear seats fold down to provide additional space.
 The C5 is a good looking car that has some styling cues from the German manufacturers, as the original TV ad stated. The interior is very modern with all the controls being easy to use and all in the right place. The quality is up to a relatively high standard; this French car has removed the myths about poor build quality and some parts of the car are on par with what the Germans can produce.
The official combined fuel consumption figure is 53.3 MPG, but we only achieved an average of 44.1 MPG over the 1010 miles that we drove the C5, and bear in mind almost 99% of this was done on motorways.
The C5 is a good alternative in the D-sector, but this is a shrinking market as more people are tending to choose a more practical vehicle such as a crossover or MPV and Citroen has plenty of these, so why pick a C5?
I enjoyed the trip to Paris and back once the suspension had stopped being so active. This car is a good motorway cruiser, but is maybe just a bit too expensive.
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