Sorry for the long post.

So following on from my previous thread, I was after another car.

I was after a few things on the new car, part of the problem with changing cars is that you don’t like to lose things you’ve had on previous cars. Spec below:

• Similar size to the Fiesta and 5 doors.
• After having poor headlights on the last car I was definitely wanting LED Headlights.
• Heated and electrically adjustable door mirrors. Quite a few cars in this class/ size have electrically adjustable mirrors without heating.
• Cruise control.
• Spare wheel.
• Rear parking sensors or camera.
• A wee bit of get up and go, so about 100bhp.
• Was after quick availability, so no waiting on a factory order.

1st car to consider was the Fiesta Titanium 1.0 Ecoboost 100bhp. Have had 3 Fiesta’s in the past and liked all of them. LED headlights are a factory option (not standard), also it has keyless start (at least no keyless entry though). Although the Keyless Start keys are meant to go to sleep now, it still seems to me like an inherently insecure system (every week people are being told to put their keys in a faraday pouch on ask Honest John). So, having keyless start meant I didn’t consider if any of the Fiesta Titaniums which were already in the country had LED headlights fitted.

Same price as the Fiesta Titanium was the Fiesta Active 1. No keyless entry and no keyless start, good. However they didn’t have cruise control.

The Skoda Fabia’s didn’t have LED headlights as standard. The Polo only had LED headlights on the GTI Plus.

Audi A1 Sport 1.0 TFSI. Very nice car, very well finished car. Had everything I wanted on it. LED headlights as standard (as they are on all the A1’s). Ticked all the boxes. However, it was just too expensive.

Ended up looking at the SEAT Ibiza. To get the spec I was after I was going to need to go for FR or Xcellence Trim levels. The Trims below this didn’t have any of the following: Heated mirrors, Cruise control, LED Headlights.

The Xcellence had keyless entry and keyless start, which ruled that out. Preferred the look of the FR and particularly its rear bumper, with the dummy twin exhausts. Thought the Ibiza was a very smart car in general.

Ended up getting a test drive in a 115PS FR and really liked it. It drove well and the acceleration was amazing. While keeping it at lower revs, it was easy to keep within speed limits in towns.

So, ended up getting the Ibiza FR 115PS (6 speed). I’m sure the 95PS (5 speed) would have been fine though.

The only thing missing was the rear parking sensors or camera. The dealer fitted a camera for me which works through the infotainment screen. The camera looks as if it’s factory fitted. Also got a spare wheel.

Have to say that this is a real drivers car. Doesn’t wander about the road. You would never know that it’s a 3 cylinder. LED headlights are out of this world. Very comfortable. Very smart to look at. Very spacious (Was parked next to a 16 plate Golf the other day and I’d swear that my Ibiza is every bit as big).

I have one criticism about the Ibiza (and I knew about this when I bought it). There is no interior light over the rear seats and the light from the front courtesy lights doesn’t reach the rear of the car at all. Not a big issue for me as I don’t have many rear seat passengers. However it would cause issues using it as a family car. My 2012 Fiesta had rear courtesy lights, don’t know what SEAT are thinking about. Otherwise everything is spot on.