A Fiat Abarth would be such a fun car! We have a 1.1 Panda in the household and it's without doubt the most charismatic car we have ever owned, 50 bhp but every journey feels like a rally drive. Bizarrely, it holds our family record for S Wales to the tip of N Wales in just under 4 hours, across Wales. BRM is right, there's a huge satisfaction from piloting a small low powered car to its max, compared to a sense of frustration perhaps, with something high powered, on our camera infested modern roads. It feels like that a lot on my bike these days.

Indeed - a lot of the time its whether a car's good decent mid-range grunt for overtaking as well as at low speeds that makes all the difference. That's why the economical but very nippy VAG 1.4/1.5 TSi 140/150 is so well thought of.

I found the 1.4TSI 122 in a base Scirocco I test drove perfectly decent to drive, so the 140/150PS engine must be a good deal better. I would say that a great handling car with a reasonable powerful engine is a far more enjoyable drive than an average handling car with a powerful engine.

I can certainly attest to that driving my 12yo 1.6 N/A petrol Mazda3; even my Dad's 10yo Fiesta 1.25 (and its older predecessor) was a very enjoyable drive even though that car only had 75-80bhp.

Edited by SLO76 on 19/10/2018 at 22:56

"Minor points - the footwell is rather narrow with nowhere to put your clutch foot."

You're very tolerant, Veloceman: for me that's quite a major deal-breaker. On a long trip it's surprising how uncomfortable an unsupported left foot can be.

I think a proviso should be made for low power AND good handling/road holding. I can fully see the fun in wringing the neck of something small and light to get the most out of it

As a car lover I was even able to appreciate the good points of my old chugger non-turbo diesel van

However as a daily drive do I want to go back to a 15 second 0 - 60 and having idiots in Audis constantly sat up my chuff? No.

Some serious rose-tinted windscreens in this thread!

All of the cars mentioned will manage to sit at 70mph or more, the maximum legal speed in this country.

As for the notion that the best way to alleviate tailgaters is to drive faster than them?, sorry but that is madness and is simply not going to work. All that will happen is you will inevitably, at some point, get done for speeding or worse. No matter how fast you drive, unless you are an absolute lunatic, there will always be some idiot with scant regard for safe braking distances up your chuff. You obviously feel different, but IMO the best way to deal with them is to let them past asap. I drive at the speed i choose to and i accelerate at the rate i choose to (which, with 70bhp in my Caddy SDI, ain't gonna be that quick under any circumstances!), if some halfwit behind me has a problem with that, tough!.

Drivers these days are constantly bombarded with the notion that they must have more and more power, when they don't. You can thank Clarkson for that, not to mention the motoring press, who all seem to think that a car which takes more than 8 seconds (never mind 15) to hit 60 is way too slow. The performance cars available now are a complete waste of money, apart from bragging rights. You are only going to be able to use a fraction of the power and performance, so what is the point?. And don't give me that, "it is safer to overtake" nonsense, if you can't overtake using a low powered car, then you are simply not a very good driver. And i do speak from lots of experience here. As well as the Fiesta i mentioned earlier from a long time ago, since i met my wife-to-be (who gets a motability car) there has been a VW Polo 1.9D (64bhp), a Peugeot Partner Combi 1.4 petrol (75bhp), and a Daihatsu Sirion 1.0 (68bhp). All 3 were good fun to hustle and all 3 could cover ground much faster than you would expect thanks in equal parts to knowing the roads and knowing how to extract and best use what they had to offer. The most powerful car we have had was a Vauxhall Meriva 1.7CDTI (128bhp). By contrast, while it was quite fast, it was not much fun to drive because of its weight and the narrow power band.

The most fun i have had driving a car in recent history was a Citroen C1 we got as a loan while ours was in the bodyshop. this was a couple of years ago, so the current shape. Essentially the same engine as our Daihatsu, but smaller and lighter, it was brilliant fun!. Bursting with enthusiasm like a little puppy straining on the lead, feeling way faster than the figures would suggest. The benefit of a lack of inertia you see, low weight means quicker off the line (if not to 60mph) and quicker reactions to driver inputs. You'd have to be very determined to beat one of these in an urban environment.

I agree with a swift, doesn't have to be a sport model though, Ive recently said goodbye to mine after 3 thoroughly enjoyable years. Mine was only a 1.2 4x4 with around 90 horses but it proved to be a real drivers car, handled wonderfully and came of course with Suzuki reliability as standard.

I had the 1.7 Zetec in a Puma

One of the best engines Ford have made, and 250k miles plus is something that is realistic subject to good oil and filter changes. Most, in fact change that to NO 1.0 turbo units are proven to make that kind of distance without huge additional bills. The Ecoboost unit was only created for a max intended life of 150k miles and that was VERY VERY optimisitic.

One thing I noticed growing up was that Jap engines just seem to go on and on, not showing a hint of any distress even under abuse or lack of servicing until one day they just let go completely.

Whereas 'other' engines seemed to obviously have stages of wearing out.

Whats the BHP per litre of the ecoboost compared to modern motorcycle engine?

Carl233, be very interested to see your evidence for that statement about ecoboost engines being designed for no more than 150k miles.

It's a Ford..

Ford have not been supplying many spares for years. With the first Zetec you had to buy a complete bottom end if you had issues but at least prices were sensible, about £350 exchange. With the later Zetec a full engine was the only option. All I wanted was a crank and bearing set but simply could not find any. Aftermarket bearing sets were available but the only way to get a crank was to buy a used engine and hope it was better than the one you had. Ford did come good, bought a complete brand new engine in a crate including flywheel, clutch, exhaust manifold, inlet manifold/TB/injectors etc etc for £650 + VAT. Sold surplus bits off on e-bay for £200, sold the good bits off the damaged engine on ebay for £400, total cost was £180 and I had a brand new motor.

Same with the Yamaha Zetec and the Mondeo Duratec (4 clinder and V6) but since these engines are popular in motorsport there are now plenty of quality aftermarket parts.

Most things you buy today are use and throw away when they break and car engines are no different. But at least they last a good deal longer than their ancestors did before needing major surgury.

If they last 150,000 miles that is probably more than most cars actually do in their useful life so I don't actually see an issue.

Carl233, be very interested to see your evidence for that statement about ecoboost engines being designed for no more than 150k miles.

There was an official Ford video on Youtube slobbering all over itsself about the miracle that is the 1.0 Ecoboost unit. The video mentioned that the design life was 150k miles which I thought was low. Then again the industry is working towards cars being nothing more than white goods with a shelf life so this fits in with such a methodology.

Most cars (HJ said this once, I believe) have a built-in design life of about 7 years or so, thus 150k isn't that bad unless you do a high mileage. That being said, building in obsolescence at such a low number of years or mileage, especially given the advances in technology and seemingly across the board, is wrong.

I have no problem in them do this IF they give the motorist an alternative product actually designed to last far long (e.g. 20+ years) and which will, guaranteed, have full access to parts at reasonable prices throughout that lifetime.

7 years sounds credible, On the basis that most cars will last that long. Obviously they don't all die on the day or even in the year after their 7th birthday, but between 7 and maybe 15 the majority of them will be gone. Clearly some are better built and designed, and more reliable than others.

It might have been a myth, but I have seen several references to the original Micra having been designed to last five years. I once borrowed a 20 year-old one.

Edited by Manatee on 25/10/2018 at 18:50

I remeber now, all the 7 year nonsense comes form a recent post by JohnF where he said that the "AVERAGE" age of a car is now only 7 years.

That does not mean cars die when they are 7 years old. It means that if one car is written of aged 1 day old and another is written off aged 14 years old the average age they died was indeed 7 years.

Think I posted at the time that the DVLA site quoted that the actual average age of cars on the road is now just over 14 years. And a good number of those are Fords.

Just stop moaning and enjoy modern cars for pities sake, you have never had it so good.

Most cars (HJ said this once, I believe) have a built-in design life of about 7 years or so

Have you proof of this, I cannot honestly believe that HJ would say that. We sold the Micra at 8 years old and it was fine, no defects. 2 Golfs at 7 years were also fine.

Plenty of cars locally well over 7 years, looking at a 57 plate across the road as I type this.

I'm sure most do last more than this, but I do definitely remember him writing that, either on the forum or via his agony column in the Telegraph. Its more about cars being economic to keep after roughly that time - for example, I was quoted £900+ to just replace the PS pump on my Mazda3 - a pump that, for a similar spec in the building services industry, that I could buy and have fitted for half the price.

For people like you and me who already budget keeping the car for a reasonable amount of time and make sure they buy a decent new or nearly new one and keep it well maintained throughout its ownership, then they are likely to last much more than 7 years without having to invest huge sums in replacement parts, but for others, who buy a 7yo car that wasn't well-maintained, that's when (IMHO) this sort of thing kicks in, especially for so-called premium marques, e.g. BMW, Audi, Mercedes, etc.

I know many people who scrimp on servicing/maintenance after the warranty period is up, often using the MOT or a breakdown as a guide to whether a part gets replaced. A former colleague did this and his beemer (younger than my Mazda) expired - he didn't bother to do anything about an oil leak and one day it deposited the entire contents on his drive overnight - he even missed that, started the car an ruined the engine.

Break from the hot-hatch crowd, get a Mazda 3 MPS, 0-60 in near-as-damnit 6 seconds 250+ bhp and excellent reliability.

For the OP, one of the problems in, say, buying a Mazda3 MPS (I considered both before buying a Mazda3 1.6 petrol) is that, like with the Honda Civic Type R of the same era, both the gen-1 and 2 cars are now into the 'modding' territory and will likely incur huge insurance penalties and won't be as reliable as unmodded cars (not that many MPSs about anyway). The latest Tyre Rs are very expensive compared to the ones that came before.

The Mazda3 MPS gen-2 went out of production 5 years ago, so isn't what you'd call 'new' any more as well, and is coming up to the age when more of the expensive parts need changing out, e.g. suspension, clutch, etc. How many really depends upon how sympathetically its been driven and well maintained it has been, even for cars that aren't modded (I wouldn't touch modded cars with a bargepole).

Unfortunately, many of these cars now ARE modded or maintenance is scrimped on, as quite a lot (but my no means all) are owned by young boy racers, possibly trading up from their old (likely modded) Fiesta, Golf or Saxo.

If Mazda made the current 3 in MPS form, then I'd recommend it in a heartbeat (I might've got one myself [new]), as the only thing lacking in the standard car (even in Sport 165 form) is outright pace and grunt at low and mid-range revs.

Most cars (HJ said this once, I believe) have a built-in design life of about 7 years or so

Have you proof of this, I cannot honestly believe that HJ would say that. We sold the Micra at 8 years old and it was fine, no defects. 2 Golfs at 7 years were also fine.

Plenty of cars locally well over 7 years, looking at a 57 plate across the road as I type this.

HJ has repeated his comment in today's (part 1) Agony Column:

www.honestjohn.co.uk/news/honest-johns-motoring-ag.../

(See: Eating Habits)