Have you driven the 1.6 Yamaha and is it nippy or lacking in that department?

I've got one, the 1.6 Ti VCT 105. 0-60 12.8 seconds. It's a quiet, smooth running engine that revs sweetly. However, you have to have your wits about you if wanting to overtake. The valve timing is quite abrupt. The car is quite lethargic when moving off from a standstill, then the valve timing kicks in and it livens up. It's almost like an old school turbo. My previous Avensis 1.8 petrol had a much more subtle system that you couldn't really feel, and felt gutsier at low revs with no sudden transition.

If I was using it to meet fast traffic on motorways/dual carriageways all the time then it wouldn't be my first choice, it's lacking in that situation. However I use it mainly for driving on B roads so it's not really an issue.

On the plus side it's a tough, reliable engine with none of the complication of your two other engine choices. But you would have to test drive one and see what you think. Once it's running at above 2k revs it's lively enough. Cruising at high speed is no problem, and the MK3 Focus is refined and quiet. It's just getting there!

There are two separate "power" measurements in a car, bhp and torque. A turbo, whether petrol or diesel, means more torque at lower revs. That in turn means if you put your foot down at, say 2-3k rpm, you will get a much better response than if you did the same with a n/a petrol. Once the rpm gets higher, the benefit of the turbo (vs n/a) diminishes. So, if you have a n/a petrol with the same power, using a lower gear and not changing up till the point where maximum bhp arrives* will give broadly similar results. You just have to get used to driving it different to how you would a turbo.

I'm not saying that a 1.6 Focus estate is particularly nippy, more that the difference in performance between it and a turbo equivalent of similar bhp (and weight), isn't going to be as big as you think if you drive it in the manner needed to extract the most of what it has.

We used to have a Honda Jazz and it had very little torque (and what it did have peaked at 5k rpm!), but if you go to where the power is (4.5-6k rpm), actually surprisingly nippy.

For what its worth, I live in Nort East Scotland and am rarely on anything other than single carriageway roads. Never found too much difficulty overtaking in various cars over the years, most of which would generally be considered slow/underpowered (hopelessly so in some cases!) by the majority of drivers.

*That would be 6000rpm in the case of a late (n/a) Focus 1.6 (125bhp)

. My concern is reviews for all 3 suggest the 1.6 petrols are sluggish and lack acceleration. I drive a lot of rural/single carriage way roads so need to overtake slow vehicles often. I appreciate the confidence a bit of poke gives me when I need it. Have you driven the 1.6 Yamaha and is it nippy or lacking in that department?

Yes, our Mk1 Focus estate 1.6 Zetec was nippy enough. It had the reliable maintenance free 4F27E Mazda/Ford 4 speed autobox which provided skill-free gear changes at max revs ensuring maximum use of available power for overtaking. I don't know when this excellent TC g/box was discontinued and replaced by the troublesome 'powershift'. Anyway, there were no powertrain problems till it was sc***ped at over 160,000 miles -original cambelt and third set of spark plugs. Overall mpg 36-37.