I took SWMBO around a few dealers yesterday to replace the Trajet with something a lot smaller. We looked at the Suzuki Splash, Hyundai i10 and Citroen C1 of which the winner by far was the i10. However, she thought she needed something a little bigger and we had a look at a Mazda2. That is very nice and very spacious. However, I haven't got her to the Daihatsu dealer yet.
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Thanks GB, glad to have been of help. Atleast we know the leather was infact cream rather than biscuit coloured ;-)
The current small Daihatsu, the Sirion, is well worth a look as it is such a substantial car yet gets the low emissions and I think its 56.5 combined which isnt far behind my Charade.
It will be very interesting to know what the new Charade is like when it is launched and what it brings to the table. Incidentally, Subaru sell their version ( Justy ) too and it also has the 5 year warranty aswell.
I was talking to the dealer who took my Subaru back off me, part of the same family garage chain that I bought the Subaru from. He told me that in the last week, ten Subaru owners had been in wanting to trade down to smaller cars - me thinks the trend has started now for proper downsizing.
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Enjoyed that write up Stu!
I think Diahatsu are really onto something getting the Charade down to 720kg. (Aygo 890kg, Panda 1.1, 840kg and 938kg diesel)
So the Panda and even the Aygo/C1/Pug, are heavier and I suspect that yours would come out top in regular, real world fuel consumption. Check this blog for a few thoughts on C1 fuel consumption.
tinyurl.com/58cvcw
All that better consumption with the Charade and no need for diesel with its Common Rail complexities and worries about mis-fueling.
Sure, the small diesels in the Multijet Panda and HDi C1 may well be a few miles per gallon up on yours, but they are carrying the complexity of Common Rail to get there.
Great choice of car Stu, must be a relief to get into something suited to current times.
I think the UK lags behind in desire for cars around 700kg, I did 87,000 miles in a 408kg 2CV, you would think that would be the future.. Maybe in France where there is less fuss around trying to show wealth via ownership of a Luxo-barge.
I often found when working though, it frequently amounted to `fur coat, but no knickers`
Good luck with your car Stu. What about a write up on the other one?
regards
Edited by oilrag on 02/06/2008 at 16:53
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`Fur Coat` in the UK, that is. ;)
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As a fan of small eastern cars the Daihatsu range was very much in my sights but living in Doncaster the nearest dealer is 20 miles away in Barnsley. Reliable as they may be plus all the other nice things that are said about them thats just too far a distance for calling in for odd noises, dealer suport and the rest. If they had a dealer in Doncaster I could be interested.
In the end I bought an 07 plate 1.4 Hyundai Getz at 11 months old with 3k on the clock for £5900 from the Hyundai garage in Doncaster.
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Did you check if the dealer did collection for maintainance work? 20 miles is a way out for sure, but if its once a year its not so bad, nice day out! I wouldnt expect many odd noises tbh, its not european ;-)
Getz is a nice little car that said, diesel is a cracker.
I think I may become a self-appointed champion of Daihatsu, they get far less recognition than is deserved.
I would do a Picanto write up, but have only driven 50 miles in it so far, but I will hand a report in when I get home from my holiday, when we will be taking both cars!
So far, my misses has totally fallen for the Picanto already though. She said put a Flat-4 plus heated seats in it and it would be perfect!
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but living in Doncaster the nearest dealer is 20 miles away in Barnsley. ... thats just too far a distance for calling in for odd noises dealer suport
Count yourself lucky that you don't live in the Scottish Highlands. To have a dealer within 50 miles would be a wonderful luxury for many of us.
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< >
Memories........i'm saying not another word
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Nice write-up stu, sounds like you have a winner there and long may you enjoy all the benefits. Good mpg and VED which will help keep overall costs as low as possible.
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2000 miles Stu. Must be time to change? :)
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Bobby G - I have form for keeping small cars much longer than big ones - I kept my Matiz for 2.5 years and 55k, so I have it in me!
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Always nice to see some other Daihatsu enthusiasts :) I'm on my 3rd and they have all been excellant.
So, to add my experience of my 1.0 SL 54 Charade - i've had it since new and currently covered 46K miles. I do a daily commute of 50 miles, about 40 of which are on the motorway.
It's serviced at the scheduled intervals and the only problem i had was a hole in the exhaust, either side of the exhaust box. One of them was fixed under warranty and the other cost me £100. Apparently this is not uncommon. Other than that, it's been standard service costs only with no additional costs (as an indication, a recent 45K service was approx £130).
Amazingly so far it has only needed 2 front tyres (at £30 each) and several windscreen wiper blades (they are tiny and they don't seem to last very long). So 2 of my tyres are the originals as well as the brake pads ! Running costs couldn't be much lower.......
It has a fantastic little engine with a great tone to it. I actually enjoy the motorway part of my journey as the engine is very comfortable and quiet all the way up to 80-85mph. On a particularly quiet traffic day recently i was up to 95 mph and it still felt like it had more to go. I am, and always have been, amazed at how good an engine it is for a 998cc. And, it's not slow and often i out accelerate other drivers at lights.
The interior space is excellant - so much better rear legroom than most mid-size family cars. The boot is small but with enough space for a small Tesco's run and the seats drop down if you need extra.
The turning circle is amazing. I take a colleague out most lunch times and we often laugh at the spaces i can turn around in. It's a brilliant car for buzzing round town and squeezing into car park spaces. Visibilty is great with large windows and bein slightly narrower can be a big help in multi-storey car parks.
I bought it to fullfill a purpose - to get me to/from work every day reliably, cheaply and economically and it does all that perfectly. I fully intend to take it up to at least 100K and I'm very confident that it will make it easily.
I'm looking forward to the new model (where on earth is it in the UK ???) but it will have to be damn good to get me to trade up from the one i have.
When Jeremy Clarkson reviewed the Charade in 2004, he said that "your kitchen table is more likely to go wrong". And, you know, i think he was right :)
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For info, Auto Express have a Subaru Justy on long-term test (report this week) - a very similar car to the Charade. They seem to like theirs too.
A small car that isn't frenetic at motorway speeds is a Good Thing. The Ford Ka is surprisingly good in this respect, the Honda Jazz not so good.
Edited by Avant on 27/06/2008 at 01:49
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Ive always been a fan, they are often such underrrated cars although dynamically they arent always perfect, more so handling than ride.
Back in 1986 my mum had a Domino from new and I also had a 1994 Hijet 1.0 van, both of which did sterling service.
The new model is imminent but wont be much cheaper than the Sirion by the looks of it.
The Subaru Justy is the same as a Sirion, but not the Charade which is a different car, albeit with Im sure some common parts.
I am yet to meet a dissatisfied owner tbh as these cars are totally unpretentious and as such, they do exactly what they say they do, more often than not, very well.
Incidentally, I just got my latest economy figures in - 60.3 mpg on ordinary unleaded, mixture of A-roads, town and village running with no special effort towards economy but not thrashing either - this includes the vast majority of the time the car carrying about 100kg of valeting kit.
What figures you getting sflatt?
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Quite right Stu - sorry, I meant the Sirion. If anyone is choosing between these two it'll be a matter of which dealer gives a better deal.
The Charade is no longer listed in What Car - maybe the Sirion is a replacement?
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There is I believe a £500 price difference between the Justy and the Sirion, based one would presume, on the badge cachet of the Subaru!
The Charade wasnt replaced and sits under the Sirion - the Sirion was a replacement for the...Sirion.
A new Charade is due out which is why the prices on the Sirion have recently moved up a little as the Charade cost the importers nearly as much as the Sirion and they want to distance the two pricewise and sell it under the Sirion as it is a smaller car.
Learnt all that from our enthusiastic dealer.
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All i can say about my MPG is that i always seem to fill it up with about 30 litres and that will go 350-390 miles, so that seems to be about 53-59 MPG. My commute goes between plain sailing on a motorway to sitting idle on a motorway with the rest made up of normal town driving.
One thing to note about MPG is that the Charade tank can be filled quite a bit past the point where most petrol pumps will automatically stop. I remember being slightly dissapointed with my early MPG until i figured out i could squeeze another few litres in, which extended the range up to 350 miles from about 300-320 i was initially getting.
I should add that our other car is a Sirion (1.0L again) and that's just as impressive. Obviously it's slightly slower but it's that little bit more solid and chunky all around and you have a bit more interior space. It's our family car and we regularly do 200 mile trips in it, fully loaded, and that's also great on the motorway. I'd have a very hard choice to decide which is the overall better car. Once again, it's been faultless in the 2 years we've had it. I see that they now offer a 5 year warranty on new Sirions and i'm not surprised as i doubt they ever have to pay out much on warranty claims.
I'm excited by the prospect of the new Charade, although slightly dissapointed to see that they've made it bigger than my version. To me, the new version looks like a cross between the existing model and the original Yaris (not surprising with the Toyota influence). I also note that they've managed to increase the BHP but i guess that's going to be off-set by more overall weight so i'm presuming it won't be any quicker than the current model. I just hope that Daihatsu UK properly advertise the new version as i have never understood why their cars aren't more popular than they are.
A final thought....but I would love to see them produce a new Charade Turbo model - like the old diesel turbo from the late-eighties. Admittedly they wouldn't sell many but i think it would attract a lot of attention in the press and that might lead to some better exposure.
BTW - I'm not a Daihatsu salesman.........just a huge fan of Daihatsu's !
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Well you know what? There are loads of VAG/Ford/BMW fans in here, its about time we had some balance for those of us who like lil jap cars instead.
I tend to run my car down to the red, drive 20 miles then fill up - I wait till the first 'stop' point, then round it up to nearest pound so I can easily replicate the process for mpg figures.. Usually I get £32 worth in ( 27 L ) which gives 360 miles on average although it has to be said that since I bought the car, its economy is steadily improving leading me to believe that the previous elderly owner prob didnt strecth the car or use it too often, whereas Im using it daily doing 300 miles a week, perhaps its loosening up some?
Not sure you will be seeing a turbo Charade although Im sure there is such a model in the home market ( they would strap 4wd and a turbo to a milk float ). i would imagine that the car will be a cross between our Charades and a 'cool' city car type, like a Twingo for example. thats my guess anyway on where they will see it falling.
Would be interesting to hear from any other Daihatsu owners.
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I have an '05 Charade EL automatic. Love it to death and have covered about 24k. Virtually all of my driving is short trips in town and I get 43 mpg. Not great, but for an automatic doing journeys that are rarely longer than three miles, I'm not complaining. Agree with everything Stu has said about quality, etc. So much more than I was expecting.
My local dealer was a bit of a nit-wit, so I drove thirty miles to another fellow who had just taken on Daihatsu (ran a Volvo shop next door, as well). I use a local much-trusted garage for servicing, so the dealer's remote location was no bother. I have never needed to see him again. Except once: they put the wrong reg plates on the car and I did not notice until a few days after getting it home. Having just passed the warranty end date, I was a little worried that things would start to fall off, but nothing yet.
Problems: factory tires are rubbish and front set replaced at 12k; as said elsewhere, wiper blades are small and leave a large section of screen uncleared; I find that the A-pillar on the passenger's side blocks my view at left turns; driver's seatbelt is losing its recoil (but, judging from the emergency stop I made yesterday, it keeps me in place); driver's seat creaks; standard stereo/CD is standard because it must have cost about 50p; looks a bit dorky and will not make you popular with the ladies. Fortunately, I'm happily married, but my wife and I have joked about turning it over to the crew on Pimp My Ride for a little jazzing up.
Advantages: makes me grin like a chimp every time I park in the crowded city centre; design, fit, finish, engineering all to a high standard; has admirably tackled wild and hilly Dartmoor on three holiday excursions; very smooth automatic; brilliant air con; brakes holding up very well (an automatic in a city -- amazing).
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It is interesting that Daihatsu seems to have a level of adoration, albeit for different reasons, that Subaru enjoy. The basis seems to be a combination of reliability and competancy - strange that its such a rare combination.
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That would be just outside Andover?
I think the ownership has changed since this was a Volvo franchise (they weren't that good, mind you Volvo dealers as a bunch don't seem to be).
Mrs. Bong! found them to be exceptionally helpful when she enquired about a Sirion. She liked the car a lot but it was just a bit too small - that wretched Yaris has taught her a real lesson!
Can't fault the dealer though.
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That's the one. The dealer was helpful and flexible. He very much wanted me to move up to the Sirion, but my wife, whose parking is usually, shall we say, approximate, found she could park the Charade blindfolded. There was no getting her to consider another car, no matter how slightly larger.
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Now hit 5000 miles since purchase. Still love the car just as much. Its showing a shade over 30k now and feels as tight and sharp as a new car.
Had its MOT and cambelt done yesterday, plus the tracking and a pre-MOT check ( he checks it then takes it to an MOT station himself ). All in inc VAT £236 which seemed reasonable, using Daihatsu parts. Oh and it passed its MOT with no advisories :-)
Motoring at its least expensive continues. Should put another couple of thousand on it in two weeks time when we take it on holiday to Cornwall, 6 hours driving, yay!
Only negative was a customers wife said its 'a bit gay' on account of the colour, but she soon quietened down when I called her red Mini a chrome plated tomato :-)
On the plus side re the colour - young women seem to love it and pass only positive judgement on me for driving a car in that colour!
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Interesting read.
The fuel figures you're reporting are what we should be expecting in the early 21st century. A modern engine in a light car, yet retaining a decent NCAP score and a degree of refinement - what a brilliant combination! Why can't other manufacturers do it instead of this ever spiralling bloating problem? The French are particularly guilty of it (the new Clio weighs only a fraction less than a Laguna from 10 years ago)
Bonus on the image with younger women. I have discovered in the last 6 months that driving a Volvo (lovely car as it is) is akin to telling the opposite sex you have a nasty itch and shower once a month. If I were a single man, I would have sold it. I think that's why SWMBO likes it! :-)
Good luck with the car anyway. Sounds like a corker.
Cheers
DP
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Im very happy with the fuel figures. To get a regular 59 mpg from a petrol city car is good even today, the best part being that its not hard to get it either. On more gentle weeks I get into the low 60's.
What is especially good is that it demonstrates the way forward is light weight, as this increases performance aswell as improving economy at the same time - why more effort is not being put into this is beyond me.
Also owning a Picanto, which is a class rival, it is great to compare them alongside eachother, day to day.
What it has underlined to us, is that the Charade is a packaging miracle - it is shorter than the Picanto yet has a far bigger boot that not only has more depth, but significantly more width.
Rear legroom is the same story - there is easily 4 inches more in the Daihatsu if not more and it means a normal sized adult can travel without knees jammed against the front seats. And all this yet the Charade is 200kg lighter.
There are many points that you can compare them on, but overall, I would have no difficulty choosing the Daihatsu over the Kis, even if teh Kis is a decent enough car in its own right.
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