1 1.0 68 3dr Hatchback

Very good all rounder economic car; the engine struggles at low revs with the Airco on

Firstly I inherited my car from my parents (so paid £1 and a bag of chips for it, perhaps): 4 years old and 13,000 miles (i.e. barely driven). It has all the 'toys' I could ever want: Airco, Bluetooth integration with phone etc. that I missed on my old Citroen C1 that had the basic body kit.
I would never have thought to buy a Kia (who? what?) on my own initiative - and I am impressed in general. For a 2 person + load space (I hardly ever have the back seat up) it is great. I do use the load space for real haulage of hay bales, wood, sports gear, bags of sand, shopping and I keep a large emergency fuel/clothing/fluids box in most of the time. The rear gate could be lower - but not much and there are no stupid parts to catch on items as they are placed/removed (had that in previous cars; the engineers learned I think!).
The fuel economy is good to very good. I have - on the local Dual Carriageways of Teesside that are our motorways - really seen 66 mpg across 120 miles down to West Yorkshire and back; got pictures of the display and the distance / fuel receipts confirm it. But you have to be really, really careful to achieve this and doing closer to 55 mph not 60 or 70 and you are not going over the Pennines J22 to J26 at that economy. Around town and the general runs I do I'm irritated if I don't get 55 mpg on a tank even at 5 years old: and that is with everything interesting a 5-10 mile yomp on a dual carriageway with one traffic island.
Maintenance is trivial so far: nothing expensive, ever, yet. But then I'm doing low mileage, good roads and have a very gentle driving style learned from piloting bigger 'craft' (boats, aircraft, horses).
Two minor niggles:
1) The boot/trunk/hatch seems to not close properly sometimes and I've had a flat battery because of it.
2) The seatbelt doesn't retract on the driver's side as it should - hence a load of 'dings' in the door frame paint from the buckle. Apparently the mechanism could just need a grease I'm told; I'll get that done. Real soon.

To address the Motorway Noise point flagged as a negative on the main review:
Really? Never noticed....love to know what 'quiet' is like then - but then I had a C1 before which is definitively the opposite of quiet at any speed over 50 mph.

My negative points is the poor engine power at low revs - even the recommendation change points are too low. I joke the Airco button is the 'Non-Turbo' button: the 'drag' from it is really noticeable at low revs and I often turn the Airco off to accelerate away from a standing start and re-engage it after my final change upto 5th gear.

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