Wanted. Small car.

[Mick F]

Good morning guys.
Yesterday was interesting.
Mrs Mick F and me bicker and argue a lot, and yesterday was no exception. Nothing ever serious, but we do bicker, but make up in the end after coming to some compromise or other. 44 years of marriage, so we're on the right track somewhere.

It's funny that when you have some sort of fixed ideas, then you look at stuff in the flesh, your ideas change?

We saw the Peugeot 108 and it was horrible. It was claustrophobic inside and cramped. It seems like they've tried to fit a big car inside a small car and everything was overpowering. We didn't stay long, but in retrospect, we should have looked at the 208 .......... though I doubt we'd have liked it.

From there, after a spot of shopping and driving to Lanivet for a fish and chips lunch, we headed right down the A30 to the far end of Truro to Mazda to look at the Mazda 2. This car was OK, though the build quality left something to be desired. The one we looked at in the showroom had "orange peel" paintwork in places, the bodywork shut lines were poor, and the rear light cluster had sharp exposed edges when you opened the rear hatch. Also, it was a bit too big.

After going right through Truro city centre, we headed up the A39 to Honda and had a good look at the Jazz. We were absolutely smitten by it. Excellent build quality, the rear seat fold down system is brilliant, as they fold easily and you basically end up with an estate car. Mrs Mick F wants one ........... so that's a definite plus.

Then, we went into Toyota. I want the Yaris Hybrid. Mrs Mick F is concerned that it's too quirky and she won't want to drive it.
The build quality is excellent and as good as the Jazz, but we didn't fold down the rear seats to see how they work. TBH, at this point at Toyota, we'd had enough of looking at cars for the day, and we still had an hour's drive home to do, so we didn't really look at the Yaris enough.

Whilst there at Toyota, we swapped contact details and we plan in the next week or two to take a Yaris out for a test drive. The salesman said we can try the manual as well as the hybrid. After doing that ............ and bickering again no doubt ............. we should know if we fancy a Yaris or not. Give it a few days, then we'll contact Honda to arrange a test drive of the Jazz.

Meanwhile, we still need to look at Ford B-Max - don't like the shape of the Fiesta in the slightest. The VW Up! is too small so we'll look at the Polo. Somehow, I doubt very much that we'll go for either of them.

The Jazz is the front runner, and it's going to be a hard one to beat.

[comfortablynumb]

Hi Mick,
Thanks for the update. Good idea to go back to the Toyota fresh another day. Do have Mrs F drive it, she will find it really simple and wonder why all other non hybrids are so hard to drive, it's other cars which are "quirky"
Never driven the Jazz but heard good reports on them too. Speaking to a chap last week who's had the Dual Mass Flywheel break up on a Ford B Max less than 20,000 miles and around £1000 to fix. Ford totally disinterested.
Are you aware of the Honest John car review site?
Good luck, Steve.

[Mick F]

Yes, Mrs Mick F will have a drive at any car we test drive. Unless she's happy, the car would be rejected. I have to be happy too, but I'm more capable at driving and coping with different stuff than she is. She wants a predictable, simple and normal car, and I want an entertaining and interesting one and I'm not afraid of technology and gadgets.

I've been Googling lots, and Honest John comes up as a site regularly.

[squeaker]

Thanks for the update....

+1. As one running a '98 Clio I'm reading this with interest
Was the Jazz a new one? Can't say I like the latest Honda front ends - saw a Civic in the open yesterday - hideous plastic angles

[thirdcrank]

... but we didn't fold down the rear seats to see how they work. ...

Bearing in mind the importance you attach to load carrying rather than passengers, this is something that merits attention because there's been a move to prioritise passenger safety over load capacity which, AFAIK, applies across the board; presumably this is an international standard of some sort.

In essence, the traditional system whereby the rear seats were fastened with some variation of a hinge at their front, and tipped forwards to form a flat(tish) load floor and usually a low bulkhead behind the driver, has been replaced with one which has the seat base fixed to the floor and the backs hinge forward, resulting in a load area which isn't as flat. I've no idea if there are exceptions to this, but if there are, I suspect it will only be because some models still haven't been changed.

(One reason I know about this is that my Mark1 Yaris had a really flexible system for the rear seats and the one we bought in 2010 didn't. )

[bigjim]

... but we didn't fold down the rear seats to see how they work. ...

Bearing in mind the importance you attach to load carrying rather than passengers, this is something that merits attention because there's been a move to prioritise passenger safety over load capacity which, AFAIK, applies across the board; presumably this is an international standard of some sort.

In essence, the traditional system whereby the rear seats were fastened with some variation of a hinge at their front, and tipped forwards to form a flat(tish) load floor and usually a low bulkhead behind the driver, has been replaced with one which has the seat base fixed to the floor and the backs hinge forward, resulting in a load area which isn't as flat. I've no idea if there are exceptions to this, but if there are, I suspect it will only be because some models still haven't been changed.

(One reason I know about this is that my Mark1 Yaris had a really flexible system for the rear seats and the one we bought in 2010 didn't. )

The rear seats in my 2002 Yaris slide forward, down and under the front seats to give a flat floor space. Ingenius but I have not seen it in any other car.

[thirdcrank]

... The rear seats in my 2002 Yaris slide forward, down and under the front seats to give a flat floor space. Ingenius but I have not seen it in any other car.

We particularly liked the way the entire back seat could be slid forward to increase the load area quite a bit without any faffing, or folded as you describe to get the max capacity. That's all history for anybody buying one new.

BTW, at one point I was tempted by the Verso, but I had my doubts about the weird shape, which in the event never caught on. One of the things that put me off was quite trivial: when I looked at one in the showroom, somebody must have been exploring it because everything inside was a mess. That convinced me to buy a Berlingo (my unfortunate experience with that have been well-catalogued on here so I won't go through it all again, but it had loads of room, especially with the back seats completely removed, which only took a couple of minutes with a Torx key. That model of Berlingo is also history, although there are plenty still on the road. Other people were luckier than me.)

[al_yrpal]

Which magazine assessment...

1 Yaris Hybrid
2 Audi A1 = Skoda Fabia
3 Yaris
4 Alfa Mito = Polo
5 Jazz
6 Mini

Jazz and Jazz Hybrid are Number 1 in s/h best buys = Suzuki Swift

Al

[bigjim]

but I had my doubts about the weird shape, which in the event never caught on.

Yes it is a bit quirky. My wife's work colleagues call it the Popemobile. I quite like it but I suppose you get used to it. Plus, at 6' 2" I like the leg and headroom. There are quite a few round here, but I think it may be a Toyota Longevity thing. I see a lot of them in Europe. At least they are different. I too like the Berlingo but was never convinced about reliability.

[thirdcrank]

... I too like the Berlingo but was never convinced about reliability.

I liked mine, except that it convinced me about its unreliability. In round figures, in 2002, a diesel Berlingo was about £8K and a Yaris Verso £13K. I must nearly have made up the difference in 7½ years ownership and not a huge mileage. There was also a lot of work done free during the warranty period.

[francovendee]

Had another chance to try a friends new Honda Jazz. Loved it last time and love it even more now. Really brilliant small car. Visibility all round is very good and space inside is amazing for a car of this length.
Still very interested in what you end up with, maybe none mentioned and something left field.

[Bonefishblues]

Which magazine assessment...

1 Yaris Hybrid
2 Audi A1 = Skoda Fabia
3 Yaris
4 Alfa Mito = Polo
5 Jazz
6 Mini

Jazz and Jazz Hybrid are Number 1 in s/h best buys = Suzuki Swift

Al

The good news is that there isn't a bad car amongst them. I do think that the Toyota hybrid system is particularly clever and likely to be very useful on Cornish hills, giving really good torque when needed.

[Mick F]

Thanks for the update....

+1. As one running a '98 Clio I'm reading this with interest
Was the Jazz a new one? Can't say I like the latest Honda front ends - saw a Civic in the open yesterday - hideous plastic angles

Yes, we went into the showrooms ........... mainly because the cars were open and unlocked so you could see inside and have a play.
Yes, modern cars don't look very good these days.

We spent the day in Plymouth shopping and having lunch today. We called in at Noah's Ark pub and sat outside on the street as it was too noisy inside ....... football on the telly.
The taxis came and went, and one was a Toyota Prius, and whilst it was waiting outside the pub, I went over and chatted to the driver.

He said that he wouldn't have any other car than a Toyota hybrid. He said that there's nothing to go wrong with them and that they are very easy to drive and simple and you don't have to think about them.

He showed me his trip computer.
The car had done 143,000odd miles (can't remember the exact figure) and he told me that it had done it all around the city and locally, and he also showed me that his trip computer was reset at 202miles and it had done 62.8mpg since then.
During the day, we saw two other Prius taxis, and each one of them sailed past in almost silence with none of that rattly diesel noise of normal mini-cab noises.

Impressive stuff ........... and the best part, is that Mrs Mick F was impressed too.

[thirdcrank]

Something else that I don't think has been mentioned is the trend with spare wheels, or rather lack of. The introduction of temporary spare wheels was delayed in the UK by a police insistence that they did not comply with the Con & Use Regs. That's history, but more recently, there's been a widespread move by manufacturers to provide no spare wheel at all, but rather some version of a gunge aerosol which should get you home, or not as the case may be. Apart from saving the cost of the spare wheel, the weight reduction helps with the all-important EU fuel consumption figures.

Even if it does get you home, you then have a gunge-filled tyre which most tyre firms will press you to replace because they don't want to mess about cleaning out the gunge.

IME, this is something that car salesmen skirt round, because they know that anybody with grey hair is unlikely to fall for the twaddle about free breakdown membership and all the rest of it. Fine words are useless when you are miles from anywhere with a gashed tyre, possibly no phone signal and bad weather has the AA/RAC at full-stretch.

My own horror story involves my wife's niece and her family. Crimbo 2015 they booked a holiday cottage in Wales. They gashed a tyre in the dark and in pouring rain. Tyre wrecked, but no spare. Car loaded to the gunwales and two small children, including one with learning disabilities. No phone signal. They were nearly at their accommodation and they managed to contact the farmer who owned it. He rescued them, but recovery service quoting a wait in years rather than hours. When they replaced their car a few months later, a full-size spare was numero uno on the shopping list.

So, when you are checking things like how the back seats fold down, ask to see the spare and if there is one in the showroom, get confirmation there'll be one for you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1W4rVtT4Ok

[old_windbag]

Yes the fiesta comes with a foam kit. But once used on a tyre it's more often than not binned because of the mess inside tyre. The boot has the space for a standard spare( not spacesaver ) and the foam kit just sat in a polystyrene filler tray. I got the garage to put in the full spare with tools in place of foam kit( it was second hand car and there were new to swap with ). At purchase new the foam kit is standard, spare wheel an option. It makes a small breakdown for puncture into towing event if the tyre has bigger damage that just a nail in it. Some cars don't even have the space for a spare, its foam kit only.

A very retrograde step in my view.