2.0fsi or 1.2tsi

[Ashley Weightman]

Hello all,

Thinking of buying a car soon to replace my current car as It's giving me a head ache due to a few problems. Not brand new as I can only afford used. The cars I'm looking at are a 2.0fsi Golf, Leon or A3. I've seen a few on autotrader for around the £2,000 mark. I've also been looking at the mk1 BMW 120i 150bhp which is also the same price roughly.

However if I save for a few months longer I'd be tempted to buy a SEAT Leon 1.2TSI 110 or Mercedes A160. Being newer cars they're more expensive obviously.

The question I'm asking is which would I be better off buying performance wise? My current car has a 1.2 72bhp/77lbft and I want something quite a bit faster but not too mental. The first cars mentioned are all naturally aspirated 150bhp/148lbft which would be more powerful than the more modern Leon and A class with 110bhp/133lbft. However those two are turbocharged. On the road would the two more modern engines feel faster than the older 2.0fsi's? Or is there too much of a gap in outright power?

Sorry for the long winded approach, new to the site. All answers appreciated

[Macron]

Budget would help. Are you saying £2k tops? Or may be available?

If so I've got to be honest, I think you'll have more pressing concerns than "performance" at that price. Like running costs, reliability etc.

This will likely be moved to the Car Buying subforum in about 3 minutes where helpful folk will ask more questions.

[Sensibleboy]

The 2.0 FSi is fairly rare isn't it? Longer term could you struggle to sell it ? 1.2 TSi might be more desirable to buyers once you've done with it.

[Baldchap]

The power and torque curves for the turbocharged lumps will probably have a bigger area underneath them. This means that whilst peak power and torque may be lower than the larger N/A engines, the turbo lumps produce more power and torque across more of the rev range - I.e. for more of the time. It's worth bearing in mind that unless you're a tit, you almost certainly don't drive everywhere almost bouncing off the rev limiter (i.e. at peak power in an N/A car). You'll probably find the turbo car is at peak torque from something like 1500RPM to 4500RPM, then peak power from there to almost redline. This engine flexibility is often called driveability.

You need to test drive both. Having had a 1.2 Leon as a hire car, I was astonished how well it drive for 'just a 1.2', but you might hate it.

[Pica-Pica]

We have the Fabia 1.2 TSi, but it is ‘only’ 90ps, not 110ps. However, it pulls quite well from low down. If you drive on motorways that have long hills, it will struggle. So your 1.2 Leon should be fine for town and country driving, but for sustained motorway driving, it may struggle a bit.

[defblade]

Watch out for the timing chain issues on the older tsi's:
https://www.adamlewin.co.uk/vw-mk5-golf-tsi-engine...
is a good starter on the topic...

(That helped narrow my choice down to the newer version of the engine... but at a higher budget... (If it helps: the newer version of the 1.2 drives very much like a 2 litre IMO, so long as the revs are over about 1400/1500... don't let it drop lower though as there is absolutely nothing below that!))

[stevemcs]

Avoid the older 2.0FSi, you would be better off spending 2k on a Focus or Astra.

[ZX10R NIN]

If you want a decent car that has good performance then a Astra 1.6T SRI 180 is a good pick at the 2k ish mark:

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

Or the later 1.4T SRI 140

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

1.4T Megane GT Line TomTom

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

If you can live with something smaller then the Alfa Mito in 155 Veloce spec is worth a look:

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

Leftfield

IS250

https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

[tallpaul26]

Performance wise, the 2.0 fsi is ok in a Golf sized car. However, past a certain age/mileage they start drinking oil. I put 50k miles on an 04 Golf GT and by the end (@100k) it was using about 1L of oil per 1000 miles. I traded it in.

Other than that it was very reliable. Apart from consumables the only other costs were replacement of 2 broken springs. BUT, you’re basically talking about a shed now, so any car could be hiding problems either due to neglect or shear age.

[Ashley Weightman]

Thanks for the replies guys. Good to get a few different opinions; I appreciate it. I think I'm going to test drive some of the cars and decide if I want something with a 2.0 150bhp or smaller turbocharged engine.

Cheers

[BuzzBravado]

Pica-Pica said:

We have the Fabia 1.2 TSi, but it is ‘only’ 90ps, not 110ps. However, it pulls quite well from low down. If you drive on motorways that have long hills, it will struggle. So your 1.2 Leon should be fine for town and country driving, but for sustained motorway driving, it may struggle a bit.

I'm quite happy with our 90ps 1.2TSI as well. Its no rocket ship but it pulls nice enough. The only downside is it sounds a bit like a diesel, but i'm putting that down to direct injection.

OP, the 90PS becomes 110PS with a simple remap, or 130PS if you push it. They are the same engine, its just that the higher spec models got the higher output, presumably to help sales.

[Trevor555]

BuzzBravado said:

I'm quite happy with our 90ps 1.2TSI as well. Its no rocket ship but it pulls nice enough. The only downside is it sounds a bit like a diesel, but i'm putting that down to direct injection.

Is there something wrong with it?

We have two of these cars in the family (2015 & 2016) with this engine and you can hardly hear them when running.

I think I read somewhere that they can suffer from a noisy fuel pump.

[BuzzBravado]

Trevor555 said:

Is there something wrong with it?

I dont think so. We bought it at low mileage and its always made a noise. I'm not talking old clattery diesels but a modern quiet diesel. Either way it is not as smooth as other petrol 4's i've had.