Fiat 500 TwinAir Plus

[DLovett]

My first brand new car.

Got this on a 3-year lease. Burnt my hands badly on a 106 Rallye, which costed me tons of money; ended up selling it with a major loss.

So far... I'm loving it!

More than enough poke for city as well as motorway driving, great soundtrack and nice spec. 140NM from 1900RPM through to 4500RPM means good poke and lots of city hooning. Revs to 6000RPM, dies out at about 4500-5000 RPM, rev band is a little short for my liking, but the power delivery is old school shove in the back, meaning a lot of fun.

It would say the handling is 'good' for a modern car. The facelifted 500 has the same underpinnings as the Ford Ka and I would rate it quite highly. Turn is good, a little too much roll for my liking and lots of grip from the wide 16" Continental Premium Contact 2's (195-45-16).

Ride is a little jittery, but not as bad as the pre-facelift 500. Certaintly miles better than my old Rallye.

Spec is very good, enjoying the part-leather seats, dark interior and Blue and Me handsfree system. Voice recognisition is not the best, but what do you expect?

Love the colour, as far as I know it's limited to the TwinAir spec.

Enough talking, here are some pictures:









Excuse the photos, I tried and failed.

[DLovett]

M5 Russ said:

Great car but you should try the Abarth 500. Its more fun to drive than my M5 especially now I have upped the boost to around 170bhp !

Thanks, but we don't get them in Denmark(the Abarth models), plus this is 95g/km and cheap insurance. In 3 years time I'll get something sligtly more exotic

[DLovett]

Otispunkmeyer said:

Really love the 500, its almost certainly on the to buy list (long lis that). Probably as a second car because of the amount of "road trip" style driving we do... Interested in hearing the 2 pot.... isn't it a bit rough? or would you say more characterful?

Not rough at all, tons of character. There is a bit of vibration at low RPM, it seems to get better and smoother as I'm running it in.

You should go for a test drive, I had a completely different idea about the engine before I test drove one(After seeing the Alonso commercial :P).

[DLovett]

M5 Russ said:

I get 35 mpg out of my Abarth ! I did not realise the new twin air was a 2 pot - wow

Edited by M5 Russ on Friday 23 September 14:56

I have gotten a steady 36 MPG out of the car so far - and I have a pretty heavy foot. It seems to be improving though, not that I'm particularly bothered about MPG. I do dodge the upcoming Copenhagen congestion charge with the 95g/KM.

It is a 2 pot, which is quite weird and special at the same time. The power delivery is sort of reminiscent of a diesel, just with a broader power band. At low revs it sound more like a moped of some sort, at higher revs more like a sporty bike engine at lower revs - hard to explain

[DLovett]

LukeSi said:

I think the run in period on these is supposedly quite long and that mpg steadily improves through out.

I can confirm this. Now getting around 42MPG without changing my driving style; about 1850 miles on the clock now.