General Bye Bye 500 hello Fiesta

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General Bye Bye 500 hello Fiesta

solseadog

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As i am now a granparent I need 5 doors and was looking at the Punto Twinair and the Fiesta,Ford offered me £750 more for my 500 than Fiat did 5 months ago plus £750 off the cost of my new car,Have loved the 500 but needs must ????
 
New fiestas look really nice and ford are just giving away an extra £500 for may. What version did you go for ? The little ecoboost engine is a cracker and zetec trim all you need.
 
The £500 discount is across the entire ford range and is subject to test driving an ecoboost engine. £250 is from ford for taking pcp. Discounts have always been good on the fiesta but it's no different to what is available on the panda, discounts can be found on the 500 but they are not quite as strong as the panda.

The fiesta is overpriced but then so is the 500 for what it is, but I guess so are the mini and ds3 which also compete for the same customers
 
Fiesta is a really great car. My daughter has one and in always very impressed with quality, ride, handling etc.
 
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I would def. get the Fiesta. The Panda is really ugly and no one is buying it. The amount of 500's I see on the road compared to the new panda!
The Ecoboost engine is Ford's version of the TA!
 
The Ecoboost engine is Ford's version of the TA!

Not in the slightest. Whilst it's clever, it hasn't got Multi Air. The EU6 Twin Air adds the three features that the Ecoboost has over the the EU5 TA:

Flow controlled oil pump
Electronically controlled thermostat
Exhaust manifold cast within the head, to promote much faster coolant warm up.

The EU6 TA is an engine in a higher state of technological advancement. The Ecoboost is supplied in a higher tune, but the TA has more in reserve, for sure.
 
Not in the slightest. Whilst it's clever, it hasn't got Multi Air. The EU6 Twin Air adds the three features that the Ecoboost has over the the EU5 TA:

Flow controlled oil pump
Electronically controlled thermostat
Exhaust manifold cast within the head, to promote much faster coolant warm up.

The EU6 TA is an engine in a higher state of technological advancement. The Ecoboost is supplied in a higher tune, but the TA has more in reserve, for sure.
you know I really don't know whats wrong with me to not like the TA so much = )
What can I say; it does not float my boat!
 
I don't agree on the ugly bit, and sales are picking up in the UK after Fiat woke up and started to give worthwhile discounts.

In Italy the Panda has 8% market share at the moment, so I'd hardly say no one is buying it.
8% market share on new sales or in the car market in general?
In Italy the Fiat Panda is literally free, it must be one of the cheapest cars on sale = )

That's what I mean, for sales in the UK to have anything, they have to sell them really cheap despite it being more practical and of the same build quality of the Fiat 500.
Its just not a looker!
 
8% market share on new sales or in the car market in general?
In Italy the Fiat Panda is literally free, it must be one of the cheapest cars on sale = )

That's what I mean, for sales in the UK to have anything, they have to sell them really cheap despite it being more practical and of the same build quality of the Fiat 500.
Its just not a looker!

8% of new car sales.

List prices start at €10,400. I don't know how much discount you can get off the car over there, but it would have to be close to 99% to make the car literally free.
 
I think Fiat have always been good at coming up with new engine technology but its the rest of the car that has let them down. However there does seem to be people that will deliberately say i'd never by a Fiat/Alfa because they break, yes they have a few issues but in reality no more than other manufacturers, people will buy a VW because the perceived reliability yet from my experience this isn't the case, drivers will always defend them I don't think the Panda is ugly, and to be honest there are not many cars at that price point that are seriously good looking. The 500 trades on the retro look and i think it has aged well, just like the Mk1 Ford KA, i feel that has aged well.

I have driven the 1.0 100ps ecoboost in the FOcus and it really was a nice engine, hopefully i'll get off my bum and try the TA this weekend. I would be interested to see how far a TA could be pushed though. Does anyone know the differences between the 85 and 105 ps versions ?

Ford have run the 1.0 ecoboost at 225bhp (I think) in a Formula Ford race car and there have been rumors of a 177bhp roadcar appearing.

I think a 500 TA with around 120bhp could be a fun little car, how or if that can be achieved reliably i'd be interested to find out.
 
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Not in the slightest. Whilst it's clever, it hasn't got Multi Air. The EU6 Twin Air adds the three features that the Ecoboost has over the the EU5 TA:

Flow controlled oil pump
Electronically controlled thermostat
Exhaust manifold cast within the head, to promote much faster coolant warm up.

The EU6 TA is an engine in a higher state of technological advancement. The Ecoboost is supplied in a higher tune, but the TA has more in reserve, for sure.


hi,
please enlighten me, ;)

is the TA6 in production..??,
- as in does it feature in my 2013 Punto TA..??, as I find that it takes longer to warm-up than my FIRE engines fiats :(

I like the Twin-air - especially over my FLAT 1.1 Panda,
VERY tight when new but at 2400 miles is starting to free-off nicely,

Charlie
 
I think Fiat have always been good at coming up with new engine technology but its the rest of the car that has let them down. However there does seem to be people that will deliberately say i'd never by a Fiat/Alfa because they break, yes they have a few issues but in reality no more than other manufacturers, people will buy a VW because the perceived reliability yet from my experience this isn't the case, drivers will always defend them I don't think the Panda is ugly, and to be honest there are not many cars at that price point that are seriously good looking. The 500 trades on the retro look and i think it has aged well, just like the Mk1 Ford KA, i feel that has aged well.

I have driven the 1.0 100ps ecoboost in the FOcus and it really was a nice engine, hopefully i'll get off my bum and try the TA this weekend. I would be interested to see how far a TA could be pushed though. Does anyone know the differences between the 85 and 105 ps versions ?

Ford have run the 1.0 ecoboost at 225bhp (I think) in a Formula Ford race car and there have been rumors of a 177bhp roadcar appearing.

I think a 500 TA with around 120bhp could be a fun little car, how or if that can be achieved reliably i'd be interested to find out.
Yes my mom's Golf TSI 160 DSG ran out of coolant the other day, so I put some on and then 2 days later the coolant warning light came on again and was showing no coolant! Thank god the car is leased so we just took it straight to Avis and they gave us an Audi A3 1.8 TFSI S-Tronic to play with. Decent car, but I would never spend 25,000 pounds for one.
 
hi,
please enlighten me, ;)

is the TA6 in production..??,
- as in does it feature in my 2013 Punto TA..??, as I find that it takes longer to warm-up than my FIRE engines fiats :(

I like the Twin-air - especially over my FLAT 1.1 Panda,
VERY tight when new but at 2400 miles is starting to free-off nicely,

Charlie

No, only the 105hp TA in the 500L is EU6, currently.

You'll find your engine gets better still as it approaches 10000 miles. It took at least 5000 before mine was anywhere near to how it is now (at 10.5k)..
 
Does anyone know the differences between the 85 and 105 ps versions ?

Might be worth using the search function as I wrote a thread about it. There are some important detail differences.

I think a 500 TA with around 120bhp could be a fun little car, how or if that can be achieved reliably i'd be interested to find out.

With the standard TD02 turbo on the 85PS engine, you're going to struggle above 100hp or so, as there simply isn't the capability for flow from the turbo. But the 105 has been remapped to 120+.
 
Fiat say they can get 135 bhp from the Twinair easily. But of course there are many internal differences.

The Ford engine has three cylinders, and seems to offer power plus economy, possibly more than the Twinair, but I'd like to know the real figures.

I'd like a comparison with something like the new 500L Twinair 105 and the Ford B Max Ecoboost.

And of course, Fiat has improved Twinairs in the pipeline, but at the moment, as always (Fiat :cry:), they aren't on the market yet.

I also think Ford gearboxes are very good, and this part of the powertrain, plus good ergonomics behind the wheel (but not for me unfortunately), matters a lot.

However, I really don't like the trademark pointy Ford look that applies to all their products at the moment, and the interiors aren't great either, too many buttons and styled far too much like a Klingon spaceship, circa 1990, for my liking. The Fiesta has a horrid red lit strip across the dashboard in front of the passenger which is really annoying and would even lose a sale to me, if I could bring myself to buy a Ford :D.

As for the B Max, I sat in it and practically jumped straight out, so small did it feel and so gaudy was the dashboard. And it felt really tinny.

I really can't see the point of the missing B pillar, and the door mechanisms slammed with the sound of an empty biscuit tin hitting concrete. Plus there was a trip wire connecting the rear doors to the body - Awful.

But. The Fiesta is a roomier car than the 500 and Panda, and if it offers good refinement, better economy, a better drive and better performance, plus a lower price, then the temptation has to be very real for the vast majority of people. I don't say that this is in fact the case but it is the received perception, mainly due to road test reports, and for myself I am not at all comfortable in a Fiesta, but others are, even if the cars are what I would call tin boxes on wheels with zero design interest. But punters think they look good, which is why I guess Fords sell so well. And they have lease and fleet markets sown up too of course.

I'd like to see Fiat get their uprated Twins out there soon, to compete!

By the way, when the revised fuel consumption test procedure is introduced in a couple of years, to include starts with cold engines from freezing instead of 20 degrees, and more realistic stop-start city driving, plus high speed driving, the figures for all manufacturers will be very interesting to see. At the moment all the tests are carried out at temperatures of 20 degrees + and high speed is considered to be 70 mph, and all tests are conducted on warmed engines with special lubricants :eek:
 
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