Hi all,

I've chopped in the Stilo for another car, due to be collected next Saturday.

I havea couple of bits for sale in the classifieds icluding a Connect Nav+ unit, and a CD Changer, but on to the purpose for this post. I have been the owner of my 5 door Stilo Abarth for 13 months. In that time it has spent 4 weeks in total in a number of garages to have work carried out on it. It has shed nearly £2000 in value, and it has averaged 19 mpg overall. It has had umpteen mysterious electrical faults, it's needed to be topped up with 5 litres of oil outside of normal servicing, it has needed the following fixed, replaced or dealt with.

Needed -
New thermostat,
New AC reciever drier,
New rear exhaust box,
New front discs and pads,
New rear pads,
New fuse board on top of the battery, new auxilliary drive belt,
New Connect Nav + unit,
New CD changer,
New rear indicators x 3 pairs,
New brake lights x 2pairs,
New brake light switch,
New Alarm siren and control unit,
New Seat backrest knobs - Original fell off and was lost.
New drivers side puddle light - Original fell off and was lost.
New windscreen wiper motor due to the blades just stopping mid screen one day!

Also had

New interior mats,
Refurbished Alloy wheels,
A cracked exhaust manifold,
Stuttery take off when cold,
Really bad AC when it works at all.
Tempramental parking sensors,
Random warning mesages that come and go.

My general feeling about owning my Stilo as mixed. It has cost me a huge amount of money and I regret buying it, but it has been fun to drive, I have had no real problems with the selespeed box, or the engine so it really has been a fun car to drive fast, and the stainless back box has made it great fun to really welly, especially in tunnels.

The dealer network, of which I have had dealings with 3 different ones has been appalling. They are useless verging on intentionally so. I have had most dealings with Stoneacre, and I would genuinely advise anyone to say well clear of them. They are uniformly poor, parts, service, manners. Everything is lacking.

I think that anyone thinking about buying a Stilo, particularly an Abarth should re-consider and buy something else. These cars are clearly under developed. There are so many electrical issues that pop up, it is scary. When it came to swapping my car, I went to maybe 5 garages to look at deifferent things, and out of them 3 said they couldn't take it is as a part ex, as they would never sell it, not even at auction for anything like the cost to buy it in against a car. These are mian line dealers, one against a new car, they could not move it on. That is the reputation they have.

Now I know that soon there will be others along who will add I assume that Stilos are brilliant, reliable and dependable and that they have never had one break down. Well, neither have I. But they bug you constantly. Things like the design. The water from the windscreen runs off into a drainage channel which drops water directly onto alarm siren and the wiper motor. Why? Why do that! Just poor design. Fiat Main dealer fix? Wrap the alarm siren and motor in plastic and silcone seal it. Thats the dealer approved fix to work around poor fiat design.

I have owner 3 Fiats now, An Uno, a Tipo and the Stilo. And of them the base model Uno and Tipo were significantly more reliable and better designed than the much more modern Stilo.

If you've read this far, cheers and bye bye.

Just luck of the draw I guess - and it would seem perhaps you've been unlucky although I suspect mainly in choice of dealer.

Andymacselespeed said:

The water from the windscreen runs off into a drainage channel which drops water directly onto alarm siren and the wiper motor. Why? Why do that! Just poor design.

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I think you'll find that concept is very common in many cars.

You need to let air into the car without also letting water in and that's the purpose of the scuttle. The water is supposed to drain at either side and there's no reason why the siren or wiper motor should get a soaking as they're directly protected from rain (water may still flow underneath them in a thunderstorm though).

Obviously if the drain(s) become blocked then you have a problem.


You haven't said what car you're getting

problem with scuttle panel is lack of thought when converting to right hand drive

Argonought said:

Just luck of the draw I guess - and it would seem perhaps you've been unlucky although I suspect mainly in choice of dealer.

I think you'll find that concept is very common in many cars.

You need to let air into the car without also letting water in and that's the purpose of the scuttle. The water is supposed to drain at either side and there's no reason why the siren or wiper motor should get a soaking as they're directly protected from rain (water may still flow underneath them in a thunderstorm though).

Obviously if the drain(s) become blocked then you have a problem.


You haven't said what car you're getting

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I once had a MK2 Golf, the drains got blocked by leaves and I went out one morning after heavy rain to find 3 inches of water on the floor of the car, lucky I had a Vax to get it all out.

Anyway Im sorry you didnt have a great experience, thank you for your contributions here to my threads and others, I have learned a lot from just reading what others post. I hope you enjoy your new car and have better luck. Take care

It does seem like Petrol Stilos suffer problems a lot more than the Diesel versions do. Does anyone agree?

1.2 and 1.6 models are known to have some problems, but mainly the guy said he didn't have a problem with the engine itself, just electrical annoying stuff all over the place.

By reading this forum I went ahead and bought 2 1.8 stilos, and both of them are fine with no problems whatsoever. Got the first in 2007 and the second 2 months ago. Got the 1.8 because you guys said that they're the least to have problems, apart from the diesels, but unfortunately it would've cost almost 2000 euros extra to register one of those in Romania, because most of them are only EURO3.

I always knew the abarth was bad on almost everything, generally speaking.

Thats not restricted to stilo's. Generally aside from Turbo and filters, Diesels have less problems... well until they do go wrong that is.

I think the older 5 door abarths were a fair bit less developed than the more recent models. So i would be saying stick to the face lift models.

As for not being able to sell it. That is sort of a given in this day and age. It has nothing to do with the problems. Since the car was first built lots has changed. We are much more concerned with the environment and petrol prices have sky rocketed. Peple dont want 2.4l petrol family wagons any more. The kind of people that can afford to run such vehicles want newer and more prestige.
Im in a fairly lucky position that i own my car with a passion for owning it Something that money cant buy. Then i consider that i bought it after they fell out of favour due to the economic climate. The money i have spent modifications and TLC i have made on it must be pretty close to what i originally paid for it (not including ice). This is something that i could never have afforded to do had i got something similar from any other Manufacturer.

But your presence here has been a pleasurable one and im sorry that Fiat didnt wow you with this car. We can but learn from our mistakes and i hope your new car does you a better service. Which is by the way?

volxstu said:

But your presence here has been a pleasurable one and im sorry that Fiat didnt wow you with this car. We can but learn from our mistakes and i hope your new car does you a better service. Which is by the way?

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Many thanks. I ran a string of Alfa Romeos including the ubiquitous early 156 Selespeed that was near faultless for 3 years and 40 thousand miles. I also had a couple of fiats I the late 90s, and early 00s. The dealers then seemed so much more helpful! Maybe just me.

I have bought myself a 2005 Ford Focus C-Max 1.8 petrol in ghia trim. It's done 49k and is in really good nick. I went to a near empty Ford dealer on Saturday to chat to the chap in the parts and service department and we had a nice chat about what to look for on the kind of cars I was going to view today. He was really helpful, even after I said I had no intention of buying any bits from him. That's the kind if service that means when I need bits I WILL go and see him. It has been a pleasure on the whole to hang about here over the last year, and I may well be back if I convince my wife that she'd like a 500 as a second car.

To be honest though I doubt it as she's even more sick of the local Fiat dealers than I am! She's pining for a mito! If only the purse was deep enough.

Ford generally do a good service at their Dealerships. There failings is at the price reduction and selling expensive finance. All of which can be avoided if your savvy.

Ive never had any real dealings with Alfa round here. I may do soon though as my Dad is looking at the Giulietta for my mum. Alfa seem to be doing some very exciting stuff at the moment.
Its even hard for myself not to consider some side mounted number plate action.

Wishing you all the best with the ford mate...like you now my stilo went 5months ago for me only because I got the right part ex deal for her she'd done 102000 odd miles with fsh on 1.2 3 dr and they took her for £1200. I now own a 1.9tdi mk6 (3c) VW passat saloon.

So far so good as for the 1.2 stilo I miss her so and she never gave me trouble really so like what has already been said it just depends on the life they've had imo rather than model.

Andymacselespeed said:

The dealer network, of which I have had dealings with 3 different ones has been appalling. They are useless verging on intentionally so. I have had most dealings with Stoneacre, and I would genuinely advise anyone to say well clear of them. They are uniformly poor, parts, service, manners. Everything is lacking.

The water from the windscreen runs off into a drainage channel which drops water directly onto alarm siren and the wiper motor. Why? Why do that!

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The paragraph about the dealerships made me giggle. 'They are useless verging on intentionally so' was a particular highlight. Can't say i've had much dealings with the Fiat Dealer Network but that's in part due to their reputation, i'd rather just steer clear if i can help it. There are good dealerships, some exceptionally good, but it's patchy across the country & i can't say i've ever heard anything particularly positive about Stoneacre.

You'll be pleased to know that, not satisfied with the job they made of your Stilo drainage channel, they went one better on the Grande Punto & Alfa MiTo petrol models - fitted the alternator directly below the drainage tube. Water ran onto the alternator & then froze in the UK winter, causing the alternator belts to snap off when the car was started on an icy morning - good huh

Shadeyman said:

It does seem like Petrol Stilos suffer problems a lot more than the Diesel versions do. Does anyone agree?

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On the whole on modern cars, diesels do seem better for reliability than their petrol counterparts. With Fiats/Alfas it's slightly more model specific.

With the Pandas and 500s, it's safe to say the petrols are better. Panda Multijet had power loss issues and 500 Multijets suffer because of their DPFs, whilst the petrols remain generally problem free. Alfa 147s are generally better in diesel form, whilst some petrol engines are fragile. Generally italian autos (Sellespeed, Speedgear etc) are worse than their manual equivilent, possibly Stilo 1.6 manual as an exception.

However, Stilo's need to be broken down further. The best overall seem to be the JTD and 1.8 petrol. 1.2 petrol is okay but can have headgasket & gearbox problems. The 2.4 is usually problematic due to the gearbox & engine, weirdly in OPs case it was just about everything else that broke. The worst of the bunch seems to be the 1.6 petrol. Frequent coilpack failures, serious gearbox failures & seemingly more electrical problems make the 1.6 the one to avoid in my mind.

Anyway, to the OP, best of luck with the C-Max. They also have a less than shining reliability reputation, especially compared to other Fords.

JTD_Liam said:

Anyway, to the OP, best of luck with the C-Max. They also have a less than shining reliability reputation, especially compared to other Fords.

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Cheers!

JTD_Liam said:

Anyway, to the OP, best of luck with the C-Max. They also have a less than shining reliability reputation, especially compared to other Fords.

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Andymacselespeed said:

Cheers!

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Im sure it'll be better than the experience you had with the Stilo. You'll be loathed to know that my Stilo has so far been fine, but it's fair to say yours wasn't too special, so i'm sure the Ford will be able to do better in this instance

This is a very old thread, but I wanted to drop in and update it.

It has been 4 years nearly. I still have the Ford CMax. In that 4 years it has suffered the following.

Holed AC condensor
Broken front coil spring
Broken bonnet release cable
New stat last winter.

That's it.

I decided that utterly sensible wasn't for me, so about 3 years ago I added car 2 to the household fleet . A 2003 Alfa Romeo 156 GTA sport wagon. 3.2 litre V6 nut house. That has had a number if irritating niggles like AC temp dial stopped working, brake light switch stopped cruise engaging. Nothing serious like the Stilo.

You'll also be interested to know that Ford dealers are better set up, more courteous and generally more willing to help. Alfa dealers are as wilfully rubbish as Fiat dealers.

My ford dealer is total rubbish they always have been. Rude, unhelpful and and a really poor customer service........ The only reason I go back is that it's just around the corner and the next one is like 20 miles away..... Much to my dismay

My 1.6 is fab best car i have ever owned it had the feel of a modern car and as smooth to actually drives better than my dads new kuga

Andymacselespeed said:

This is a very old thread, but I wanted to drop in and update it.

It has been 4 years nearly. I still have the Ford CMax. In that 4 years it has suffered the following.

Holed AC condensor
Broken front coil spring
Broken bonnet release cable
New stat last winter.

That's it.

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Very disappointing. What on earth do you do with all the spare time now?

Steve148 said:

Very disappointing. What on earth do you do with all the spare time now?

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HuHum, Alfa 156 GTA. That'd be where!