Very tempted
I must say I am very tempted.
What about headroom and visibility? how tall is the reviewer, (I'm 1.93 metres)?
They say good things come in small packages, and at only 3.5m long Volkswagen’s new city car is certainly small. To put that into context it is 28.5cm shorter than the unloved Fox it replaces and only 53.5cm longer than the original Mini. Volkswagen Up VW's done a good job with the styling There’s no denying VW has done a …
"He said he was 5'11" (aka 1.83m - or more correctly 13.1 linguine)."
More precisely 180.3338 cm (1.8033m) or 12.881 linguine courtesy of the Reg Online Standards Converter
My Audi A3 cab (140bhp 2.0TDi) has averaged over 50mpg in its first 15,000 miles, despite the fact that I sometimes enjoy driving it. It's fairly easy to get >60mpg even with the lid off on any trip over about 10 miles. I would have thought it would be reasonable to expect 80-90mpg out of a car like this?
You are comparing apples with pears.
The size of this thing precludes the fitting of a larger, heavier turbodiesel engine. It's intended City Car use precludes the use of a DPF and these are now mandatory on oil-burners. Thus a petrol engine is a must.
The sweet spot for fuel consumption, if you're fuel-agnostic, is the Focus size.
> You are comparing apples with pears.
Agreed, though it is possible to convert between the two. Diesel has about 12% more energy than the same volume of petrol, and correspondingly releases about 12% more CO2. (See, for example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_fuel#Fuel_value_and_price)
For a diesel car to have the same CO2 emissions as a petrol car that does 52mpg, it would need to do 52 * 1.12 = 58mpg.
> The sweet spot for fuel consumption, if you're fuel-agnostic, is the Focus size.
It depends on the type of driving. There are three main things that cause you to use fuel. Changing momentum, overcoming air resistance, and overcoming friction with the road.
For city driving, changing momentum is the dominant cause of fuel usage, since you spend a lot of time accelerating and decelerating, and you are going slowly enough for air resistance to not matter. The way to reduce this fuel usage is to reduce the weight of the car, hence city cars are small and lightweight. Since air resistance is neglible at low speeds, they don't need to be as aerodynamic.
For motorway driving, air resistance is dominant, since the force is proportional to the speed of the car cubed* but you don't change speed much. Here, reducing the car's weight doesn't have much of an effect, but making the car more aerodynamic does. This is why bigger cars can achieve high fuel economy for motorway driving.
Friction of tyres on the road is usually smaller than the other two causes of fuel usage, but chunky off road tyres are less efficient than slicker road tyres (unless you actually are off road, in which cases having the wheels spin road without you moving anywhere is infinitely inefficient).
*ignoring wind for simplicity
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That's what I was thinking, I'm not sure where you're winning here with the Up!, although admittedly it is a very nicely packaged car. I get 50+ MPG from my '07 diesel Astra Estate, which I can then haul almost anything around in at will, instead of being stuffed in a tiny box.
How about giving it some unique character? Get the 1.2 TDI from the Polo Bluemotion, stick it under the boot, raise that boot floor to be completely flat when the back seats are down, stuff the spare tyre in the space where the engine used to be at the front.
A unique 4 seater RWD hatch, and I guarantee with that engine on board, you'll get absolutely ridiculous economy.
Uh... Or you could put an 8.0 litre W16 mid-chassis, throw in some radiators and ramp up the map to 1,000hp, like Bugatti did. That would be fun, too, right?
Unfortunately it's not the car on review, which is a small, city, petrol. As a commenter above has already pointed out, this is an extremely good economy for this type of car.
Reading a review of a car and then saying "why didn't they..." and coming up with a completely different concept is a bit, well, giraffe.
Yes but the only thing you want from a small city car is good MPG.
It's like building an 1000hp 8L V16 and saying well it isn't fast but what do you expect from a supercar?
The only reason for not fitting a diesel is to sell it in the US, and the US aren't going to buy a family car that you can't fit 6kids and 36 cupholders in.
Come on pals, this is a PETROL engine. My own 2011 Polo that likely sports a close cousin of this engine (3 cylinders, 1200CC) eats between 5.2L/100km and 6.0L/100. This converts to 54-47 mpg in your strange units if I'm not misled (most online converters seem to be for US gallons). I think it's pretty decent for a petrol engine, so at 50 mpg the Up is in the same ballpark.
You call that shrunk? My fleet of Sirion Mk3s (I got two - 2003 and 2004) is 3.68 m in length (only 18 cm longer) and they have nearly double the luggage space, 5 doors, can seat 4 adults properly or 3 adults and two kids. VW still has a lot to learn in terms of interal space optimization and design :)
You call that fun to drive? The Sirions can hit 0-60 in 8s and the 4x4 can go onto country roads with several inches of soft mud on them from a weekly bout of torrential rain (like the one we are having now in the UK or the one they had in Europe in mid may). Now that is what I call fun to drive :)
They also do 52mpg if driven sensibly (very difficult with a car that goes like the proverbial clappers and growls like an angry bullterrier about to break off its leash). So VW economy is also just barely on par with a 2003 car.
One word: Meah.... Not impressed, not impressed... At all..
It looks good, I love the way the sat nav integrates with the stereo and vehicle systems.
But I have to agree with others 50-52 mpg from a 1L petrol engine, that's really poor, should be knocking on the door of at least 60 mpg.
We've just picked up a Fiesta 1.6 TDCi ECOnetic and the first 200 miles we're getting 57mpg!
So it is not a bad copy of a long list of better designed, better executed and more fun to drive cars by Daihatsu and Suzuki?
We have seen only some of them in Europe and even the ones we have seen have been crippled by Toyota (Daihatsu) and GM (Suzuki) marketing. In Japan they have had ~10+ models across all manufacturers in this class at any give time for the last 30+ years. Hyundai and Kia also do cars in that category (Amica, Atoz, i10, Picanto, etc). If you want to "drawn" in a sea of cars in that category you need to go to the far east.
In any case, VW is neither original, nor the best in class. Its only redeeming feature is that it is VW which for some strange reason makes some people have a hard on and give it unjustified 0.95 reviews.
no mention of the other VAG cars based on the same platform, that are cheaper if you are not a badge snob
look at the Seat Mii, or the Skoda Citigo
the skoda is better equiped, cheaper and has been available in 5 door format since launch unlike the VW up which will not have a 5 door variant until q4 2012 or even q1 2013
in the auto express group test the skoda was more economical than the other 2, better equiped and cheaper like for like factory fit options
These tiny cars aren't my cup of tea, but I'm not fond of expensive german badges either.
If the other half wanted a small car, I'd recommend a Skoda Citigroup.
Generally, according to warranty websites, they're better thrown together than their german compatriates.
(Mine would have to be the Octavia VRS though.)
Saw one of these "UP!"s the other day. In white. Didn't like the design, too cold, clinical and germanic. Like driving around in an iPod.
And whats the exclamation mark about? "Ja, dis is ein fun wagen. See der exclamation mark!"
I was at the Frnkfurt Motor Show where this car was unveiled.
Walking along the fleet of cars looking at the number plates:
Red Car - Red Up!
Blue Car - Blue Up!
Yellow Car - Yellow Up!
Green Car - Green Up!
White Car - White Up!
wait for it...
Black Car - Black Up!
All it was missing was Jazz hands and the horn saying "Maaaaammmmmmmmy" when you pushed it...
I've heard that there's a customisable version in the offing. The purchaser will be able to specify individual panel colours, choose from a range of window tints, add a variety of styling accessories and also pick one of a wide selection of interior trim levels and materials.
Create a car that is unique: Up Yours.
There is a reason most modern cars don't go down that route, cheap it maybe but it is noisy, just try the Aygo or one of its identicals by other makes. Another tiny impractical pseudo eco-box with real world economy way below its claims and rivaled by other much more practical cars.
Agreed. I still can't reconcile the comments of "typical premium VW finish" with the amount of bare metal on the interior surfaces (the dash is actually a plastic insert, painted in body colour, though). This is a cost-cutting measure, and nothing else.
The Up is good, but the new Fiat Panda is so much better in every way barring the badge-snobbery, perhaps, although the current Panda seems to enjoy something of a following as a statement against this sort of thing.
I should come clean here and admit I spent most of my week driving the Up with my right foot buried in the carpet - it being someone else's car and petrol. Had it been my car and fuel I'm pretty sure I could have got 60+mpg from it. My actual figure of 52mpg is probably the very worst you would get.
I was reading a comparison between the Up! and the current Panda.
The Panda won.
I can undersand this. Last summer I rented a virtually brand new Panda in Spain and loved it.
Just before that The wife had bought a new Ford Ka and I commented on the similarity of lots of the driver interfaces. It turns out that the Panda, the Ka and the Fiat 500 are effecvtivy the same car (with minor differences) coming off the same production lines somewhere in the Czech Republic.
For me the panda is way the better car - and it has 4 doors.
From what I remember, Top Gear (the mag not the show) also put the Panda ahead.
I ike that city-breaking thing though, I could use that.
The car you had was the previous-model Panda, and it is indeed the basis of both the Ford Ka and Fiat 500 (and the Lancia/Chrysler Ypsilon). While the newest Panda (launched this year) has returned to Italy, the 500 and Ka are still both made in the same FIAT plant in Poland.
Ford did the cosmetic design for the Ka, based on FIAT's platform, but then completely outsourced the development of the car to FIAT, which makes it fun to see comments from reviewers in the likes of "What Car?" that claimed that the Ka would be mechanically more reliable than the 500, being a Ford.. (the only mechanical difference between the cars is a different rear suspension arm and dampers; everything else is 100% identical, and all FIAT).
The Up isn't a bad car - it's very good, and a world away from VW's previous efforts at this size. But it's not the best.
In Europe these pregnant roller skates are OK for city driving only but if you venture outside the city you are a rolling accident looking fo a place to happen. I have seen the not so Smart cars in Germany hold up a line of cars on rural roads because they could not accelerate up to 100 kph with two passengers in the vehicle. This makes these vehicles suicide rides as they infuriate everyone else on the roadway and a large lorry can blow them into the ditch when passing by.
In the U.S. where they have grossly sized SUV's, these things along with the not so Smart cars are death traps when hit by a huge, oversized and overweight SUV.
I'm following a lot of german car magazines.
Usually they are extremely positive about any car that comes from the Volkswagen group.
But when you read the user comments the picture is very different.
German motor press is sponsored by Volkswagen.
I really really hope that isn't the case with you.
Ok its a decent small car, but i'm sorry it's not that good.
There are many better alternaitves
Read up on DPFs. http://www.stocksy.co.uk/articles/Cars/diesel_particulate_filters_dpfs_and_rising_oil_levels_the_uk_government_demonstrates_the_law_of_unintended_consequences/). I did when I noticed my engine oil was increasing and I was forced to draw approx 1.2l of oil out via the dipstick to prevent engine meltdown! This is on a car which gets a 60 mile motorway thrashing 5 days a week i.e. not a city car with a blocked DPF.
I will never buy another diesel car and cars like this are the future as far as I'm concerned. The only problem is the waiting list. Won't get mine until September at the earliest.
there have been a lot of adverts in Farmers Weekly recently for the last generation of tractors with Stage 3A compliant engines for similar reasons. Means you don't get issues with EGR (and having to occasionally rev the nuts off the engine to clear it out every now and then according to a JD dealer I've heard) or having to use AdBlue with the extra cost of topping that up.
Don't get me started on biodiesel... of all the things to waste land and real diesel making...
<<Despite the piddly little motor, the Up can get quite a move on. The 0-62mph sprint is dispatched in 13.2 seconds>>
0 to 100 km/h in 13.2 is truck territory. Where's the fun when all other cars are passing you by, even if that wiper motor that passes as an engine in this car is screaming (whining?) at full speed.
VW makes a really economical car that is actually useful: Passat Diesel.
Seems like it's better than the new Micra in small city car territory, but not a lot else. I can't understand the reviewer's love for it, bar that he got to thrash it about on someone else's dime for a bit. Which really is the best thing about these sorts of cars! I've had to family-size up to a Note from the old Micra and I sort of miss just leaving the pedal planted to the floor the whole time.
As for fuel consumption, this is a petrol car and not a diesel one. Modern diesels are not appropriate to the "city car" concept like the old ones were. The paraphernalia required to stop the fumes killing us all clogs up too easily under those conditions. Also, in my personal experience, the smaller engines may deliver a higher optimal MPG but they go south in a very big hurry with even a slight over-use of the right foot. My bigger, heavier 1.6L Note doesn't deliver real-world mileage much below the 1.2L Micra it replaced. A lot of that is in the fact that it's perfectly happy to schlep along in 4th in town, which would make the Micra choke and die. It's also partly that it's now dangerous to just drive around with my foot on the floor. :)
Is this "UP!" car from some people here in sillycon valley. I thought that Yahoo! was the only brand that had a '!' in its name.
Now for a comparison: The original VW Bug had a 36 HP engine until about 1960, and then it went up to a whopping 40 HP. All with a 1200 cc engine. I drove a 1964 one, and 'upgraded' it to a little peppier 1400 cc. It found hills a little easier after that. Of course in the 60's VW Bugs sold for $1995 (they put it on a billboard).