LIKE most things that come out of a Kia factory these days, the Rio is now a full-on worthy addition to any potential car buyers shopping list.
Kia’s become very much a design led company since the day they persuaded Peter Schreyer to say auf wiedersehen to Audi and hang his coat on the back of the door marked Chief Design Officer.
AN SUV for the price of a supermini? Don’t mind if I do.
Dacia’s Duster is a small and tough SUV that costs about the same as a small hatchback, but offers a bit more space along with some Tonka toy looks.
It’s at the opposite end of the spectrum from the class leading SEAT Ateca and Nissan Qashqai, but offers pretty decent value for your money.
AUDI continue to prove that when it comes to doing business, motorists are still beating a path to their showroom doors, evidence that the German premium brand remains relatively unaffected by the downward pressures in the high street.
Indeed, the march to the top of the wish list for both business and private buyers is given a helping hand by a range that not so very long ago boasted just 10 models but which now has a dizzying choice on offer.
Take the latest A5 Coupe. A decent number of motorists will, and won’t be too disappointed with their choice.
A CITROEN C3 might not be the car you’d turn to to travel back and forth from your ‘other’ house in France on a regular basis, but we have friends who did just that – on a regular basis.
A competent little car in the past, the main bugbear being that while you could load it to the gunwhales, they were pretty compact and bijou gunwhales.
How they would have loved the new middle age spread and slightly porkier C3 you can exchange your cash for.
PEUGEOT pandered in the past to the French obsession with creating MPVs – cars that could transport Rene and his growing family around in a spacious and safe motorised environment.
But times change – and so have Peugeot. Now 3008 stands very much for a car of the 21st century that is much more SUV than MPV in looks and all round ability.
What we have here is a chunky looking crossover that has its own distinct stand-out look to set it apart from the mass market medium-sized SUVs that just about every other manufacturer has in its brochure. This one has a muscular presence that you’ll have to look long and hard to find in any other showroom and its high sides and smallish window area give it a sporty hint too.
FOR a car so small, it’s perhaps surprising that Suzuki’s IGNIS is catching so many eyes.
It’s dimensions are so compact you could easily miss it in a queue of traffic – except for the fact that it has a highly distinctive look and cheeky appeal.
A scaled down Tonka toy off roader look in a car that will earn its crust plying the Queen’s highways and byeways with a full complement of adults and offspring aboard.
LOOKS like Nicole has definitely got her bus pass – ZOE is set to be the Renault name on the lips of motorists in the future.
That’s because Papa – and you too – now has a car that goes a long way (!) to dispel the ‘range anxiety’ worries of earlier fully electric vehicles.
Zoe has upped the stakes.
ONE week it’s driving a five litre V8, the next a three pot 12 valve one litre under the bonnet – but in reality, Hyundai’s one cylinder short of a full stack engine isn’t the anti climax you might anticipate.
There’s a distinctly more sporty design to the i20 Coupe when you line it up alongside the more staid five door model.
There’s a more distinctive, sporty look to the Coupe, highlighted by the front grille and its sloping roofline at the rear, which has a slimmed down black C pillar to emphasise the difference between 3 and 5 door i20s.
THE Lexus RC F has got more letters after its name than General Sir Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett and has about the same level of sanity…..
Here is a car that demands full on foot down bravado to extract the very best from it, a car that demands ultra high levels of concentration to ensure you always stay in control.
And while there’s an eco light on the dashboard, and you can in fact select eco mode, something with a naturally aspirated five litre V8 engine shoehorned in under the bonnet is hardly going to be sipping its way through the tanker sized fuel tank. Not with a 4.5 second hurtle to 62mph and an electronically limited top speed of 168mph available to your right boot.
IT’S getting tougher out there for manufacturers, as various sectors of the market see more and more new, interesting or revamped models vying for your cash.
And probably none more so than in the MPV market, where families with more than your average 2.4 children are scouting round for the best – and safest – way to transport the anklebiters.
Vauxhall launched its Zafira people carrier back in 1999 and its latest incarnation, called the Tourer, has become even more of an up market family mover in terms of the space it offers and the quality of the interior. A much needed and welcome improvement over the original.