What new car to get??

Kilty_2

The difference between £6050 and £7895 is £1845. The difference between £5550 and £7895 is £2345

Picanto is 3 star, but meh. A bad enough crash in any small car is going to leave you smarting a bit :rotfl:

bigjl

Thought you meant £2 grand more than a Twingo Kilty.

I still maintain that to spend £2000 under budget to get an inferior and less safe vehicle is a bad decision.

However my viewpoint may be different as I have seen what happens when a 5 Star NCAP car is in collision with a 3 Star NCAP car, it isn't pretty and no, the 3 Star car doesn't win that particular battle.

I once saw a Chevrolet Matiz hit up the !!!! at under 20 mph by an unladen Transit Connect, the connect was almost undamaged, just a scuff on the bumper and a broken headlight, the Matiz got pushed into the Merc C Class in front and was bent like a banana, seats had bent backwards, steering wheel airbag went off and gave the driver a huge friction burn to her arm.

According to NCAP the Matiz is a 3 Star car, but they have crossed thorugh the 3rd star for some reason, maybe it was a 2 1/2 Stars, LOL.

If you have a budget of £8000, as the op does, it is best to spend as much of it as possible and get yourself into as safe and reliable a car as possible.


Renault have always been good at superminis, and as far as safety goes they are up there with the best.

I believe the current Clio, introduced in 2006 but recently facelifted, was one of the first superminis to get 5 NCAP Stars.

The Clio is certainly better than any Renault I have owned or driven. Though I did like my Renault 25 TX back in the day, a massive car with sofas for seats.

grimsalve

Kilty wrote: »

Nice company car choice that'll be I reckon. Don't think I'd have one though.

Don't like the Auris as a whole - it built upon the reputation of the Corolla and doesn't live up to it. Had a couple of month old one from a large hire company - 7k on the clock and the dash plastics looked very tired :eek:

What amazes me even more is that Lexus have just brought out the CT200h - basically a "pimped out Auris" - starting price £23k

jase1

NCAP ratings are fairly meaningless when a big car hits a smaller one. The test is done against an immovable target.

A large, older 3-star car will make mincemeat of a newer 5-star one in a high-speed head-on. The 3-star car probably won't be in a very good state either, but NCAP isn't the be-all and end-all.

jase1

grimsalve wrote: »

What amazes me even more is that Lexus have just brought out the CT200h - basically a "pimped out Auris" - starting price £23k

Well if Audi can do it with the A1..... or the A3 for that matter!

bigjl

jase1 wrote: »

NCAP ratings are fairly meaningless when a big car hits a smaller one. The test is done against an immovable target.

A large, older 3-star car will make mincemeat of a newer 5-star one in a high-speed head-on. The 3-star car probably won't be in a very good state either, but NCAP isn't the be-all and end-all.

No, it won't.

The test is done against the same immovable target.

A 3 Star car is a 3 Star car end of story.

I take it you didn't see the test done by, I think, 5th Gear when the hit a Volvo 960 estate or small car with a decent NCAP rating.


Though I can tell you from personal experience that a Clio makes a hell of a mess of an oldish Merc E-Class, the occupants of the Clio walked out, all the doors opened fine, no injuries, the occupants of the merc was a different story.

Another incident was a 206, that hit a Daewoo Espero head on, on a flyover on the A13, the occupants of the 206, uninjured, walking about, the driver of the Espero, had a compound femur fracture.

Please try and keep your comments factual, as your comment will only encourage people to ignore NCAP before they select a car for the use of their family.

You may notice that cars used by the Police and Ambulance services tend to be NCAP 5 Star rated, Zafira, Astra, BMW's, Volvo etc.

You do actually appreciate what NCAP is a measurment of?

You do realise that newer cars are much heavier than cars of the same class from years gone by, it is this extra weight that gives the extra protection.

Size isn't the be all and end all.

Unless you hit a bus or truck where you will come off second best in all cars.

Do you actually understand what the NCAP ratings actually measure, the reason they use the same object to hit and the speeds and angles are kept the same is so that the individual car can be judged in the same accident.

knightstyle

Hyundai i10 1.2 with alloys etc. £7,338.33 OTR looks like a good deal. good ride and solid build. Go for a test drive and try to get cheaper for one in stock.

jase1

Yes, and conversely I have seen the mess a Primera made in a head-on collision with a 5-star Fiat 500. Neither car was pretty afterwards but the Fiat fared worse.

The relative car masses make a *lot* of difference. Simple physics. The heavier car will impart a greater force on the lighter one than vice-versa.

The test is only part of the story. If I was transporting kids around I wouldn't be putting them in a small car, 5-star or no 5-star.

I wouldn't put them in a 3-star car either, but that is beside the point. Even though the NCAP rating does give you a good idea of a car's safety relative to others in the class, it isn't the whole story -- a smaller car is imparting less force on that deformable concrete block than the larger one is, and so in effect it is easier to gain the star rating in the first place.

You may notice that the cars you mention in the last sentence of your post don't include little city boxes.

Kilty_2

Bear in mind my PX was a Laguna II, possibly one of the safest cars ever built. Didn't buy that for its safety credentials either.

bigjl

Yes not a bad price, but still reckon a Clio is a beter driving car than many in this sector, though it is going to be replaced soon surely, perhaps the prices of Clios will get better.

Though any supermini with less than 100g/km co2 will be a good long term ownership prospect, no road tax, free London CC, whats not to like.

I do like the look of the new Picanto and Rio which are out soon. The 1.1 3 cylinder Rio does 85mpg according to official figures!!!!