SMART cars

[Skii]

Opinions please

[Konan555]

If you live in the inner city and require very little luggage room, I think they're a smart idea.

As a car.... they're awfull.

[Flibb]

How much do they cost?

[Moby-Dick]

I've driven one and found it better then I thought it would be.

As a largeish chap, I was suprised at the ammount of space for driving it had. The suprise came when I looked over my shoudler to be face to face with the windscreen.

performance wise it was quite nippy , but you had time to make a cuppa inbetween gear shifts ( I'm told the brabus chip helps reduce this time significantly )

very economical and it handles like a rollerskate unless the traction control decided you didnt want to.

[Skii]

K -

We are in the process of buying our first place, but money is very tight and we are being pushed to the limit financially. She's had her VW Lupo for less than a year, the commutes to work 3 miles away daily and doesn't use it for anything else, extremely low mileage, doesn't go near a motorway, ever.

Plan is to sell the Lupo for 7-8k, get a Smart for half that leaving a fair chunk to make to pay off outstanding finance and loans. The Smart is incredibly low insurance and very good mpg, as well as having all the toys.

Thoughts ?

[Skii]

Cheers Moby - good stuff.

[Skii]

Flibb - there are examples with all the toys on Autotrader with 30k miles under 3 grand

[Moby-Dick]

The smart will do that fine - its quite a "fun" little car really.
It had the acceleration not to cause traffic jams in MK ( which is all NSL roads )


if its only 3 miles then you'd almost be better of with a scooter ? ( or even walk )

[Skii]

if its only 3 miles then you'd almost be better of with a scooter ? ( or even walk )

Trust me - NOT an option

[5lab]

walk or buy a bike.. driving 3 miles a day is pretty silly imo..

if you insist on a car, why not get one of them honda electric things? i believe you can charge them overnight, and for 3 miles each way it'd be fine, and very cheap on fuel

[iMc]

Sinclair C5 tbh .

Seriously though I think SMARTs are good for what they are meant for.

[Skii]

walk or buy a bike.. driving 3 miles a day is pretty silly imo..

I wouldn't say that at all, if you can get a car cheap and pay low insurance and running costs, why not drive ? 3 miles and back 5 days a week rain or shine ? walking is not an option. She still wants a car giving her independance and the ability to go where she wants should she desire to, the fact that its main use is for work commuting, albeit a short distance.

[5lab]

well because driving a car for 3 miles is lazy, and half the reason that the population is getting fatter all the time. atop of this, short jouneys wear a car a lot more than longer ones, and 3 miles of town driving will not allow the engine to properly warm up. i can fully see the point of having a car for independance, but driving 3 mile jouneys when you are 'pushed to the limits financially' is madness.

[Durzel]

I agree, 3 miles is nothing!

[Butuz]

Get real 5lab. No one thats sane is gonna walk to work in the rain, and end up looking like a drowned rat every morning with a permanant cold. If this was las vegas, then yeh walk to work. But it isnt, so dont be so stupid

As for the smart - i assume your talking about the for two - cheap insurance, cheap as heck running costs, small, and nippy. And if you buy one thats out of warranty, you can get a chip that will give you a bit more power as well as reducing the time it takes to change gear by over 1/2. In gear, its actually pretty quick. Its just the 5 second long gear changes that slow it down.

Put it this way, i went to southampton and back on my mums and it cost me under 20 quid in petrol. Cost 50 quid in the nissan.

Great little city cars, infact probaby the ultimate city car. Very safe too, as shown by top gear / 5th gear's recent Corsa v Smart thing where they panned them both diagonally into a concrete wall at 70 and the smarts doors both openede whereas the corsa was a mess.

Butuz

[Allen]

Its just the 5 second long gear changes that slow it down.

Can you just explain how it takes 5 seconds to change gear? Is that in an auto or something? If so, that's pretty dire.

They are quite nice cars though, very good for a 1st driver I would suspect what with being cheap to buy, cheap to run and cheap to insure! They don't look that bad either.