Haven't driven either yet, or got down to any substantive discussions about price, but next weekend we hope to drive both in a quest to choose our second car.
Like the Citroen's price, looks, impressive reports on the diesel engine (16v one) and interior space. We even thought that the interior trim was OK despite some reports of it being flimsy. Any C3 owners care to comment ?
Like the Ibiza's looks too, the one we've seen is £9,995 and the engine's meant to be good too.
Anyone driven / owned either of them ?
Matthew Kelly
No, not that one.
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Road test of new Ibiza including TDI PD 130 Sport on this site. TDI PD 150 Cupra R is on its way.
HJ
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Just test driven both
Plus the Fiesta 1.4 TDCi and the Skoda Fabia.
Chose the Citroen, largely as it's her car not mine. I think I'd have gone for the SEAT, but bought it from a dealer in Ireland.
Haven't got the figures to hand but I think it was 14,800 euro tax free, which with the VAT on import wacked out around 11,650 GBP.
The Citroen (1.4 TDCi 16v 92 bhp in SX trim) cost 8,900 from a UK dealer
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UK Car Broker appear to be offering just that vehicle (which is what I have in mind) at £8,622 according to their website although I will get an exact quote from them. I’ll speak to my local dealer as well and see what the cost is once part ex of my 1990 VW Golf GTI has been taken into account. I’m not holding out a great deal of hope for anything aboce three figures!
I was considering the import route, however with sterling at 0.69 Euro according to the BBC this morning I’m not sure I’ll get a better deal.
Matthew Kelly
No, not that one.
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Citroën Belgium has a VAT free promotion at the moment, except over there VAT is 21%. The result is that a LHD car with 2 years' warranty and a diminished resale value would be over £8k for the 8v (the 16v isn't sold over there in SX spec) even after the big discount. Factor in transport costs and a possible LHD premium and the fact that no one bothers importing Citroëns into the UK because they're so cheap over here, and the only possible reason for going the import route is to drink lots of Belgian beer. Far better to buy the car over here and then get a Eurostar across later.
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We pick ours up on Saturday. I'll let you know how we get on with it.
Added an extra 50 quid for the Moduboard thingy (seems like a good idea) and another 500 for some Exclusive-type alloys.
Still looks like a lot of very economical car for the money.
Rob
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Wouldn't the executive have been very little more then?
Ben
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"Wouldn't the executive have been very little more then?"
Probably.
I hadn't really got it in my head how much the wheels would cost, and not really needing stuff like cruise control we just went for the SX.
Then a really good discounted price popped-up on the internet for the exact model and we used that to beat the dealer into submission. Not sure if the Exclusive is as heavily discounted, but if I was still in the market I'd certainly look around as Ben suggested
I told the dealer I wanted a Moduboard and he is fitting one.
less than three days to go. Report back Monday.
Rob
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That's useful. So did you get the Moduboard as an option on te SX ? It seems from the Citroen literature that I have that it's standard only on the Exclusive and not available as an option on anything else.
My only problem at the moment is that it's not been approved for the Britax Isofix car seat that we're thinking of getting whereas our Skoda has.
Matthew Kelly
No, not that one.
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Matt - can't comment on the C3 other than to say that a quick peek in a showroom was not too impressive. Regarding the TDI, we were looking for a used one a couple of years ago, but gave up as they seemed like hen's teeth - added to the scarcity of Skoda dealers round here (Cheshire). And the dealers that exist seem to disappear quite quickly.
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sorry - meant Seat - slip of the keys.
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Just remembered.
The Exclusive would have been a lot more expensive as it doesn't benefit from the thousand quid extra support from the manufacturer that the SX does.
Hence the dealers can't discount it nearly as far.
One day to go. Report back Monday
Rob
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I've just taken delivery of an C3 HDI 16v Exclusive (£9886 with metalic paint) and my car got the £1000 discount as you can see from the price. Up to now I'm very pleased, although I've only done 300 miles!
Reggie
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I have a C3 1.4 SX, the trim fell off, rattles coming from everywhere, power steering gone stiff, knock in steering,whine in gearbox,squeaky brakes, poor build quality,only done 1,670 miles. I would have been better off buying secondhand car of a different make. don't buy a citroen.
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Just to bring things to a conclusion, we?re going with the Ibiza not the C3.
On the test drive my wife found it very difficult to use the clutch comfortably on the C3 because the pedal comes up a long way and it?s tricky to get your foot out of the way when driving along. In addition she didn?t like the cab forward position where you couldn?t see the front of the car. By contrast she preferred the driving position of the Ibiza and the way it handled.
I too found the left foot area of the C3 uncomfortable and also preferred the interior of the Ibiza. While the C3 interior has lots of neat touches e.g. drawers under seats etc. the less self consciously cutesy interior of the Ibiza appealed to me & her more. I wasn?t quite as bowled over by the 1.4 16v HDI engine as I?d hoped to be, it?s good but I don?t think it?s better that the tried & tested VAG 1.9 in my Octavia and in the Ibiza.
When it came down to discussing deals with the Citroen dealer they were less than impressive. We had a very specific question about Isofix car seats which the man was either unable or unwilling to grasp the details of. I had also armed myself with a quote from an online car broker for a C3 which was £400 less than the dealer?s stated price. The dealer was unwilling to countenance even dropping a little bit to get nearer to that price (which is his prerogative of course) but a flat refusal was surprising.
So I?ve ended up with a one year old TDi S Ibiza for £9,495 (plus 12 month?s tax) which was one of Seat?s early demonstrators according to the sales woman (she said that it has Seat UK as the owner on the V5 and I?ll check that before taking delivery of the car) and has only covered 800 miles, which wasn?t exactly a plus point for me but wasn?t a negative either.
Let?s just hope it lasts !
Matthew Kelly
No, not that one.
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Matt,
I see no reason why you shouldn't be very happy with the Ibiza. Certainly the one I drove was impressive, and actually more to my taste than the C3.
But then the C3 is her car, not mine, so I was happy to go along with it. It also helps that my own car is a Puma, and the contrast between the C3 and the Ford make it a refreshing change. The Ibiza is certainly more like the Puma, I may well look at the 9about to be launched) 150 bhp diesel Ibiza when the lamented Puma needs replacement
The dealer (who had matched an Internet quote) fumbled the hand-over. The car was't ready when we arrived, nobody seemed to know we were coming. But to be fair the contact salesman had been off ill all week.
We've put about 250 miles on the C3 this weekend. Two of the six fuel contents lights are now extinguished, what a guzzler! ;-)
So far it seems quiet, well mannered, but much swifter (pun intended) than the Suzuki it replaced. Certainly very glad now that we didn't go for the Fiesta which was also considered. We did about 150 miles in a 1.4 TDCi Fiesta hire car in Italy the previous week, in my opinion there is no comparison, partiularly since that Fiesta would have cost us about 1,500 quid more in the UK than the C3.
Very practical car, you either like the interior or hate it.
Cheers
Rob
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Both of my neighbours have got Seat Ibizas; both diesel Tdi's. Both are W-reg, both have around 20,000 miles, both are out of warranty, and both have developed a peculiar engine rattling and turbo whine.
I have a Seat Arosa 1.7 diesel; all three of us use the same Seat main dealer and we all agree that the service is simply pants and extremely expensive for what you get (including £260 for a cambelt change that takes 1.5 hours).
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