I have just fallen in love with...
- Thread starter PraxxtorCruel
- Start date
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
No sub £15k hatchback suits my tastes, so I'm really not sure what my current car has to do with it.
This is such a painful question to answer. It doesnt even buy a Clio RenaultSport! Nearly a Fabia vRS but its £700 over budget.
Fiat 500 Abarth Essess. £15100. Probably that.
But really, I wouldnt have any. I struggled so hard to pick something because literally everything costs more.
I can't remember where I read it, but one review mentioned that the new giulietta drives and feels like a Golf. 
So on the one hand, a solid feeling car with touches of quality. On the other, largely uninvolving, perhaps even "boring".
That's just one person's opinion though, would like to drive it for myself to make my own mind up. Certainly a nicer interior that any other car in the class.
So on the one hand, a solid feeling car with touches of quality. On the other, largely uninvolving, perhaps even "boring". That's just one person's opinion though, would like to drive it for myself to make my own mind up. Certainly a nicer interior that any other car in the class.
[TW]Fox;17510236 said:
Okay, I'll take your answer as Fabia vRS, as I'm sure a dealer would probably do a 5% discount.
Have to say though that your taste in cars outside the used exec saloon segment was far from what I had expected....
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Why is it so hard for you to understand? I don't have a taste in cars in the sub £15k hatchback market. I picked one based on spec, I don't really like any of them and wouldnt buy any of them. My taste in £15k hatchbacks is 'none please'.
Permabanned
What are your tastes in the £15k plus hatchback market?
New up to £20k? Probably something like a Mk6 Golf or an Audi A3 (Although really, this car is getting very long in the tooth now for a used buy). I used to be a Focus fan - I still like them especially on the used market but the Mk6 Golf is now a fresher car than the Mk2 Focus.
Used hatchback over £15k? Audi S3 or BMW 130i.
Used hatchback over £15k? Audi S3 or BMW 130i.
Clarkson on the Giuletta. Don't quite agree with the thrust of his article, but despite his dismissive reference to it being a 'car' rather than Alfa, it has to be said that Alfa do need a normal 'reliable' quality car in this segment, rather than an tradtional 'Alfa' (with all its classic Alfa foilables)
It’s a wonder, really, that anyone has a name. Because now that you can call a child anything that comes out of a bag of Scrabble letters there are millions of options. Moon-Unit. Chardonnay. Seniquiere. Janet. Absolutely anything will do, except perhaps Adolf.
And while I realise that there are many women who get pregnant while visiting the lavatories at a nightclub, most mums share the birth with a husband. Which means that there are two people involved in the tricky business of picking a name. As well as grandparents. And friends.
To make the whole issue even more complicated, it is difficult to name something that doesn’t actually exist. And even if you wait for the foetus to emerge, you still only end up with a baby that, in my experience, looks exactly like every other baby that’s ever been born. I’m surprised every one of them isn’t called “Useless” or “Annoying” or “Noisy Sod”.
Whatever. You’ve now got millions of options, 16 people involved in the process and absolutely no idea whether your 9lb bundle of sick and excrement will grow up to be Fatima Whitbread or Keira Knightley. And that’s before we get to the problems of geography, because you can no more call a girl Charlotte or Arabella if you live in Rotherham than you can call a boy Jesus if you live somewhere other than South America.
For our first-born, my wife and I decided on Boadicea — pronounced the way it used to be in the days before the Mumbai brigade went all Iceni on the history books and decided it was Boodicka.
Anyway, at the last moment, we worried that we might give birth to a mouse of a thing who wanted to drive a Kia and not a Ford Mustang with knives on its wheels. So we chickened out and called her Emily — a decision for which we have not been forgiven.
There is another problem with calling your child Trousers or Retro-Rocket: you will come across as a pretentious idiot who cares not one jot for the wellbeing of the infant on its first day at school. We don’t think you’re interesting if you call your son Defibrillator or Astroflash. We think you’re cruel and daft and making up for the fact that you’re called Timmy. If I had my way, everyone would be called John.
Of course, none of the above applies to pets. You can name a pet whatever you like, and the more amusing and bizarre, the better. My son called his tortoise Enzo and I think that shows spirit.
You have probably guessed where I’m going with this. And you’re right. Cars. And the names bestowed upon them.
As a general rule, prestigious models have letters or numbers, so we have the XJ12 or the 7-series or the S-class. But this is not always so, which is why we also have the Phantom, which is an excellent name, or the Phaeton, which is even better, or the Mulsanne — which is a straight bit of road in northern France and consequently a bit hopeless. Mind you, BMW names its superfast cars after British motorways and that’s even more stupid.
Normally, though, actual names are reserved for middle-order cars in the hope that they emerge from the christening with a bit of personality. There’s a logic to this. I called my pigs Walter and Zeppelin, and, as a result, I could not possibly put even a small part of them into my mouth. If they were Pig 1 and Pig 2, they’d be in the fridge by now.
So it’s a good idea to give a boring car a name, which is why I’m surprised that so many of the names chosen are so woeful. Mondeo. Mégane. Insignia. Corolla. All terrible. And that’s before we get to Golf. I’d rather have a car called the Certain Death.
I realise, of course, that there are many pitfalls when it comes to naming a product that’s sold all over the world. Toyota, for instance, was probably very pleased when it came up with MR2. Until it found out that when said in French, it comes out as “merde”. Rolls-Royce had a similar problem when it came up with the Silver Mist. Great, but in Germany mist means “dung”. And I doubt Ford could sell the Ka in Albania — because no one wants to drive around in a “penis”.
Strangely, the Americans are very good at thinking up names for their cars. Mustang. Firebird. Thunderbird. These are all much better than, say, Montego or Maestro or Metro. They name their cars after amazing creatures. We name ours after the French underground.
But for complete stupidity we must turn to the Italians. In recent years Fiat has tried to sell us the One, the Point, the Road and the Big Point, while Maserati wants £80,000 for something called the Four Doors.
Then we have the subject of today’s missive. Alfa Romeo wanted to call it the Milano, and you might see nothing wrong with that. Well, Alfa workers did, since it had recently been announced that the company was severing its last major ties with the city. And so, after the launch was prepared, bosses decided that Giulietta might be better. So Giulietta it is, and for that alone — it’s a lovely name — the car is worth a look. Now you’ve looked and you’ve thought: “Yes, for a five-door hatchback, it’s quite pretty.” And then you will buy a VW Golf instead. Fair enough. I can’t argue with that. It’s your money and you want a car made by a company with a reputation for reliability. Absolutely.
I cannot sit here and tell you that the Alfa Romeo will not break down. I assume it will, of course. But I don’t know for sure. I do know, however, that the driving position is not suitable for people with arms, and you can’t drive with your elbow resting on the windowsill because the B pillar is in the way, and the front seats lack lateral support and it isn’t as big in the back as you might have expected. So it’s not an especially comfortable or spacious place to sit while waiting for the breakdown truck.
So far, then, it’s just like every Alfa Romeo that’s ever come my way. Pretty, quirky and possibly on fire at some point in the near future. But then, it’s not like an Alfa Romeo at all, because while it may have multi-link rear suspension like a Golf or a Ford Focus, it doesn’t feel even remotely lively.
If you are expecting something as far ahead of the pack as the Alfa South was back in the late Seventies, you’ll be disappointed.
It’s the same story with the engine I tried. It was a 1.4 featuring something called MultiAir technology. This offers up the holy trinity: excellent torque, low carbon emissions and good economy. But take it to the red line, push it, wring its neck and it behaves like the fat kid at a school sports day.
On the plus side, and even more strangely for an Alfa, this is a car that glides over speed bumps, a car that turns even the most frost-ravaged tarmac into a never-ending roll of freshly ironed bed linen. Unless you press the “dynamic” switch next to the gearlever, which either makes the car noisier and less pliant or sends a message to the dash saying, “Dynamic mode not available”.
This car, then, is odd. It is an Alfa. It says so on the back. But it most definitely isn’t an Alfa. They should have called it the Car. Because that, I’m afraid to say, is all it is.
It’s a wonder, really, that anyone has a name. Because now that you can call a child anything that comes out of a bag of Scrabble letters there are millions of options. Moon-Unit. Chardonnay. Seniquiere. Janet. Absolutely anything will do, except perhaps Adolf.
And while I realise that there are many women who get pregnant while visiting the lavatories at a nightclub, most mums share the birth with a husband. Which means that there are two people involved in the tricky business of picking a name. As well as grandparents. And friends.
To make the whole issue even more complicated, it is difficult to name something that doesn’t actually exist. And even if you wait for the foetus to emerge, you still only end up with a baby that, in my experience, looks exactly like every other baby that’s ever been born. I’m surprised every one of them isn’t called “Useless” or “Annoying” or “Noisy Sod”.
Whatever. You’ve now got millions of options, 16 people involved in the process and absolutely no idea whether your 9lb bundle of sick and excrement will grow up to be Fatima Whitbread or Keira Knightley. And that’s before we get to the problems of geography, because you can no more call a girl Charlotte or Arabella if you live in Rotherham than you can call a boy Jesus if you live somewhere other than South America.
For our first-born, my wife and I decided on Boadicea — pronounced the way it used to be in the days before the Mumbai brigade went all Iceni on the history books and decided it was Boodicka.
Anyway, at the last moment, we worried that we might give birth to a mouse of a thing who wanted to drive a Kia and not a Ford Mustang with knives on its wheels. So we chickened out and called her Emily — a decision for which we have not been forgiven.
There is another problem with calling your child Trousers or Retro-Rocket: you will come across as a pretentious idiot who cares not one jot for the wellbeing of the infant on its first day at school. We don’t think you’re interesting if you call your son Defibrillator or Astroflash. We think you’re cruel and daft and making up for the fact that you’re called Timmy. If I had my way, everyone would be called John.
Of course, none of the above applies to pets. You can name a pet whatever you like, and the more amusing and bizarre, the better. My son called his tortoise Enzo and I think that shows spirit.
You have probably guessed where I’m going with this. And you’re right. Cars. And the names bestowed upon them.
As a general rule, prestigious models have letters or numbers, so we have the XJ12 or the 7-series or the S-class. But this is not always so, which is why we also have the Phantom, which is an excellent name, or the Phaeton, which is even better, or the Mulsanne — which is a straight bit of road in northern France and consequently a bit hopeless. Mind you, BMW names its superfast cars after British motorways and that’s even more stupid.
Normally, though, actual names are reserved for middle-order cars in the hope that they emerge from the christening with a bit of personality. There’s a logic to this. I called my pigs Walter and Zeppelin, and, as a result, I could not possibly put even a small part of them into my mouth. If they were Pig 1 and Pig 2, they’d be in the fridge by now.
So it’s a good idea to give a boring car a name, which is why I’m surprised that so many of the names chosen are so woeful. Mondeo. Mégane. Insignia. Corolla. All terrible. And that’s before we get to Golf. I’d rather have a car called the Certain Death.
I realise, of course, that there are many pitfalls when it comes to naming a product that’s sold all over the world. Toyota, for instance, was probably very pleased when it came up with MR2. Until it found out that when said in French, it comes out as “merde”. Rolls-Royce had a similar problem when it came up with the Silver Mist. Great, but in Germany mist means “dung”. And I doubt Ford could sell the Ka in Albania — because no one wants to drive around in a “penis”.
Strangely, the Americans are very good at thinking up names for their cars. Mustang. Firebird. Thunderbird. These are all much better than, say, Montego or Maestro or Metro. They name their cars after amazing creatures. We name ours after the French underground.
But for complete stupidity we must turn to the Italians. In recent years Fiat has tried to sell us the One, the Point, the Road and the Big Point, while Maserati wants £80,000 for something called the Four Doors.
Then we have the subject of today’s missive. Alfa Romeo wanted to call it the Milano, and you might see nothing wrong with that. Well, Alfa workers did, since it had recently been announced that the company was severing its last major ties with the city. And so, after the launch was prepared, bosses decided that Giulietta might be better. So Giulietta it is, and for that alone — it’s a lovely name — the car is worth a look. Now you’ve looked and you’ve thought: “Yes, for a five-door hatchback, it’s quite pretty.” And then you will buy a VW Golf instead. Fair enough. I can’t argue with that. It’s your money and you want a car made by a company with a reputation for reliability. Absolutely.
I cannot sit here and tell you that the Alfa Romeo will not break down. I assume it will, of course. But I don’t know for sure. I do know, however, that the driving position is not suitable for people with arms, and you can’t drive with your elbow resting on the windowsill because the B pillar is in the way, and the front seats lack lateral support and it isn’t as big in the back as you might have expected. So it’s not an especially comfortable or spacious place to sit while waiting for the breakdown truck.
So far, then, it’s just like every Alfa Romeo that’s ever come my way. Pretty, quirky and possibly on fire at some point in the near future. But then, it’s not like an Alfa Romeo at all, because while it may have multi-link rear suspension like a Golf or a Ford Focus, it doesn’t feel even remotely lively.
If you are expecting something as far ahead of the pack as the Alfa South was back in the late Seventies, you’ll be disappointed.
It’s the same story with the engine I tried. It was a 1.4 featuring something called MultiAir technology. This offers up the holy trinity: excellent torque, low carbon emissions and good economy. But take it to the red line, push it, wring its neck and it behaves like the fat kid at a school sports day.
On the plus side, and even more strangely for an Alfa, this is a car that glides over speed bumps, a car that turns even the most frost-ravaged tarmac into a never-ending roll of freshly ironed bed linen. Unless you press the “dynamic” switch next to the gearlever, which either makes the car noisier and less pliant or sends a message to the dash saying, “Dynamic mode not available”.
This car, then, is odd. It is an Alfa. It says so on the back. But it most definitely isn’t an Alfa. They should have called it the Car. Because that, I’m afraid to say, is all it is.
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- 6 Jul 2008
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stunning alfa,
hopefully the depreciation will be horrific on these and i'll get one for peanuts in 3 years
With a front like that, I'd rather have a peanut to be honest.
Had a poke round one the other day, looked nice.
Far too expensive as a new buy and they will lose so much money so quickly that the 231bhp model would make a good second hand warm hatch buy soon.
Have to say I love what the Fiat Group are doing with small turbocharged engines at the moment. Streets ahead of Ford, VW and the rest just a shame you have to get one in a car with a 'Fiat' or 'Alfa' badge.
Far too expensive as a new buy and they will lose so much money so quickly that the 231bhp model would make a good second hand warm hatch buy soon.
Have to say I love what the Fiat Group are doing with small turbocharged engines at the moment. Streets ahead of Ford, VW and the rest just a shame you have to get one in a car with a 'Fiat' or 'Alfa' badge.