Fiat STILO RANGE
With Some Fierce Competitors Lining Up To Take A Pop At It, Fiats Stilo Needed To Up Its Game. Andy Enright Checks Whether The Latest Versions Have What It Takes
Just when
Fiat thought the family hatch market in which its Stilo competes couldnt get any tougher, it just did. Markedly. With heavyweight competitors from
Volkswagen,
Vauxhall and
Ford all lined up to give the Stilo a pounding, Fiat needed to spike their guns. With a beefed up range, improved quality control, more equipment and a new engine at lower prices than ever, can the Stilo face down the big boys? It certainly has a task on its hands.
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Get a potential customer behind the wheel of a Stilo and they often bought one. The combination of sharp styling, advanced design features and an aggressive price was usually enough to clinch the deal. The problem was getting the sort of buyer whod make a default choice for a
Ford Focus, a
Vauxhall Astra or a
Peugeot 307 to even acknowledge that the Stilo existed. Weak promotion of the car meant it has almost zero brand recognition.
Until
Fiat can address this, no amount of tweaking is going to radically alter the cars future prospects. Prices now start at a tad under £10,000 and although the three body styles continue as before, Fiat have updated the styling on the five-door hatch giving it cleaner lines at the rear. The trim structure has been revised as well, with Fiat introducing an equipment-stuffed Prestigio model to sit atop the five-door line up. Also introduced was the a version of the Active trim level fitted with air conditioning, dubbed with crushing predictability the Active AirCon.
The 80bhp 1.2-litre engine has been ditched in favour of a 95bhp 1.4-litre 16v unit. Given that the 1.
2-litre lump was already more powerful than most rival 1.4-litre engines, Stilo buyers will be getting a lot of performance for a relatively small outlay. Talking of which, prices have been trimmed by around £500 right across the board. Fiat seem resigned to being given something of a duffing in the sales charts, hoping to maintain the same level of new registrations next year.
"Get a potential customer behind the wheel of a Stilo and they often bought one"
The 1.4-litre 16v engine makes a fine entry-level choice, powering the Stilo to a top speed of 112mph via a sprint to 60mph of just 11.8 seconds in three-door form. Thats not a whole lot slower than an
Alfa Romeo 147 1.
6 and the Alfa certainly cant touch the Fiats combined fuel consumption of 43.4mpg for the three-door car and 42.1mpg for the slightly bulkier five door. Fully Euro IV compliant, the engine emits 153g/km of carbon dioxide in the three door body style and 160g/km for the five-door.
Somewhat unusually at this price point, the 1.4-litre engine is mated to a six-speed manual gearbox. Many of the other engines and transmissions in the Stilo line up have undergone mild fettling aimed at improving efficiency. Safety provision is at or near the top of the class and with the availability of up to six airbags including two Multistage bags and window bags, the Stilo is a very secure way to transpoty your family.
Bar safety, no other area of car design has progressed so far so fast as that of interior fit and finish. Drive a ten-year-old car, even the best built - a Mercedes S-class for instance - and the interior fit and finish will feel cheap next to the Stilo. This is precisely the effect that Fiat were after. The expensively slush-moulded fascia and the attention to detail paid to the colour combinations, the materials chosen in the cabin and the sheer design input distance the Stilo from the best of yesteryear.
It also stacks up favourably against the cream of todays crop, and Fiat have managed to pull this off without demanding too much additional outlay from the end customer. The more versatile Multi-Wagon estate bodyshape offers a little extra space at a £500 premium over the standard five-door hatchback. This boasts up to 1480 litres of luggage capacity. As before, theres a wide choice of engines 103bhp 1.
6 and 133bhp 1.8 petrol units, plus 80 and 115bhp turbo diesels for all models, plus the 1.4 16v and 2.4-litre petrol units.
The importers have restructured the trim levels which now run from Active to Active Sport, Active Air Con, Dynamic, Abarth and Prestigio. Prices start at £9,995 for the 1.4 16v Active three-door and with most models, the premium for the five-door bodystyle is £500. The most popular models are the Active Sport 1.
6-litre petrol and 1.9-litre diesel models. These come with 15-inch alloy wheels, a leather steering wheel and gear lever, and a CD player, Fiat claiming that this package represents approximately £600 worth of equipment for an additional £300 which is fine if those extra bits are actually the ones you wanted. Like the Brava and Bravo lines that it replaced, the Stilo looks quite different in three and five-door guises.
Although the two variants sit on the same floorpan, the engineers have cleverly teased the five-door bodyshell into a shape 50mm higher, 28mm wider and 66mm longer. The airiness of the interior is helped by the option of a full-length sunroof, dubbed the Sky Window by Fiat, which makes the five-door cars interior feel as spacious as current class leaders such as the Peugeot 307 and
Honda Civic. The three-door model is a different proposition. Lower, more aggressive and to most, more attractive, it shares only bonnet headlamps and grille with its more practical sibling.
Drop into the driving
seat after driving the five-door and youll do just that drop. With a seating position 50mm lower, you hunker down into the car. Drive the cars in the opposite order and youll feel as if youre perched on a barstool. The Stilo Multi Wagon features a higher seating position than the hatchback with a clever sliding and tilting action to the rear seats.
When slid forward they liberate an additional 40 litres of space over the usual 470 litre capacity. For the average family hatch customer, the Stilo hits the bullseye, but the Fiat isnt going to appear above the Golf, 307 and Focus in many comparison tests that we can imagine. Dont let that dissuade you: its priorities are just different. As Antony Sheriff, Fiats head of product development notes, "The very essence of the Stilo is its substance." Think about what you really use the family hatch for, test drive the Stilo and see if it doesnt tick all the boxes.
FACTS AT A GLANCE
CAR: Fiat Stilo range
PRICES: £9,995-£16,095 - on the road
INSURANCE GROUPS: 4-14
CO2 EMISSIONS: 149-197g/km
PERFORMANCE: [2.4 Abarth] 0-60mph 8.5s / Max Speed 134mph
FUEL CONSUMPTION: [115bhp 1.9JTD] (average) 53.3mpg
STANDARD SAFETY FEATURES: Six airbags, TCS, ABS
WILL IT FIT IN YOUR GARAGE?: Length/Width/Height (5dr), 4253/1756/1525mm
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