Talk about a rocky start! This week I handed back the keys of Suzuki’s newest version of the Celerio, and when I say “what a rocky start,” I mean it. Within the space of only a few months on the market the Celerio had to be recalled on account of brake issues. What made matters worse for the brand is that the problem was spotted by Whatcar? Magazine while they were test driving the car.
The problem was that the brakes failed to work after 80mph. In complete fairness to Suzuki there was no messing around once this was brought to their attention. This is by no means the first time a car has been recalled and when the manufacturer found out, they issued an immediate recall of the Celerio – which is much better, and safer, than pretending that the problem doesn’t exist!
So, it wasn’t a great start for this little car, but now all is well. The problem has been fixed, and the Celerio I received was in full working order. On the outside this isn’t a bad looking car. Yes it lacks the pizazz and flare of the Fiat 500 and the Renault Twingo, but without being too chic it still looks nice. The segment that this car falls into is a funny one in terms of what’s on offer. The most stylish of the lot is the Fiat 500, then there’s the cool looking Twingo – the Celerio kind of sits on the other side of the segment with the Skoda Citigo, its looks are more conventional.
One of the things that appeals to me most about this car is that it’s not expensive to run. It’s cheap and cheerful. I drove circa 200km in this little machine, and it barely put a dent into the fuel gauge. On-paper we’re told that the fuel economy of this car is 4.3l/100km. It’s not the most costly car to buy either, with starting prices from €11,995.
The 1.0litre petrol engine was noisy enough at times – especially when crawling towards motorway speeds – around the city was a different story. This is a nifty car and towns are where it belongs. What surprised me most about this car is that the interior feels deceptively spacious – I mean, this is a very small car, but at no time did I feel squashed. At no point did I have 5 people in this car, the maximum I had was two adults and two children – but I received no complaints from my passengers.
If you are in the market for a small car, it would certainly be worth having a look at the Celerio. There are a lot of cars on offer in this segment, including the aforementioned Citigo, Twingo and Fiat 500. Also worth a look would be the Hyundai i10 and even the Dacia Sandero.
