Saturday, June 20, 2009

Smart Fortwo

Normally, I am not particularly in favor of small cars or city cars or anything which has a body size of a dining table. Despite the fact that I am an Asian and therefore quite compactly sized, I still don’t like to be driving in a city car because they are mostly noisy, way too slow, ruthlessly built and unbelievably cramped. But as the streets today are jammed by enormous cars and with fuel price keeps climbing up, small cars has become an inevitable choice for most people: young mothers to take their kids for a school run; students whose dad doesn’t allow a speed more than 60kph on the highway; or even grown-up men who have no imagination because they drive such micro cars. Having considered several selections of city car available in the country such as Hyundai i10 and KIA Picanto, I think that these cars are simply boring, unimaginative and no sense of humor to be precise. Sense of humor in a city car is obviously important, at least for me, because such cars are mostly driven in a town with stressful gridlocks every where, so there must be an element in the car which soothe your brows as you dive into a heavy jam and the cars I have mentioned above simply don’t have this element. However, there is one car which presumably stands uniquely amongst others, rather too unique actually because it has a genuinely individual design which you will never find in any other cars and it has been consistently built from the scratch as a micro car, the Smart Fortwo.

Frankly, there are quite a lot of things in this midget car which don't deserve a positive approval and I will start off by explaining its on-board power. This car doesn't have an engine, what it does have is a lawn mower fixed at the back of the car. It was a rear mounted 3-cylinder 0.8L diesel engine which is only capable of 45bhp. Despite the fact that the engine was boosted with a turbocharger, the car was so slow that it took almost 20 seconds from standstill to reach 100kph. Things get even worse because the engine is paired with the Smart's automated manual, it is basically a manual transmission but it enables the driver to change gear without clutch. At first, it might sound very sophisticated and promising, however after a careful deliberation; I figure that it was completely hopeless. The main trouble is, the gearbox was somehow at a complete loss because it sometimes froze in neutral position when I have shifted the selector either into manual or automatic mode. Furthermore, the gear change was jerky as well and the car lurched back and forth every time it changed gear. Then we come to the weirdest thing of all in Fortwo: the steering, which was not adjustable, however this niggling little fault was nothing compared with its mechanism. Normally, the steering mechanism in a city car is designed to be light so that it would ease the driver to park or sneak through heavy traffic, but Fortwo somehow breaks out this norm. The steering during low speed is noticeably heavy and it strangely becomes very light on highway, rather too light actually because the steering wheel vibrates badly once you inadvertently stray over 120kph. What's more, the vibrating steering wheel was also indicated with a noisy engine sound inside the car and instability of its light body. With an overall weight less than 800kg and combined with short wheelbase, the Fortwo's body wobbled as if it was made from a card board. In terms of mechanical exercise and engineering innovation, this car is certainly not a good example, but don’t immediately assume that this car is rubbish because things start to pick up well in other aspects.

"You can tell other people that you drive a rear engine, rear drive, turbocharged, two door Mercedes Benz."

In a car park, Smart Fortwo still draws quite an attention thanks to its unique approach of how a city car should be looked like. The signature design of Smart’s cars which is the Tridion steel frame provides a distinctive style while maintaining itself as a safety cell which protect the passenger from an accident. Fortwo is also 20cm longer than its predecessor and it is therefore much better proportioned since it has a wider wheel track. Nevertheless, the extension in body length might cause a vertical parking style typical Smart’s micro cars become impossible, moreover several cities for instance Munich have banned such parking method. Anyway, the exterior of Fortwo generally looks fresher and more appealing. Inside the car which is the Passion trim level, Smart still maintains the funky interior design such as the chic carpet surfaced dashboard and some eye catchy details such as the pod clock and rev-counter on the top of center dashboard console, which made the Fortwo’s interior is a very nice place to be. The overall trim and color combination represented a youthful and dynamic design language, the frameless doors and semi bucket seats lent a sporting look, the panorama roof gave the car a spacious feel, and the whole interior ambience simply made you feel relaxed and happy. I would admit that several parts of the interior fitting were not entirely smooth, for instance the sun visor material which was seemingly derived from a recycled case of computer keyboards and cheap plastic in several panels, but these faults were nothing compared with the overall interior atmosphere. In terms of practicality, there is plenty of space for both passenger and driver. The passenger seat can also be folded to transport longer goods such as surf board. Smart has also lengthened the body of Fortwo compared to its predecessor and as a result, the boot space has also jacked up from 150L in previous model up to 220L in Fortwo. Obviously, it is still far from what people refer as commodious, but this boot space is sufficient to accommodate several shopping bags and a small suitcase.

Enough said with its exterior and interior styling, I come to the best feature of this car which is also its selling point: economy. I had been driving this car for around 980km with various traffic conditions: on the highway as well as in the city with stop and go traffic jams, and the fuel consumption of this car was absolutely biblical, I actually expected it to be very good and it went beyond my expectation. I was initially doubt about Smart’s claim of the fuel consumption in this car, they say that it only consumes 3L of diesel for every 100km. However, after a careful calculation of refueling the car and total covered distance, I am very sure that the 33L fuel tank plus 5L reserve fuel in this car could take me for a total 980km distance on a single tank and without any refueling; I mean this car was genuinely very frugal in consuming fuel. Then because the car burned such a little amount of fuel, it also generated a very little amount of carbon dioxide into the air. With only 88kg of CO2 every kilometer, Smart claimed that Fortwo is one of the environmentally friendliest cars in the world. This result in a very low tax the customers have to pay if they own this car, so Fortwo is a cheap to run car. Then take into account that Mercedes Benz owns Smart these days, you can tell other people that you drive a rear engine, rear drive, turbocharged, two door Mercedes Benz when you have one.

All things considered, Smart Fortwo is a well made car despite several problems I have pointed out previously. The mechanical drawbacks such as wobbling body on highway might just not a big deal to shout about, mainly because the city is where Fortwo belongs, although the heavy steering wheel is clearly a deep concern since it is a city car and the steering in a city car is supposed to be light. Moreover, despite its microscopic size, Fortwo is a safe car thanks to its four-star crash test rating based on Euro NCAP evaluation. At the end of the trip and even until now, I still want to hate it and laugh at its pathetic engine performance, but the stylish interior design and its unbelievable frugality in consuming fuel have completely won me over. It has the sense of humor which a city car must have and this car is really such a giggle, I didn’t feel weary, stressed or want to stab other people after completing a long journey in it. Eventually, Smart Fortwo is obviously a proper, undiluted, stylish, efficient city car and that is just about the best thing a city car could offer these days, which make it the new favourite little car of mine. Until the next posting, enjoy!

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