Fiat 500s

[leenkerri]

Does anyone drive a Fiat 500s. Kerri is now doing more frequent short journeys now for work which isn't doing our diesel any good, so want to buy a little petrol car for these short journeys. I'm not a fan of Fiat, where she really wants a 500. Anyone have any opinions on said car?

Thanks.

[justacey]

When I was looking for a new teeny car 3 years ago, I wanted a Fiat 500. They look so cute, don't they? I went to the showroom, sat in one, got straight out and went to the Skoda garage and bought a Citigo.
Actually I did take it for a test drive as I was there, but just did not like it at all.
I love my Citigo.

[colin39]

Fix
It
Again
Tomorrow
I say no more lol. They are in effect a ford Ka so there not bad, they use the fiat engine, tried and tested over the last 15 years.
Like any car tho, if you search had enough you'll find horror stories.
As a vehicle engineer i dont get called out to them for one specific thing.

I looked at differant cars at the start of the year and ended up with the dacia duster, and love it.

[mollybogle]

A friend of mine has had 3 of them and loved them, but she was into small cute cars. I drove one as a hire car once and felt like I was in a flintstones car.

[leenkerri]

Originally Posted by justacey

When I was looking for a new teeny car 3 years ago, I wanted a Fiat 500. They look so cute, don't they? I went to the showroom, sat in one, got straight out and went to the Skoda garage and bought a Citigo.
Actually I did take it for a test drive as I was there, but just did not like it at all.
I love my Citigo.

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They actually do look quite cool, but at the end of the day its a Fiat

Originally Posted by colin39

Fix
It
Again
Tomorrow
I say no more lol. They are in effect a ford Ka so there not bad, they use the fiat engine, tried and tested over the last 15 years.
Like any car tho, if you search had enough you'll find horror stories.
As a vehicle engineer i dont get called out to them for one specific thing.

I looked at differant cars at the start of the year and ended up with the dacia duster, and love it

See more...

Yea i'm not a fan of Fiats, my work van is the new Vauxhall combo with fiat engine, it's terrible, luckily we are getting Fords soon!

Originally Posted by mollybogle

A friend of mine has had 3 of them and loved them, but she was into small cute cars. I drove one as a hire car once and felt like I was in a flintstones car.

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If i have to use my feet to move it like the flintstones car then its a big no no

[captjack]

Originally Posted by colin39

Fix
It
Again
Tomorrow
I say no more lol. They are in effect a ford Ka so there not bad, they use the fiat engine, tried and tested over the last 15 years.
Like any car tho, if you search had enough you'll find horror stories.
As a vehicle engineer i dont get called out to them for one specific thing.

I looked at differant cars at the start of the year and ended up with the dacia duster, and love it.

See more...

The new ford ka is based on the fiat 500, it is built in the fiat factory and then shipped to ford.

[marypoppins38]

My sister has one. I've only been in it a couple of times but I'm tall (for a woman!), 5ft 10 so can barely fold myself into it. All I kept think was, if we are in an accident then we will be toast as no way is this little thing going to protect us!

[the_rangdo]

My wife had a 500 1.2 for 3 years. She loved the car, and it was fun to drive (zipping through muddy Silverstone fields when all the expensive cars had sunk in the mud was a laugh) but there were a couple of issues that seem common :-

Breather pipe split - if you're ok with a screwdriver it's a fiddly but easy enough fix. I'll ignore the fact a car under 3 years old with less than 15K on the clock shouldn't have splitting pipes.

Air intake pipe is secured to the front of the engine bay. The screw works itself loose and vanishes and you end up with a rough sounding car as the pipe vibrates like mad when you accelerate. A replacement screw is easy enough to add in until the plastic section it screws into snaps off through vibration stress.

The worst one was the wiring loom into the tailgate. It's been designed with a very tight bend in it at the tailgate hinge. Using the tailgate regularly (crazy concept, using your boot!) will eventually result in the wires breaking; seems to start manifesting itself as a rear wiper that doesn't park in the correct place, followed by no rear lights.

Replacement loom fitted by Fiat is £800-ish. We got a local auto-electrician to fix in an extension which worked for a few months until another wire broke. I soldered that up myself and we sold the car on not long afterwards as it felt like out-of-warranty issues would start piling up.

Fiat servicing costs are ridiculous. First service which was just an oil and filter change was quoted at something like £400. They 'offered' us a low-mileage discount which brought the price down to £225. We paid that first one but further servicing was done locally.

The Fiat warranty is pretty rubbish. Manufacturer is first 2 years, final 3rd year is dealer and much more limited. The wiring loom wouldn't have been covered by the manufacturer warranty as bizarrely they say it's not a serviceable item. As we were close to 3 years we were doomed on that front.

[mrmoo123]

My MIL's one flashes it's engine management light whenever she sticks the right indicator on!

The problem occurred literally 3 days after the warranty ran out. She went back to Fiat, who wanted £800 - yes that's EIGHT HUNDRED POUNDS to fix it. She explained that she had only done 2k in 3 years, it had barely been anywhere etc. and they wouldn't budge from that offer. Disgusting.

[Gingerlife]

I am currently on my third 500 and have never had an issue with any of them.
They are nippy to drive, cheap to run and very economical.
I am considering upgrading to the Abarth version as I like them so much.
I have had a lot of cars over the years including minis etc and prefer the fiat.