Yaris Tr 1.33

[CorollaTS05]

Well to cut a long story short my cts has gone into the garage to have some work done under warrenty. they gave me a brand new 59 plate Yaris TR 1.33 with the 6 speed box and eco mode.

Outside the car look nice with smallish 15" alloywheels and being all colour coded, looks a bit tall. Inside is nice, with nice comfy seats, good pedal arrangement and a nice clear dash which feels well put together and nicely finished, and it lights up nice in the dark too! The yaris driving position isnt my personal favourite as it is very upright although it is a big improvement on the last model as it does have reach adjustable steering wheel and more legroom, much comfier than my previous p2 yaris t sport.

Performance - Amazing how frugal this car is for 100bhp which they have squeezed out of an n/a 1.33 engine. It feels sluggish low down the rev range but starts to shift once it gets to 3000 revs, it coped with the motorway fine with adequate torque, and smooth and pretty quiet. The only thing i cant understand is the point of 6th gear, on the mway which is the only place you can use it, the engine really struggles to pull and i wonder weather im using more fuel flooring it every time a slight hill approaches rather than leaving it in 5th and not even having to really press the accelerator much more. Would have been better if 6th was an overdrive gear rather than a full gear which really lowers the revs and makes the car struggle. the stop start function is very good and seems to work on saving fuel, and start back up very quickly.

Handling - The yaris is a tall, narrow car and it feels it, sometimes it can feel a bit unstable and theres a fairt amount of body roll, especially under harsh breaking, and throwing it into bends, but we wont go into that because thats not what this car was built for, its not a wanna be rally car. The ride was in my opinion very smooth and the suspension is nicely tuned and floats over speed bumps.

Summary - I really am enjoying driving this yaris, its great on fuel, ive been getting 50-55mpg on the mway and 44-48 around the town - not as good as the figures suggest as a combined figure of 55mpg but its only done 200 miles and not run in yet. It feels solid and well build like a traditional toyota, and has good performance and nice comfy ride. A very good, economical supermini!