Kia Picanto 1.0 > Reviews (19)

As you can probably guess by my user-name I love my Kia Picanto. I trained as a motor vehicle technician and worked for 15 years as a Class I HGV driver, so you may find it surprising that I like such a small car. The fact is that if you were properly trained to drive ( and few are ) in the first place you don't need a big engine to make good progress. I have the 1000cc GS which fortunately comes with a rev counter, quite useful if you want to make best use of the power available. One of the other reviews claims that the Picanto is slow at getting up speed, but if you use the gearbox correctly you can keep up with most drivers getting away from the lights.

First gear is pretty low ( not a bad fault ) but second will take you from 15 to 40mph in no time at all. The gap to third gear is quite large, so you need to be doing almost 30 before you even consider using it. Accelerating on steep hills you need to rev the engine almost to full power ( 5600 Rpm ) in second which then drops your revs down to just over max torque at 2900 rpm in third. The best and most fuel efficient performance of any engine occurs between max torque and max Bhp, but my picanto seems to be happy enough pulling down to 2500 Rpm.. It is pointless using fourth gear below 40 Mph, but then I never use fourth below 50 if I am accelerating up to the 60 Mph national limit. Fifth is basically an overdrive to be selected at 60 if you are not in a rush or accelerating on a hill on the motorway, I have never driven my Picanto flat out in fifth, but it pulls well and is quite happy doing around 80 at just over 4000 rpm.

As for fuel efficiency my overall consumption works out at about 10p a mile, almost identical to the Peugeot 205 diesel I had previously. That's not bad considering I use a lot of tight hilly country roads and am in the lower gears a lot of the time. I could probably get better figures for Mpg on A roads and motorways all the time. However, I seem to be totally unable to get the published Mpg figures, probably because they are computer rolling road generated and for comparison purposes only.

Now to the car itself, even though I am of ample girth and have a bad back I find the picanto to be perhaps the easiest car to get in and out of than any I have ever owned. The ergonomics are excellent with all the controls you need to use close at hand and in the right place. The indicator control on the right is an advantage once you get used to it, but then all British cars and lorries had the indicators on the right before we fully joined the EU export market.

Perhaps the only niggling problem I have found with the Picanto is that it is particularly prone to be blown about at high speed in strong side winds. It must something to do with the frontal aerodynamics as it weighs a full tonne at the kerb, I don't know whether other similar new small cars suffer similarly but suspect they could.

All in all the Picanto is a good buy for well under 6k if you get a pre registered one, I hope they are still making them when I eventually need another.