Citroen C3 test drive since 2002 hatchback

Citroeon C3 “Automat” -It toy

Citroone C3 is a car with a very interesting design, a spacious salon, a fairly attractive price and modest external sizes. And this means that his destiny is to be a favorite toy, the second or third car in the family, a sort of outlet in the modern world of strict, assertive design and cold colors. True, in order to become a truly true friend of a female driver, a c-a-third, in addition to all his wonderful qualities, you must have one blunt-an automatic gearbox. After all, as experience shows, it is compact cars with an interesting design and automatic machines that are most often becoming an object of attention of customers - powerful bimmers or Merus attracting attention to most of them are simply uninteresting.
And Citroeon marketing specialists understand this perfectly. Almost immediately after launching the C3 model, a version with an automatic transmission appeared on sale. True, this checkpoint is combined with only one engine-a 1.4-liter gasoline, so if someone prefers relatively powerful cars, he will have to either take a version with mechanics, or even pay attention to the models of other companies. Although there is nothing to choose from: models, equally interesting in design, are extremely few, and they are worth it accordingly. Meanwhile, the Citroone C3 1.4 AUT is interesting not only for design or running qualities, but also the retail price - this is almost the only model of such a plan, standing about ten thousand, competitors cost three to five thousand more ...
Automatic gearbox, especially on cars of relatively low cost, is not only a stub that helps to increase comfort and driving safety, but also a very significant assignment in the form of additional cost. After all, whatever one may say, and the machine is a complex and expensive device that can not be compared with a mechanical gearbox in any way. This means that even the most affordable car with a machine gun will be noticeably more expensive than the same, but with mechanics.
True, in the case of Citroeon C3, this difference in price was not so big, if not more. A thousand two hundred dollars - is it a lot for the opportunity to never score your head with various switching, squeezing clutch, mitches, etc.? As practice shows, many buyers even think that no relatively inexpensive cars think that we have no more simple versions with a machine gun than rich, but with a mechanical gearbox. Perhaps this is due to the fact that women are the main buyers of new low-commanders, and male drivers prefer used cars for the same money.
solid sizes. But even if the issue of surcharge for an automatic checkpoint for a motorist is not so relevant, it is often interested in how a car with a machine gun will drive. Recently, many magnificent, controlled by powerful processors of machine guns, against which everyone else looks too archaic.
This earlier, when most cars were equipped with three- or four-speed automatic transmission, the simplest machines on small-solcation looked like a matter of course: the machine is inexpensive, which means that the path to high technologies was ordered for it. But now, when one company overtakes the other in an effort to make the most high-tech car, the latest five- and even six-speed automatic machines appeared, which in a visual way demonstrated how imperfect their ancestors were. This is doubly also offended because almost all cars with new generation automatic machines cost no more than others, in which outdated models are used - the buyer in indignation, and excuses like and what you wanted for that kind of money now - the car enthusiast wants everything And as cheaper if possible!
Such a long prelude regarding automatic transmission is needed so that you understand how fasting our buyer has become - the machine for many today is a more important option than air airbags. And you can understand it: having paid serious money for a new car, its owner does not want to pull the gearbox lever at every intersection, smoothly play with a clutch and try to move without jerks and slippers. Women are especially picky in this regard: the clutch for most of them is a sworn enemy, with whom they in no case want to put up. Namely, they are primarily intended for budget versions of small -scale transmissions, men, for the most part more active drivers, such cars are not suitable due to their prestige and low dynamic indicators.
And if so, then the Citroeon C3 should not be regarded as a city missile, but as an ordinary, convenient vehicle intended not only for evening promenade on the central streets of the city, but also for everyday use in the regime of the city crowd. And in this sense, C-third is very convenient. The car is small, quite brisk and maneuverable, and besides, it is also high, which is very convenient. Especially in our country stream: at the wheel of a high car, you see from afar on which row the brake has started in, and therefore there is always time to rebuild into another, more free series. True, on a 1.4-liter machine, and even with a machine gun, you won’t be particularly sung: sharp accelerations for it are something supernatural. The power at low and medium -speeds is not enough to rush and rebuild in the free window in the next row, so the motor has to be twisted. You can, of course, use the 1 or 2 selectors of the checkpoint, forcing the motor to constantly work at high speeds and be in the position of constant combat readiness, but for some reason it seems to me that most drivers do not even know why they are needed, these same modes.
Nevertheless, if you do not try to drive in the COLIN MCRAY RALLYE style, then even with the Citroeen C3 automatic machine it turns out rather nimble, especially if there are no passengers in the car, the car accelerates quickly to urban speeds of 60-80 km/h. And the time of overclocking to a hundred becomes something completely uninteresting. After several frisky starts at C3, you either leave this venture, chase with powerful cars, or change the car. C3 is not originally intended for urban slalom, it will be sprinkled with various rearrangements and passage of turns in a rally style, as well as in the style of ring racing. It’s not that the car was completely unleashed, even vice versa, the C3 is controlled very well, but you can’t get any pleasure when moving in such rhythm. It is all the matter of the machine - its delay simply negates all the efforts of a good and, in general, a sufficiently powerful motor. Lose -ups seem to be small, but given the dynamics of this relatively weak car, even the slightest braking is enough for the city of C3 to be felt as a very calm car. Will you like it if the VAZ-2109 will make you at the traffic light? And this seems to be used to get used to it. For example, in Citroeon C3 with the same engine, but an ordinary mechanical checkpoint acceleration of up to hundreds takes 12.6 seconds, and as for a version with an automaton ...
Citroone C3 is a beautiful, bright toy, moreover, relatively affordable and has not yet lost novelty. That is why, it seems to me, when buying this client’s car or, most likely, the client will not be of little interest to the dynamic indicators of this duckling. In the end, he is completely good, especially if the owner prefers a calm driving style, and if the dynamics of acceleration is very concerned about, then it makes sense to pay attention to another modification of the same car - with a 1.6 -liter gasoline engine.
SUBJECTIVE OPINION:
(+) Spacious interior, interesting design, good equipment.
(-) Frankly sluggish acceleration dynamics.
Text: Pavel Kozlovsky and Sergey Mitskevich

Source: Auto -Gazeta / N 32 (378) dated 09/18/02