Ford Fiesta Zetec TDCi 2011 Review

Model: Ford Fiesta Zetec TDCi five-door hatch
Price guide (recommended price before statutory and delivery charges): $23,490
Options fitted to test car (not included in above price): Nil
Crash rating: Five-star (ANCAP)
Fuel: Diesel
Claimed fuel economy (L/100km): 4.4
CO2 emissions (g/km): 117
Also consider: Volkswagen Polo TDI

Ford's European imports for the medium, small and light car sectors have come to reside at or around the top of their respective sectors in recent years. The Mondeo, Focus and Fiesta have met with consistently positive reviews, and in the case of the WS Fiesta, introduced in 2008, commensurate sales success. That's despite a price tag placing it in the upper echelons of its class, alongside Volkswagen's Polo, and supply shortfalls for some spec levels.

Help has arrived via Thailand, at least on the supply issue. Prices remain unaffected despite the undoubted savings Ford would be reaping off the Thailand Australia Free Trade Agreement, through zero tariffs and reductions in labour and transportation costs.

Among the first things I noticed on taking delivery of our Fiesta Zetec TDCi test car was evidence of further cost cutting in the feel of some of the interior plastics. There's less soft-touch appeal here than in the ECOnetic I drove a year ago, but that goes with the territory (well, the Fiesta) these days. You want that kind of thing, you go to a MINI, Polo or Audi's new A1.

The top-spec Zetec is available in hatch only body style and is powered by a 1.6-litre petrol or 1.6-litre turbodiesel engine. The petrol comes with five-speed manual or Ford's newish PowerShift dual-clutch semi-auto transmission, the diesel with manual only. The oiler sits at the top of the range, starting at $23,490.

For that, you get essentially the same powertrain as the costlier ECOnetic – a 1.6-litre turbodiesel four-cylinder mill generating 66kW/200Nm. Although it weighs pretty much the same, at just under 1100 kg, it doesn't match the ECOnetic's 3.7L/100km combined cycle fuel consumption, or its remarkable 98g/km emissions figure. That said, you'd be pretty curmudgeonly to begrudge 4.4L, and at 117g/km, it's still more fragrant than most of the local fleet.

The drive is small oiler from central casting -- you get the full 200Nm of twist from 1750rpm, getting you up through the low gears and into the mids, living there happily in dense traffic with plenty of opportunity to shift up when things free up. Like the ECOnetic, it has plenty of leeway up the top to accommodate a sixth gear. For now, though, that's a luxury for which you have to stretch to a MINI D, and the $10,000 price difference buys an awful lot of diesoline.

I suspect that extra cog is inevitable for the Fiesta as European emissions legislation gets more demanding. It's a pity, too, that diesel Fiestas aren't available with the excellent PowerShift twin-clutch that's optional on petrol models. It's not like they can't do it -- they've shown they can by offering it to great effect in diesel Mondeos. The Fiesta could doubly do with it because Volkswagen offers a DSG option with its Polo TDIs.

That said oilers are well suited to manual gearboxes, with all that flywheel power making them harder to labour and stall than petrol engines. If you believe in the value of learning on a manual and have youngsters heading towards their L-plates, this would make a terrific learner's car.

There's plenty for those who've progressed beyond their P-plates, too, in the Fiesta's well sorted chassis dynamics have always helped justify a price tag closer to the Polo than Japanese and Korean counterparts. It's European in feel, with sharp, talkative electric steering and a suspension setup favouring enthusiastic drivers. The ride is firm without being (too) harsh, although we found it did elicit complaint from the rear seat.

The brakes are satisfactory, although we didn't put them to the test in any big way. But rear drums on a $20K-plus light car? It's par for its sector, but with the economies of scale available to Ford and all its competitors, how much difference would it really make to go to discs all round? The reality is they're adequate, but buyer perception is a different matter.

The safety package is enough to earn the Fiesta a five-star ANCAP rating (upper end ones at least -- base Fiesta CL buyers need to dip into the options list). The Zetec comes with front, side and curtain airbags, plus a knee airbag for the driver. It also comes with the full electronic safety kit: stability/traction control, seatbelt pre-tensioning plus anti-lock brakes with electronic brake-force distribution and emergency brake assist.

Equipment levels are what one might expect of a car at the high end of this sector. Outdoors, the Zetec specification gets a wheel upgrade to 16-inch alloys plus a bit of extra skirtwork and chrome trim. Inside, you get air conditioning, power mirrors and windows, trip computer, sports-bolstered front seats with height adjustment for the driver, cloth trim, six-speaker audio with single CD, auxiliary and USB inputs, Bluetooth connectivity, voice control, wheel-mounted audio and cruise controls and remote central locking.

The front seats are big-bloke comfortable and height adjustable, with enough leg and headroom to accommodate a six-foot person on a long trip without torture. But with a couple of them in the front, things can get a bit tight for knees and feet in the rear. Should you need boot space, best go for a lower-spec sedan body -- while 281-litres is okay for a light hatch, the sedan's cavernous 430-litres puts it up near the top of its class. Both have 60:40 split-fold rear seats.

The Fiesta's interior is well insulated from engine noise, but underneath it's a different story. Light cars are, well, light, and that takes its toll on virtually every such vehicle's capacity to keep road noise at bay. Where light cars excel is in fuel economy, and on that front, the oiler outdoes pretty much everything else in its class. In our week we managed an average 5.4L/100km -- admirable considering it was all-urban driving and often with a back seat full of adults and a boot full of gear.

Irritations include undersized wing mirrors leaving oversized blind spots, and inadequate wiper coverage of the Fiesta's huge windscreen, whose expanse and acute rake wouldn't do much to keep the summer sun at bay, either. Surveying the acreage of hard, brittle plastic beneath it left me wondering how the dash and fascia might look after a few years of exposure to our harsh UV, too.

On the other hand Fiesta hasn't suffered unduly from its Asian migration. It remains a smart, pretty package of above average competence, and the best-priced oiler in its class. But I can't help thinking about a couple of things. The Zetec diesel is good enough to steal sales from the ECOnetic. But the combination of a compromise in interior feel, no commensurate price adjustment and Volkswagen's convincing elevation of the light car benchmark with last year's Polo tends to push the Fiesta back towards the pack from which it once stood out.

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