I had test driven Fiat Linea diesel for a total of three times in Hyderabad in the month of November 2010 each time for about 20 minutes.
The first test drive was a car provided by Malik motors and I took to the wheel at lower tank bund road just about infont of Sri Ramakakrishna mutt.
The first impression was that it might be petrol car and hence I asked if at all they brought petrol Linea by mistake and I repeated this question at least two times. This was while company driver was driving and I was sitting in the co-drivers' seat in the front while the car was driven through traffic.
When I took to the wheel, I found that the view is a little bit blocking due to sun wiser above wind screen.
I had to use seat adjustment to lower the seat height , according to my height which is 6 feet.
The seat adjustment takes quite sometime, because while adjusting , the seat moves a little bit backward and you have to adjust the seat position again. After seat height adjustment, the view was quite good.
Everywhere you would feel the designer's hand.
The view in the ORVM's is just picture perfect.
The audio set up is like a waterfall. The dash board impresses.
You would feel after you sit inside that the car , it is a bit long, the seats are wide and comfortable, the arm rest between the two seats in the front is just perfect , and can be kept at two levels.
The impression you would sure to get and feel happy about is that you were sitting in sedan.
The doors are well made and heavy , compeltely classifying itself and
separating itself from the types of Verna.
While I was testing the car , I found that it's pick up is fantastic and runs like a jet in first gear and yet it gives you a complete feel of control. You would not feel like to hold on to clutch just to control it in first gear like for example that of a Palio. I would like to say that is has an excellant drivability.
I put it in the second gear , again the same feeling it jettisones, goes like a released arrow.
How I tested it?
I had suddenly slowed down , taking care to look in the review mirror , which is very comfortable and easy in Linea. After suddenly slowing down in second gear I shfted up the car in to third gear and gave acceleration. It picked up momentum quickly though but engine sound is quite audible with window glass fully rolled up. But it picked up quite fast. The gear shift was perfect and made me remember Honda City car gear shift. The steering is a little bit heavy.
And my shoe stuck up in the gap between clutch pedal and dead pedal. I had to pull up in haste.
That was for the first time and I had this trouble which was very embarassing quite a few times again.
The well for controls is quite clumsy and the dead pedal indeed was totally unnecessary in that limited space.
I had increased the speed which was smooth and then suddenly slowed down in third gear and put the car in the fourth. In fourth gear again the car picked up very fast. So far so good and again I pulled up my shoe which was stuck up in the gap.
I increased the speed and suddenly slowed down and shifted to fifth gear.
In fifth gear at about 30kmph , belive me , I pushed the accelarator up to the bottom and held on to it there for some time , until the car picked up speed. It took quite some time but compared to Cheverle Magnum it was a quite a bit faster.
While I was test driving in fifth gear I felt there was no need to put my feet on clutch. So I had taken off my feet from clutch and looked at speedo meter. The speedo meter showed 40kmph. I took my feet off cluctch, brake and accelarator and showed to my daughter who was sitting side by. The car Linea did not stop OR there was any knocking either. The car went on and eventhough I did not touch the accelarator , car gained speed slowly and the speedometer went from 40 to 50 to 60 and I had to immediately control since I was in a mild traffic on lower tunk bund road.
There on that road I took a U-turn in a narrow gap, but to my surprise I could take without much effort.
After this type of testing I felt that I could buy the car.
There are some negatives.
There is no bottle holder at all.
The doors are good, heavy, with good trimming but the door pockets are only to hold magazines at best. On the front side cup holders are for pepsi type of aluminium cans only and even that is difficult with armrest.
The clutch and the gap between dead pedal is very , very narrow.
I found my shoe stucking up several times , and I think one should not wear a big show or one should get used to it.
When I tested for the second time, after a few days, I was wearing adidas sports shoes instead of Bata shoes and my foot did not stuck up there.
My daughter who had test driven Linea immediately after , told me that she had no such problem at all but complained that steering was difinitely heavy.
The sales man told us that he had to check up the tyre pressure and assured us that hydraulic steering is the best on highway driving.
Linea is not really smooth from my point of view. My wife compalined on my second time test driving (for the sake of my wife) that the car is not smooth and that at least it was not as smooth as Chverle Optra Magnum.
Magnum was definitely more smooth than Linea.
My daughter noted that Linea was sturdy, stable and that there was no body roll at all.
My wife said that back seats were a little bit wide and comfortable.
From my daugter's point of view , Linea is far better than Verna. I noticed that interiors of Linea is a real class compared to cheap get up of Verna.
The car power is 93 BHP only which created doubts in us about its performance in the highway (Verna BHP 103) because there are many reviews by owners that Linea is slightly under powered. We could not test it on the highway.
When I did third test drive only with my wife and sales man , I found the car very dirty and back door glass was rattling. The engine was making more sound than usual . This car was from Cancord motors and the earlier one was from Malik motors. Even then, a car which had been test driven just for 6000 kilo meters had such a horrible sounding engine created doubts in my wife's mind and she repeatedly pointed this to sales guy. That young man told us that he would arrange for a new car.
Malik motors sales staff told us that there would not be any discounts.
But in Concord motors, where we had test driven the car twice in a week, told me that he would give me Rs.26000/- Cash discount.
Linea Emotion model costs 9, 57, 000/= on road in Hyderabad.
