1.0 Urban 5dr Hatchback

A basic, tiny but practical car for urban use. It handles quite well on country roads too.

Introduction
I have owned a 2009 107 Urban 1.0 for thirty months. It had belonged to a relative since new so I known all its history. At nine years old it has done just 31,000 miles and I have driven it 18,000 miles.


Cons:

The small clutch is a weakness so don't slip it at junctions - drive properly and use the handbrake, or it will cost you! Even the slightly larger replacement clutch smokes quite easily on a steep hill-start with three people in the car. Yet in 37 years of motoring, with mostly older high mileage cars, I have only ever needed one new clutch. If you are buying a 107, check the garage records and if necessary take possible clutch replacement into account. The original owner, who used it almost exclusively for 10,000 miles of almost exclusively very short urban journeys had it replaced at 9,800 miles. It was her last car before stopping driving and she had never needed a clutch replaced before, yet she had owned most of her many cars from new to 60,000miles or many more. Don't buy a 107 if you have to hill start all the time, you are lazy at junctions, or you will carry several adults regularly!

They leak water into the boot through the back lights, I stopped it by removing, cleaning, applying silicone sealant to the inadequate foam seals, letting it set, then refitting the lights. It worked perfectly.

It leaked water through the aerial, but it was very easily removed by releasing the interior light and removing the nut, then fixing back with silicone.

Ground clearance with more than one or two not very heavy occupants is rather poor. It's OK on ordinary roads, but the bottom sc***es when I go over a lip onto my driveway (even very slowly) with more than two people. It doesn't affect any other car I know of. It hasn't sc***ed on any speed bumps.

Gearing between first and second isn't ideal for steep hills. There is heaps of power for a good speed up a steep gradient in first, but you can't always use second. So not recommended for a very hilly area, but good in typical conditions. (There is an advantage to this gearing, because it allows for quite rapid getaways on the flat).

The ride quality is rather harsh for a modern car, but this is a budget motor. I suspect it helps the handling.

The cabin is noisy, but adding two more layers of acoustic material under the boot carpet helped, as does keeping the back seats folded up whenever possible and ensuring the back shelf is in place. Tyre noise is far more significant than engine noise, so think about what you buy when you replace the rubber.

Although the tyre noise is no fun on the motorway & mpg at 70mph is not much better than my BMW 5 series Diesel of a similar age, the engine propels the little 107 at a constant 70mph quite easily, but strong sidewinds affect it because the Pug is very light. I prefer the Peugeot for its sheer convenience and most urban and many mixed urban/shorter lengthy rural journeys with only one or two people in it

The door mirrors appear to be designed in a way that limits their useful life. It seems the cable is inaccessible and cannot be maintained. So the mirrors tend to dip too low and the only permanent solution seems to be to replace them.

I can't imagine what it is like getting out of the back of a two/three-door, but the four /five door is great for access.

The driver cannot open the electric passenger window whilst driving, the only window controls are on the respective doors.


The courtesy light only operates on the drivers door and it doesn't have a delay or a fade on it. Having only one door switch seems a bit stingy.

It is a four seater, so five people cannot be carried.

I'm wary of any car with just one front windscreen wiper, but visibility in the rain is good and it hasn't given any trouble at all.

When you have it serviced and you are billed for four spark plugs rather than three, ask where they put the spare!


Pros: I hope the cons have not put you off, because the 107 has some clear advantages:

It handles well.

It's very easy to drive and all controls are simple to find.

Cheap to maintain, it only has three cylinders, but the engine seems as smooth running as most four cylinder cars. It's a relatively revvy and responsive 1.0 petrol unit. Drive for economy by keeping the revs lower, or get a bit of performance by letting it rev through the gears. You really can get it moving quite rapidly if you want to. Second gear can take it to 60mph if necessary, which is very useful if you have misjudged speeds when pulling out of a junction and a car behind is bearing down on you.

Gearchange is quite precise.

I love using it in town. It fits into spaces where other cars cannot go.

It's a simple car so there isn't much to go wrong.

It has a spare wheel, not a repair kit.

With winter tyres it copes very well snow and ice conditions, even on a fairly steep hill, right up to the point where the front end begins to act as a snow plough.

The rear seat backrest folds into two sections, permitting the carriage of three people with a reasonable amount of baggage.

When I acquired it from a relative I intended to sell it on because I wanted something a bit bigger, quieter and more comfortable, but its dimensions are very handy. It fits in a tiny space at work that no one else can use and into which no longer car longer can fit, so I am guaranteed free parking. That saves quite a lot of time and money, because otherwise I would have to park off-site and pay.

Would I buy another - yes, because there's hardly anything else that will fit in that free space at work. To be fair, it does everything it's reasonable to expect it to do and more, including carrying small lambs, a quantity of fence posts for the smallholding, or several pallets strapped onto the roof rack. But be careful with that all glass tailgate, I hear it can be quite easily broken.

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