3 1.33 VVT-I 68 3dr

I'll never part with it

Purchased this car in 2019 to use as a second. After searching for the best equipped I could find, the car had 36k miles and now nearly 5 years later I've put about another 35k miles on it - totally trouble free.

I managed to get all the options, sport spoiler, parking sensors, nav, leather, keyless, climate, auto light & wipers etc etc, the equipment shames some bigger cars.

Mine is manual and 1.33, the engine is refined but the gearing is lazy, in typical Japanese style you need to keep the engine on the boil if you want to make progress but this adds to the fun. I won't bang on about how manoeuvrable and easy to park it is but what surprised me the most is the quality of the ride. I've carried 3 regularly. Will sit at 80 comfortably on the the motorway but you need to ignore the gear shift indicator, remember the gearing is long.

MPG? 48 consistently round town, had 53 on long journeys.

Tax is now £35 a year and insurance is cheap. I service it myself and consumables are cheap, readily available easy to replace the filters and oil. I can't see me ever getting rid of this car and I spend more time driving it than my BMW.

Practicality is subjective, if you've got 3 kids a partner and a tonne of rubble to move every weekend then this is not the tool.

Things to watch out for -
White paint, it will peel, known fault from factory so avoid if you can (mine is silver)
Drivers window mechanisms can slow then fail (relatively easy and cheap fix)
Synchro mesh on manuals between 2nd and 3rd or 3rd and 4th gears.
1.0L cars can suffer with clutch vibration.
Tyres are odd-ball sizes from the factory for the iQ3 with 16 inch alloys but there are better and cheaper options available for slightly different sizes.

That said they are very reliable cars and chain driven. The 1.33L engine (4 cylinder) is much more refined than the 3 potter 1.0L. I really can't see why anyone would purposefully go for the 1.0L for the sake of £35 a year tax. I've driven them both and whilst in normal driving the performance difference isn't huge it is noticeable and the drive and overall experience much more refined with the bigger engine.

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