2002 Daihatsu Sirion Rally 2 review from UK and Ireland

Valve clearance had to be adjusted as valves were hitting the casing requiring engine to be taken out of car.

Annoying squeaky rattle from top left of dash.

Bearing in mind Daihatsu's reputation for reliability, I was very surprised when we bought this car as an ex dealer demo with 450 miles on the clock and a month later it was in having the above repair work.Apparently, as ours was one of the first cars, it was a problem that had since been rectified.

It was off the road for three weeks, but the dealer loaned us a car and afterwards it was spot on to be fair.

This was a very quick little car (115 mph 0-60:7.9 seconds) and had easily the best performance in the class-bearing in mind we could've ended up with a Corsa 1.2 SXi for pretty much the same money!

However, the best word to describe it is flawed, in various ways.

To access the performance you had to rev the nuts off it (red line was nearly 8,000 rpm), and it was not relaxing to drive at all, in fifth gear for example, there was no go at all, you had to change down to third believe it or not to get any real shove at 70ish!

Also the cabin was quite cramped when compared to say a Punto or Fiesta, and the steering wheel was set far too low with no adjustment. Handling was reasonable, but it tended to roll excessively all of a sudden when pressed and got quite unsettled.

Build quality was also below par when compared with most competition and it definately had it's fair share of rattles.

Plus points :It was well equipped for the price (A/C, Cd player, full electrics etc), very good fun to thrash, looked different to anything else (sort of retro), and quite economical.

To be honest, Daihatsu need to update this car asap, it's not surprising that you see so few on the roads, but at least I've been there, owned one and now know I wouldn't buy another.