1998 Fiat Cinquecento Sporting review from UK and Ireland

Heat Shield on Cat rusted itself loose and was removed by Kwik-Fit.

Rubber engine mount fell off causing a very nasty vibration when accelerating and causing me much fear of finding out what could have been wrong (gearbox/engine) - only £50 in total as it turned out - 1 hour dealer labour plus £10 part.

Rear window wash keeps freezing.

Paint chips very badly and bodywork dents easily. Less upsetting now that car is three years old but worse than any other car I've owned and they were all at least 5 years old.

Passenger seat bar for moving seat forward and back broke off in my mother's hand.

Dashboard squeaks and rattles but then again it's not supposed to be a Volkswagen.

It's a fine car which does it's job well, batters down the motorway at speeds indicated up to 110mph and is fun to drive.

Big windows and little noise absorption mean it always feels like you're going fast even when you're not... this is a good thing because if you put your foot down all the time in BMW you'll be more likely to be breaking speed limits more often, in a Cinquecento you can have a riot all the time and still be within the speed limit (well some of the time anyway!)

Seats are comfy and as long as you're not carrying 5 six-footers you can genuinely take 5 people in relative comfort - helped by the fact that the passenger can sit further forward because of the absence of dashboard in front of them (there's just a little shelf)

Tyres ARE expensive but I am afraid that getting new wheels & tyres might compromise the fun handling. However I have found my local dealer supplying Pirellis for £50 fitted as opposed to Kwik-Fit's £70-odd (£67 plus 'valves & balancing' how on earth you're supposed to fit a tyre without valves and balancing I don't know)

Fuel consumption good as long as you don't spend every single minute thrashing it, but even then it's still better than my last 2 cars.

The boot although small is a wonderful boxy shape when the seats are down and takes a surprising amount of stuff - more than any other car I've had other than my Citroen BX.