We have this car as a leasing-car at work.
We got 5 of them, and after 2000km, one of them already needed to fill up his oil again! It was completely empty.
Because the car isn't large in width, and it's rather high, it's very dangerous to drive more than 120km/h on the highway (car starts floating with the wind)
The engine is also not powerfull enough to make acceleration on the highway.. But this will be better when there's a better engine inside.
* Expensive car for what it's worth
* Bad control when making higher speeds
* Not enough acceleration (engine related)
* Engine really drinks diesel! > only around 680km with full tank.
* advantage : the modulation of the back seats is nice when you want to take a lot of stuff with you (much space)
As far as I know, there is no 1.5dci engine in Meriva. There are 1.3 CDTI and 1.7 CDTI diesel engines available. Also, it's known that some cars are more sensitive to strong wind than others, but let's not exaggerate about how dangerous it is to drive over 120km/h.
I must say that I feel the review on this vehicle is harsh, it is a vehicle that does not have very much competition in my country and we only have the 1.7 diesel. In terms of economy I am unable to comment, how ever I found the drive to be fun and the car is responsive, it may be influenced by wind, but I thought it still had a very good road handling and was ready to do more at 120 km/h.
A meriva is my daily driver and I never had problems with the wind. I use it to go on vacation from France to Spain and I never felt that the wind was an issue.
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