Mini Cooper S & Peugeot 106 Rallye

The Mini and Peugeot are proof that bigger isn’t necessarily better

‘MINIS. BLOODY ENORMOUS THINGS THESE days, aren’t they? Should be called the “Maxi”. S’not a proper Mini like the original…’ It’s usually about this point in the conversation that I nod off. I’ve no particular disrespect for the kind of automotive enthusiast who considers something built in the Midlands in the 1970s to be peak automobile, and it’s not because they’re hissing through false teeth having once face-planted the steering wheel upon crashing a Marina held together with gauze and pages from the Daily Mail. The sudden and uncontrollable urge to doze off is because they’re about the sixteen-thousandth person to utter such a thing, and it’s no more pithy, relevant or insightful than it was the first time some BL bore dropped their freezing-cold take on BMW’S retro hatchback.

The subject comes to mind because I’ve been thinking lately about just how small the current Mini feels. It is, obviously, bigger than the original, but then so is a toddler’s ride-on toy and at least their drivers can waddle away without injury after a bump.

Realistically, the current Mini is about as small as it’s sensible to make a modern car with all the attendant safety requirements. OK, VW’S Up edges it, but the Mini is smaller than the current Fiesta (22cm shorter, 1cm narrower and 7cm lower) and, I should point out, still shorter than the aforementioned Austin Maxi. Other than its size, it’s the combination of upright windscreen, short dashboard and fairly level shoulder line that shrink the car around you. They’re characteristics that also enhanced the compact feeling of old 911s (997 and earlier), and it’s a far more nostalgic sensation than anything the styling can deliver.

Some may prefer the more spacious feeling of a football pitch dash and windscreen raked like Concorde’s nose cone, but the visibility afforded by the Mini’s layout and the sense of the flanks tucked in by your elbows mean it’s one of few modern hot hatchbacks that don’t have you breathing in between the hedges on a typical B-road.

Still, a recent drive in my 106 Rallye reminded me that there are plenty of benefits to something even smaller. I considered locking the Pug away for the winter, but mild weather and minimal road salt mean I’ve been able to go for a run in it at least once a month. It still feels lively on each key twist, though the intention over the next few months is to finally go ahead with some of the items raised for attention when visiting specialists Pug1off last year (evo 264).

I’m loathe to ‘modify’ the car as such, given its originality, but I’m tempted by a few subtle enhancements to tighten things up a little – spending time around modern cars with slack-free steering and growling engine notes does spoil you in some respects. A new steering wheel and a pair of buckets is one idea, in part for extra grip and support, but also to spare further wear and tear on the originals. Watch this space.

Antony Ingram (@evoantony)

MINI COOPER S

Date acquired September 2019 Total mileage 8031 Mileage this month 1050 Costs this month £0 mpg this month 44.4

PEUGEOT 106 RALLYE

Date acquired August 2017 Total mileage 113,727 Mileage this month 337 Costs this month £0 mpg this month 40.6

‘It’s one of few modern hatchbacks that don’t have you breathing in between hedges’

I’VE GOT TWO GOODBYES TO GET through this month, as change continues apace on the evo Fast Fleet. First up it’s time for the Ford Mustang GT to have a proper send-off. If I tell you that I really, really miss that car, still find myself prattling on about it at least once a week somewhere, and with someone, then you’ll probably have a good idea just how much I enjoyed having it in my life, and the extent to which I would recommend spending your hard-earned on one. It’s a great ‘character’, and that’s not to damn it with faint praise, because such a quality is sorely missing in so many new cars these days.

Yes, the Stang isn’t quite the bargain it was when it first appeared in right-hand-drive form, I suspect because Ford has realised it isn’t bought in the main by people who are counting every penny, but by those more than able to indulge themselves with vehicles considerably beyond the Ford’s price point. With options, ours came to £45,625 – although I wish we’d had the Recaros – but that still seems like real value for a muscle car when a Supra is £52,000 upwards.

One of the many things I loved about the Mustang was its individuality. I loved seeing it parked up outside the window, its sleek, blazing red form bringing to mind Bond’s Mach 1 in The Man with the Golden Gun. In the Home Counties it looked incongruous, but so glamorous at the same time, and if the modern interpretation of a mainstream coupe is, say, a 2.0 TDI Audi A5, the pony car is so refreshingly naughty, and fun. The burnout marks from using the line lock feature on our ‘Endangered Species’ shoot (evo 266) will probably still be scorched into the tarmac 20 years from now.

Of course, it’s some way from perfect. There are two ways to consider the majority of the GT’S failings. You can see them as relegating the Mustang to a six-tenths car; something that’s fun at a relaxed gait on a sunny day, for the odd burnout or three and a naughty burst of revs whenever a natural or manmade echo chamber presents itself (underground car parks were always a laugh). Or you can see it as the inevitable result of making a muscle car-lite for the broadest of global markets, and a promising blank canvas for creating something much more to the tastes of you and me. The Mustang’s squish and imprecision in the way it rode and handled was always a frustration, mainly because having spoken to tuning companies such as Steeda UK, it seemed very easy to drastically improve it.

Still, the Mustang’s underlying ability was proved at our trackdays in 2019, where it surprised quite a few people with its speed and abilities. The long gearing was much less of an issue on track, particularly during our inaugural Goodwood date, and letting the big V8 rev right out revealed every last one of its 444bhp. Nothing seemed to get away from the Stang on the straights. The bigger surprise was that nothing much left it through a corner, either; there was plenty of grip on offer, although that vagueness

meant that in the wet it needed real care if progress wasn’t to get alarmingly scrappy. In truth, I never fully trusted it at higher speeds.

Another issue was its staying power on track. We never had an issue at Bedford Autodrome, but on a summer’s day at Goodwood it could only manage a few fast laps before going into ‘limp home’ mode, which I later found out was due to the facelift cars having a sensor on the rear differential to monitor temperatures. Anyone looking to seriously track a Stang will need to consider more cooling in this area. The brakes, though, were remarkably resilient – particularly so for such a big, heavy car.

Having monstered a trackday, the Mustang always then had the knack of morphing back into something cosseting for the journey home: windows down, V8 rumbling, big comfy seats, great stereo, 30-plus mpg, just rollin’…

No wonder the Mustang has become the bestselling sports car in Europe. I really miss mine.

ON TO THE SWEDE, WHICH FOR QUITE A WHILE coexisted with the Mustang, making for a very odd couple. What can I say about the V60 that hasn’t already been said? It’s been a long while since we ran a Volvo on the Fast Fleet, and if nothing else that’s a reflection of a brand that hasn’t made many sporting cars in recent years. And yet I reckon most of us have a soft spot for the marque’s older performance machinery. I’ve never driven an 850 T5-R, and may very well find the reality distinctly underwhelming if I did, but it doesn’t stop me dreaming of its brutalist, lemon yellow front end poking out of my garage.

In the interests of clarity, let it be said now that we never expected our V60 T5 R-design to wow us as a driver’s car. However, a wagon that’s rewarding to drive needn’t be about power, acceleration or lap times, and the overall objective was to see whether there were the shoots of growth within its make-up to show that performance vehicles could once again be a part of Volvo’s future, and whether that in itself made for a satisfying rapid estate car.

It’s not easy to say this, and the phone line to Stockholm may be a bit frosty for a while as a result, but our V60 won virtually no friends during its time with us. I so wanted to like it, I really did, but it felt so fundamentally flawed in a simple engineering sense at times that the only positives were attributes shared by so many other modern cars: comfortable seats, a quality – albeit expensive at £2500 – optional sound system and an infotainment set-up that at least looked good, even if editor Stuart Gallagher took a massive dislike to it.

The saga began with a procession of lesser V and S60s on short-term loan prior to our long-termer’s arrival, and while far from having genuine driver appeal, the regular V60 D3 had much to recommend it as a classy, and classless, estate car: easy to drive, smart, and entirely fit for the task. It was a promising start.

Our T5 R-design Pro wasn’t lacking in specification, at least not after we were let loose on the configurator and inflated the price to just shy of £50,000. Perhaps this was a mistake, because not only did it raise expectations to unrealistic heights, but amid the detail lay a significant problem. Hoping for a well-rounded ride quality we shied away from

‘The Ford Mustang GT is so refreshingly naughty, and fun’

the big-wheel option, retaining the standard 19inch(!) rims, and chose the Active Four-c adaptive dampers. This would prove to be part of the car’s undoing, because with the dampers’ in their most comfortable setting the car combined a knobbly, unsettled low-speed ride with plenty of roll and loose body control at speed. Yet selecting the more dynamic setting made the ride unbearable and unusable, and so the V60 was hobbled from the off, not helped by terribly remote steering, an 2-litre four-cylinder engine devoid of any character or vim, and a gearbox that appeared to want nothing to do with said engine under almost any circumstances.

It’s such a shame, because having driven an S60 on 20-inch wheels and with passive dampers, the ride was certainly firm, but much better controlled and in keeping with a sports saloon. Maybe the extra rigidity, which I presume the saloon has over the estate, helped too.

We gave our V60 the Polestar treatment: a remap which increased peak power by just 3bhp to 250bhp, and torque by 37lb ft to 295lb ft, but promised more power and torque across the mid-range in general. However, the gains in on-road performance seemed marginal, and by this point the Volvo seemed to be defined on the fleet – and by all who drove it – as that unsatisfying car you only drove if you had to. It found a home with Aston Parrott, evo’s staff photographer, where the mileage was certainly racked up, but mention of the car now elicits little more than a wince from the quiffed one, and even that’s already fading into a more distant memory. That was perhaps the V60’s biggest failing:

‘The V60 combined a knobbly, unsettled low-speed ride with plenty of roll at speed’

for all the promise, money and kerbside appeal, it was actually a very forgettable car to drive. Like I said, a real shame.

ALL OF THIS MEANS THAT I’VE RUN OUT OF space to talk about my own cars, but then I’m ashamed to admit that they’ve spent the month hibernating inside away from the cold. However, for the first time ever I can talk about that in the plural sense, because I finally got the garage sorted, meaning there’s space for both in there.

The 911 is about to have a new exhaust system fitted, but still needs replacement discs and pads. As for the 205 GTI, it’s probably best not to mention it, because having promised that 2020 would be the year of the infamous enfant terrible of the hot hatch world, there’s a distant, unmistakable rumbling sound faintly audible but growing louder all the time.

Is it a new arrival on the ‘Towler classic branch’ of the evo Fast Fleet? Surely not – another car needing work is the last thing I need. I’d never be so silly as to do such a thing, would I? You’ll just have to tune in next time to find out.

(@Adamtowler)

FORD MUSTANG 5.0 V8 GT

Date acquired April 2019 Duration of test 8 months Total test mileage 5612 Overall mpg 21.1 Costs £2898 (Ford Performance upgrades) Purchase price £45,625 Value today £36,000

VOLVO V60 T5 R-DESIGN

Date acquired April 2019 Duration of test 8 months Total test mileage 8744 Overall mpg 27.6 Costs £745 (Polestar upgrade) Purchase price £49,255 Value today £29,000