Fiat Linea 1.4 Petrol Ownership Review

[Navtej]

Hi Navtej,

A very warm welcome to TAI and have a wonderful stay here! Linea is a wonderful car to own and expecting a very detailed review and more pics of the beauty.

Though the sound quality of the Linea's audio system is just about average, there are a number of settings for the system that are possible.

Here are some pictures of the audio system settings that are possible in the Blaupunkt system fitted in the Linea - these settings are accessed via the 'menu' and 'audio' buttons while you navigate up and down/ previous or next or increase/ decrease the values using the 4 arrow buttons just above the 'menu' button:

 

[sandeep]

hello navtej, welcome to TAI.
your ride looks nice.I LIKE THE LINEA COLOUR..ENJOY YOUR STAY HERE

 

[jayadev]

Hi 350Z, mastersquall, speed-thirst, Safire90, HolySatan, Akash- thank u guys for the welcome.

Mastersquall, I took the photos myself. Admittedly, it was a stupid thing to do; I am a bit of an emotional man and I was riled by a friend's remark saying the Linea was underpowered and he wondered if it could go past the 120 kmph mark. In fact, I got the speedo needle over the 180 kmph mark. The Linea has about +6% speedo error in that the actual speed when the speedo is indicating 100 kmph would only be 94 kmph. Car India in its March 2009 issue mentions this fact in their test drive of the Linea 1.4 Petrol regular on page 111. They recorded an actual top speed of 170.1 kmph with the speedo indicating 182.
However, Autocar India mentions the actual top speed of the 1.4 regular petrol Linea as 182 kmph in their monthly New Buyers' Guide.

Car India recorded a 0-100 kmph time of 13.94 sec as against 15.14 sec that the Autocar India mentions.

I trust the Autocar India more than the other car mags though I have a feeling the 0-100 kmph figures for the ANHC might not be as quick as mentioned. I have driven my friend's ANHC a number of times and I have NEVER felt like I am driving a 118 BHP car. The ANHC's pickup is in no way superior to the regular 1.4 petrol Linea's and you have to really rev it in order to make quick progress. This may be due to taller gearing or something else done to improve the fuel efficiency or the engine of my friend's car might not have been tuned properly. I would like my ANHC-owning friends to share their experiences on this.

y not forget about any other car ,as you have one of the best from best car makers.
i myself had lot of ambiguous thoughts while going for punto 90hp . but ambiguity is just dark history now. FIAT rockssss..

 

[Navtej]

Thanks Jayadev, the Linea and the Punto are cars that drive as well as they look. Endowed with adequately powerful engines with fantastic dynamics, they are a pleasure to drive.

I have heard about some fit and finish niggles, some plastic parts coming off in some Lineas and Puntos. Well, the rear-quarter glass chrome linings have come off and an 'i' fell off the rear Emotion badge about a month back. These are really minor things, otherwise my car has been rock-solid. However, my friend Gary broke the internal on dash boot-open button once just after 3 months of purchase, replaced the same day of course. Other than that, both of us have had nothing come off the dash or elsewhere.

I have done 25000 km+ and just got it serviced once at 15000 km when Joshi Autozone, Chd carried out the first free service just changing the engine oil and air filter etc. The car has not given me any problems whatsoever so far.

Well the AC-Climate control works well. Even in searing heat in Punjab plains with temperatures soaring to 45 degrees Celsius, it did a good job.

However, if the car was left long in the Sun (in Jun or Jul 2010), the rear occupants did complain that it took a longish time cooling the rear. This might be due to the huge glass area of the car. The Joshi Autozone chaps checked it up and it was seen that the compressor cuts off when the grille temperature reaches 7.5 degrees. However, even in 45 degrees heat, the rear passengers used to get comfortably cool in about 7-10 minutes with the AC setting at LO and fan speed turned to max and the rear AC vent is useful, though 2 would have been better.

 

[Navtej]

The Fuel Efficiency/ Mileage of my car well.... The best I've got is 20.2 kmpl as indicated by the on-board computer. After numerous runs and calculations, I have concluded that the on-board computer shows an error of about 9.5% on the plus side. That means that the actual best mileage that the car has managed is 20.2-1.90=18.3 kmpl.

The worst figure I have seen on the MFD is 9.0 meaning a sad 8.14 kmpl.

On an average, since most of the times the car is driven in city environs, the Linea 1.4 FIRE in my hands delivers about 11 kmpl.

I would also like to point out that being a physics guy, I have determined that even the odometer on the car shows an error of nearly 2% meaning thereby that every time you see 100 km on the odo, actually you have done only 98. I am not sure about other cars but my Zen and Alto had absolutely accurate odo readings.

In calculating the actual fuel efficiency figures mentioned above, I have already factored in the odo error so that 18.3 means 18.30 and 8.14 means 8.14, absolutely sure of that.

I wonder if any of you automotive guys out there have noticed similar errors in your rides; not that it makes any significant difference though.

 

[Navtej]

AcA is the abbvn of Average consumption Trip A.

 

[mastersquall]

Mileage is good . seeing soo many function i am jealous why don't TATA put same thing in our car

 

[cooldhaya]

Hello Navtej welcome to TAI , i think you are also a performance enthusiast like me and want your car to be fast! Linea is one car i love for its looks , your car is looking nice and i like the color too!


And i would advice you not to click pictures while you are driving , extremely dangerous even taking your eyes off the road for even a second.


Good comparison between Linea and City and no doubt Linea is one VFM car! Honda has always priced its cars higher. But the feature list , now i think City has got alloy wheels and fog lamps right , but still Linea has got many more features! The FE which you have been getting is also good , wishing you many more happy miles with the car!


Can you share the cost of first service with us here?


@ Mastersquall Don worry man , the Aria itself has got so many features from Fiat and so does Manza and Vista. I am sure new Safari will have most of the features!

 

[mastersquall]

nope not in new safari but in merlin . current safari will remain same >__>

 

[Umang]

Mileage is good . seeing soo many function i am jealous why don't TATA put same thing in our car

well they are already providing many features in their new cars like manza..so lets not beg them like this..

 

[Navtej]

well they are already providing many features in their new cars like manza..so lets not beg them like this..

Right Umang, the Manza has most of the features the Linea offers and of course, the Manza has borrowed the engines from Fiat as well.
And the Manza offers lumbar support and delayed power windows function too that the Linea doesn't. Though I think they have not yet given the Climate control, foldable key and electric boot release on the Manza.

Here are a few more photographs of the interiors:

 

[Navtej]

From the Menu button on the rt side of the dash, one can access multiple functions including the setting of the speed limit, service schedule reminder, button and buzzer volumes, autoclose while travelling, passenger airbag on/off, one of the 8 European languages you want on the mfd and for the Bluetooth lady to speak in, Data regarding trip B, units you want on the MFD (e.g. miles or kilometres, mpg or kmpl, fuel reqd for a given distance, temp in Celsius or Fahrenheit etc), time/date settings and more. These are what Fiat calls the 'My Car' features.

The buttons to the rt of Menu/Esc are the headlight beam adjusters and front and rear fog lamps.

 

[Navtej]

Updating the thread after some time.
Celebrated the 2nd birthday, so to speak, of the Linea on 26th Jun, 2011.
Meanwhile, the car completed 30000 km on the 1st of this month, I think.

Got the 2nd 'free' service carried out at Joshi Autozone, Chandigarh. The car had earlier been just inspected at the odo reading of 5000 km, while the first 'free' service had been carried out at around the 15 K mark [Curiously, my dad-in-law, who has done about 36000 km so far in 2 and a half years of acquiring a new Lancer, has had 7 services (3 'free' and 4 paid so far) carried out; when I pointed this out to him, he was aghast- "aisi kon si car ban gayi ki jisse 15000 km pay service karaani padti hai- tum 5000 km pay karvaya karo nahin to ek lakh km se pehle hee engine baith jayega" - I just chuckled...].

A few new photos of the car and my adventures with it follow.

I'll write about the whole 'servicing' experience- it wasn't as pleasant as I had hoped - in my next post.

 

[carfreak]

Hey super cool pics. I just loved the way you are passionate about your Italian beauty. Wish you you many more happy motoring miles with your beauty

 

[Navtej]

Hey super cool pics. I just loved the way you are passionate about your Italian beauty. Wish you you many more happy motoring miles with your beauty

Thanks a tonne carfreak, you just made my day! Some of those pics are from my Manali trip, just love that place!