Fiat Linea 125S TJet Long Term Review
The Linea with the 125S TJet is the most powerful of the lot

Fiat Linea 125S Long Term Review

The Fiat Linea 125S qualifies for a family sedan that can be raced around with

From all the long term cars I had, they were personally classified as a mini-bus, a front-wheel-drive SUV and the last one was a crossover hatchback. All the cars had diesel engines with decent mileage figures and used to go easy on the pocket. The crossover hatch was the Fiat Urban Cross and I really liked it a lot. However, I never really had a sedan to drive. This time I got lucky and got the longest car in the segment, the Fiat Linea. And to make the travel more interesting, it came with a 125 HP turbo petrol engine.

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Suspension is amazing, ride quality is brilliant

Being a Gujarati, I knew it’s not going to be easy for me to drive around a car like this. But the 1.4-litre engine producing 125 BHP and mighty 210 Nm of torque kept me going. Of all the long termers, the Linea was in the best of its condition and I personally thought that it had the best fit and finish overall, considering this was a media vehicle and not any owner’s car. About 1100 kms underway in the first month itself, I had already spent about Rs. 10,000/- in fuel expenses. With a few trips outside the city the best mileage was 11.1 km/l while the worst in the bad Mumbai traffic came down to 5.4 km/l.

[flickr size=”center” float=”medium”]http://www.flickr.com/photos/motorbeam/36943682533/[/flickr]

The Fiat Linea is long, really long

In the day to day routine which includes a little city as well as highway driving, it returned a single digit figure of 9 km/l. There was a downside to the fuel efficiency but on the other hand, the comfort and dynamics were on-point. However with the increased ground clearance it isn’t much of a fun lover but does a great job with bad Mumbai roads. It takes on the worst of potholes and speed-bumps without hitting itself like a boss. Pun intended. Fiat has kept the suspension a little stiff and this becomes a great advantage for maintaining triple digit speeds on the highways.

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Keeping the dual-tone interiors clean isn’t much of a task

Being the longest car in the segment gives a premium feel but it becomes an issue for parking in a place like Mumbai. The parking sensors are helpful, but they have a slightly delayed response and it sometimes becomes an issue as it’s not a sub 4-meter hatchback. However the size is an advantage as it gets massive boot and not to forget, good amount of road presence. In a city like Mumbai, it doesn’t really get better because the length of the car concerns the driver a lot while it does drives like a hatch. Adding to it, the massive 16-inch rims with 205-section tyres hold the road well. They are so wide that they come out of the wheel arches too.