Fiat Palio Stile [2007-2011] User Reviews

I started my research for a new car in the net, googled for a better car, bigger engine, higher HP. It went on like a hobby for quite some time, day and night surfing for Car details, reading all possible magazines in the shops, looking for My Dream Car. With a limited budget to spare, it was not that easy. Bigger engines with higher Horse Power went beyond my budget. Popular models with lower HP never enter my mind. After about 6, 7 months of research, I discovered Fiat Palio Stile 1.6 Sport falling within my budget, target, reach and taste. It is a shame, no one highlights the goodies of this car in the magazines or net. The power and the cheaper price tag it carries were not at all an attractive factor for all auto gurus. Rather web blogs and car magazines bluntly say - it gives poor mileage (I wonder, what is poor mileage when Hondas, Hundai 100HP range give below 9KM mileage and no one bothers), dated dash board and interiors, A/C controls of Borris Becker’s time.. etc. etc... Web blogs still wrote - Strong body (some people call it tank like built.. don’t know what it means because I haven’t seen a tank or sat in a tank), reliable and powerful, poor dealer treatment, no easily available spares and services, drunkard, Italian Beauty etc... etc... Mixed, varied comments with more negatives and few positives; Highlighted Negatives and Low- gear Positives. Against all these odds I hold my breath and kept my decision to go for this Italian Beauty. When ever I read in the net “hindustan me kewal maruti ka naam chalta hai baaki sab bakwaas hai” I imagine a peasant looking North Indian, mouth filled with pan-parag spitting saliva on the wall or any where and uttering these comments – real bakwaas talking about cars… I bought Palio Stile 1.6 Sport on 17th June 2009. So far I have driven 530 KMs. Wonder ful to drive. Very good handling in high speeds.It can easily drive around 80 – 100 Km/H within the RPM range of 2000 – 3000. Vow.. fun driving this car. So far I have tried maximum 100 km/h in NH47 Palakad - Trissur high way and also Pollachi - Coimbatore State high way and I felt so safe and confident in that speed. Within the RPM range of 2000 – 3000 i was able to drive around 80 – 100 Km/H. Vow.. fun driving this car. I got 50 thousand discount from Tafe Coimbatore. On road price came around 4.42 Lakhs. Spend around 35thoudand rupees for audio, window films and seat cover. Blaupunkt Hamburg MP57 is good for hands-free mobile connectivity. Colour of the car? I prefer furnace red or cheery red but 1.6 Sport comes in Ferrari red. Don't like it. So settled for Black. It looks very elegant in BLACK. I Christened it 'Blakk Styil'.
Update on August 30, 2009: I have driven 4265 KM now (75 days I own the car) no issues at all. Fine and excellent to drive. Once I touched top-speed of 140 KM/H in the Madurai - Nagercoil Highway. Driving in 80 - 120 KM/H range is normal.  The mileage never went below 12.5. Crossed 8000 KM. After 2nd service I get mileage 14 in highway driving (full time A/C)

Update on January 20, 2010: I have crossed 11,500 KM now. After the second service there was a leak near clutch pedal. It was repaired under warranty. Same excellent driving experience. One moron mini-lorry hit me in the back bumper.  I hit a dog and the front bumper was damaged.

Mileage remains the same as ever before at 12.5. Now I started to fill the tank calculating the distance divided by 12.5 KM/L.

I am really happy about my choice. Sometimes some silly alto, swift etc come to compete with me when I drive slowly in 60- 70 Km/H speed. I just press the accelerator and hit the century and the cars vanish behind.  ha..ha...ha...aa

Photos

Hi All,

I Purchased a Fiat Palio 1.1SL Black from Concorde. Its now correct time to talk on the ownership experience, but would like to put down the selection criteria.

Wagon R is a thin metal sheet ok for urban (cross to cross and local area commuting) and is a good replacement for a 3 Wheel autorickshaw. Only thing is it sells at 3.32L for LX despite its huge sales numbers (higher sales gives scope for manufacturer to reduce the margin on individual cars and offer it at lesser price, which maruti is not doing). Xing is a good car except for the backseat comfort and narrow width. Koreans and Japanese people have comfort cause of thier own average people sizes. but still SUMO wrestlers cannot fit in either of these. they still have to go for a SUV. Fuel effy of both these are good, considering, but beware they have 5 seatbelts and can seat 4 people.

Fiat Palio- the front axle width is wider than the back axle (very imprnt for cornering at high speeds). most SUV have similar axle width ratios.

the body is of same width all along and is clearly wider by 10cms then xing and 15cms (half feet) than Wagon R. both xing and WR have equal axle widths and are squarish treads.

Tubeless tyres are in Palio. 165/80 rubber 13inch.

My palio, a Corporate lease car, returned roughly15.8 kmpl in its 3000KMS range with 1300kms city/bad road/hilly terrain drive. this is with in most cases, 5 people on board with GVW-990KGS+360KGS.

Pick up is clearly slow but observe the 1/4 mile distance is covered in 5seconds delay to that of Xing and Wagon R. Even if for the entire life, we cummulate the 5seconds, we may loose 5 yrs time for 60yrs of driving. But tell me who drives for 60yrs driving time and if so, what would 5yrs matter for him then.

If the 3cars are put on race from Bangalore to Delhi (with a perfect straight highway exclusively for the 3), and all the three are on full throttle (that is 150kmph xing, 145kmph wagonR and 131kmph Palio Stile), only then Stile would take a full 3hrs late arrival at Delhi after 15hrs 2200kms continous drive. Thats the maximum difference. We (the palio users never pitch palio for doing this job). We know that our OEM has a much better answer in Ferrari's to do this job. and

Suzuki is known to be a very good BIKE manufacturer.

But lets remember, the tolerance on Indian roads are 80-100kmph and also, I do remember we frequently have to decelerate and accelerate where the Xing's and WagonR's may win.

Most important to remember also is, we do not have a straight track all along. for curves, a Differential width pair of axles (particularly the wide front track) is important (and no tall boy design please). Palio manages to maintain a relatively although may be 10kmph higher speed while cornering.

Another important thing is the 80-0kmph braking distance required, which is the lowest for Palio and the other 2 have real problems.

A typical indian car customer is lured by the BHP (they also dont see at which RPM is the BHP), and the KMPL (they never bother how much is the seating capacity) althought there can be 5 seat belts on every car. well, if we are actually thinking to have a good FE for 1 person, then better drive a Bajaj Platina? for FE, or if we think we need a reasonable so called societal commute (?) then better those buy a 3 BOX Sedan like SX4?.

Among Getz, UVA and Fiat Palio (the comparable 3 cars), The choice is clearly Palio Stile 1.1SL, for some trade off for sure in the pick-up. The power is really pathetically low and is best sutied for sedate driving people. Fiat is just 5cms lesser in width compared to Getz and UVA. Again, please do not take those pick up and BHP figures.

The xing's and Wagon R's are better compared with SPARK (all the 3 are 4seaters 1ltr engines).

A rainy Friday afternoon in Bangalore, everyone preparing to go home from work and chill out, but i am franctically pacing around trying to get my DD's ready. I wanted the Fiat Palio 1.6 Sport, and i wanted it at my doorstep today!!!

After all arrangements were done, the showroom guys were quick with the works and by 7.00 pm that Friday, the car was standing in front of my house!!!

Exterior

Fiat has given a considerable facelift to the new Palio, with the cool looking headlamps. The 1.6 is available in just 2 colors Red and Black, so i opted for the fiery looking, attention grabbing Ferrari Red.

Interiors

The interiors too are pretty well done with dual color dashboards and plush beige interiors, with sufficient Cubby holes wherever required. The only crib i have is that the Cup holders are integrated into the Glove box lid. Otherwise the dashboard is pretty decent with good readability. This car has oodles of elbow room and the rear is spacous too comfortably seating 3 adults with decent leg room.

Engine and Performance

The 1.6 L 100 Bhp monster is the main reason i bought this beauty. It has a amazing response in all the gears and the AC does not load the engine too much and response is pretty much the same. The top speed they say is in the 170's but i just did a 120 since it is the frst week.

Handling

The car feels very stable at speeds of over 100 and with better tyres will do really good at cornering at these speeds, being a pretty heavy car at almost a ton, the Palio is defenitely known for excellent stability and does not disappoint

Mileage

Well for a combined drive of the city and highway (50:50) i got around 13-14 Kmpl with AC, which is not bad at all for this kind of performance.

Value for Money

The 1.6 version comes loaded with Alloys, Tubeless tyres, central locking, rear wipers fog lamps, rear defogger etc, which makes it a value for money car at an impressive price tag of approx 5 Lakhs on road.

Overall i am proud to own a car which has the power and space of any top mid sized sedan, with a price tag that is not a pinch to my wallet.

I have completed 17,000KM. Including three long drives of 600 KM each.

This is a no problem vehicle.

Relief from frequent gear change.

Third gear is really good. On this gear you can drive in slow moving traffic below 10 km/h speed and also can maintain speed of  60 km/h with the same gear.

Car is spacious inside. Seats are broad. A/C is too good.

I have done with Second servicing. Mileage

is 19+ in city (A/C usage 20% in travel). I have checked it so many times. :)

Suspensions are good, get a feel of Volvo bus travel.

I met with a small accident, which proved it sturdiness. No damage at all :)

Some drawbacks I would like to mention are

Clutch is little heavy. Turning radius is big. Compressor fan is little noisy.

Hi all good day,

     We purchased this car on Dec 2007. The ride is very smooth. One feels the comfort and safety as soon as u step inside. I am 6.1" tall, I feel comfortable with the seats. Any bad road is converted to a smooth ride even at high speed.(Thanks to the good shock absorbers and cabin noise is minimum).The one thing thats special i think is the ROCK SOLID BODY. We took the car to karaikal via Pondy... At pondy a PSRTC bus hit us from the side... if it were other cars atleast the body would have deformed.. I found that the only the paint has come off.... Thanks to TATA Motors service backup.. they fixed the paint to the showroom condition.  I get a mileage of 9Kmpl with ac on in chennai city heavy traffic. The problems that we faced were the speedo and the fuel pump. The speedo was rectified immediately but the fuel pump took a weeks time. The TATA service is good but available of spares is still an issue.... Most say the engine is under powered but take a Test drive it will proove thm wrong. The one thing thats special i think is the rock solid body.

Its now 3 over months since I have bought a palio 1.1 sle. So far i am satisfied from what i bought.

I had a chance to go for a drive of around 700km at a strecth to my home town. It was gr8. car was very comfortable, we managed to keep a speed of 120 - 130km/ hour. and it was real smooth gr8 balance and gr8 comfort of seating. was not at all tired, there was ample space to stretch and relax. A/c was very efficient and no noise inside while driving.

Now coming to city i do feel that car pick is bad but once u r in 2nd gear it good and above its real good. So u might get discomforted especially ladies wont find it comfortable.

everyday i dirve around 35 - 40 kms in Delhi, but i dont feel tired. Once u understand the clutch to first gear ratio. i dont think that there is any problem.

one thing which i love in the car is its looks ...its just awesome. 

in city i get around 12 to 13km/ ltre and highway i guess i got 15- 16km/ litre. All this is before 1st servicing. i am expecting an enhancement in performance once i get the 1st servicing done.

take it for sure that this car is best amongst the small car segment on highway. Gr8 feel. its heavy and safe. body is good paint used is good, this is one of the thing nobody notice! Fuel is "the" criteria. but what u end up compromising is the safety. Palio dont compromise safety. it wont get squashed like santro or dabba wagon r or swift once hit. Body of the car is really strong.

u can easily negotiate this car deal at around 3.75 lac on road for sle.

Do try driving this before u go for others.

Wish u happy n safe driving

Harsh Raj....proud owner of Palio....stile 

Hi! I drove this car recently. Frankly I drove this diesel just after driving an Innova. I must say, I was taken aback by the response of this engine. I kept on saying to the sales guy with me during the test drive "What an engine!". After my analysis of engine, I started to think about other things (though it was difficult to think, because, the engine time and again kept on giving you a feeling, are you actually drving a diesel car???). The interiors are same old and dated. The car is specious and it comes with certain additional feature in a like to like model incomparison with Swift. Such as, it has de-fogger and rear wiper and washer! I must say, this is a good feature, as you really require them (at least the rear wiper and washer) during monsoons! In my opionion it's must! The ride and handling of the car is superb as always it has been for FIAT. The seats are fresh and nice, but the dash board is nothing great! The car has a superb a/c which cools in no time! I drove at 130kmph with no vibration of this greatly built hatch on the highway. The car responds superbly in 1st, 3rd and 5th gear! The gear shift could have been better. It accelerates superbly! It will make all the other lightly built petrol hathes to shame for sure! The external look is also twicked with fresh grille and new FIAT logo. The multijet logo also looks damn good at the back! There must have been a allow wheel with ABS option. And are we not missing the trademark rear spoiler in the Palio? Overall, its about Rs. 20,000 cheaper (for the similar model of Swift), better built, great ride and handling but definitely and shade lower in interiors when you compare this with swift (both share the same engine which is a FIAT engine and won the prestigious "Engine of the year" award in 2005 in Europe.)

My verdict, it's a MUST EAVLUATE hatch even for Petrol car buyers and great buy with its cost and fuel efficiency. Well, Maruti still scores with its service network, but Tatas know about that for sure!