The Handsome Brother
by Mike Grundon (18 May 05)

"All for One and One for All." The cry went up late in 2001 when Toyota and PSA Peugeot Citroen announced they would be building a new factory together in the Czech Republic to build a new small car they'd all share. One car for all and all for one car. The swords were raised together to the bright new dawn, two French rapiers and one Japanese katana - three multinational musketeers for the new world. Four years and a couple of months later, production began and Peugeot's 107, Citroen's C1 and Toyota's Aygo started trundling down the production line. Just like Dumas' fictional heroes, the faces are different, but they're all wearing virtually the same uniform.

Toyota introduced this, its smallest ever European car, to the world's press just one and a half months before it goes on sale (July 1) and it's the most distinctive of the three brothers-in-arms. Initial looks at the two French versions suggest that, apart from the wheels, everything but two panels - the bonnet and front bumper assembly - is identical. Both the nose and the tail on the Aygo are significantly different, but more of that in a moment. There's much more important stuff to talk about.

The Aygo (pronounced I-go, so be prepared for lots of corny puns throughout the press and advertising) will be available from the start in three or five door versions and in three different specification levels priced around the £7000 to £8000 range. Next year there'll be a 1.4-litre diesel option but at its launch it will have just one engine - a one-litre, three-cylinder, VVT-i petrol unit which turns out 67bhp and 93Nm of torque.

Nothing too sparkling in the performance stakes then, but that's not what this car is all about. Toyota is telling us it's the lightest internal combustion engine on the market, weighing in at 67kg, but most importantly it'll wring out an average of 61.4 miles of motoring from just one gallon of unleaded. That, along with its low initial cost, its group one insurance rating and its low emissions putting it in band B for road tax, make it an extraordinarily cheap car to own and run.

And yet for all that, you don't have to put up with the happy-clappy, perky prat styling that small-car buyers are so often forced to endure. None of the versions wearing French or Japanese badges look daft but to my eye the Toyota has the nearest to grown-up, take-me-seriously styling.

More . . .

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