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| Road Test Skoda Fabia Estate 2 1.9 TDI |
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Estate For The Fourth
There's every reason to believe that my colleagues will considering replacing their old Fabia estates with one of the new models. The basic principles of the car remain the same, and there is much that has been improved. For a start, I think the latest version looks better - to my mind the current-generation Fabia looks better than its predecessor at the front, and if the rear of the estate suggests a sharing of design philosophy with that of the equivalent Golf, well, that's not a bad thing. That tail conceals a load space which is all the more impressive considering how little the Fabia estate has grown from one generation to another. Overall length is up by just 7mm, but with the rear seat folded the load volume has shot up by 235 litres to 1460 litres. Even with the rear seat in its upright position you get 480 litres, which is about the same as you'll find in a Ford Focus estate. Passengers get a lot of room too. There's plenty of space up front - as there is in most cars these days - and although the rear doesn't look particularly generous, taller occupants will find once they're installed that they're not squeezed in as tightly as they thought they were going to be. I didn't try it, but I see no reason why the Fabia couldn't carry four six-footers on a long journey in reasonable comfort.
The best-selling engine in the previous Fabia estate was the 1.9-litre TDI turbo diesel, which the Volkswagen Group still churns out (and which I still like) even though it's been around for ages, and was long ago superseded - in theory at least - by the more modern 2.0 TDI. Skoda expects that it will be the favoured choice of people who buy the new estate too, so that's what we're testing here.
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