SEAT Ibiza FR 1.0 TSi (115PS) 6.5 Years and 105,000 Miles
So. I had the SEAT Ibiza from new and put 105,000 miles on it over 6.5 years. I posted about it a few times on the HJ forum under the username “FiestaOwner”. I have now replaced this car so it’s now time to write its final review.
It drove and handled well with brisk acceleration. Although it didn’t quite match the handling of a 2012 1.25 fiesta I owned previously (the acceleration of the Fiesta was nowhere near as good as the Ibiza). The ride of the Ibiza was slightly on the firm side (of course it was on 17” wheels and being FR trim, it might have had firmer suspension). Despite what I’ve said I really liked owning and driving this car.
The manual 6 speed gearbox mated to the 1.0TSi engine has bags of performance, it’s a joy to drive. The car is comfy and all controls are well laid out. I found it to be a nice size with decent size boot and ample space for this class of car.
As I stated on the HJ forum before, I would criticise 2 things about this car. The 1st is that there is no interior lighting for the rear passengers. The rear seats really are in darkness. This is a significant omission and it is disappointing that this doesn’t seem to have been rectified on later cars, despite there being 2 facelifts after mine was built. The 2nd thing is that it only has one feeble reversing light which makes reversing in the dark tricky. Have had other cars in the past (including a MK2 Clio and a 2012 Fiesta) which have had 2 decent reversing lights and makes reversing in the dark a dawdle.
I had this car serviced religiously every 10,000 miles. The first 6 services were done at the SEAT dealer, the 4 other services were done at my local independent garage. While still getting the servicing done at SEAT my independent put a set of discs and pads on both the front and rear (didn’t trust SEAT to do this). 50,000 miles later I had to get another set of rear pads fitted, as a caliper was slightly sticking (I had noticed it was getting slightly more brake dust on one wheel, but it wasn’t heating up). My indie freed off the calliper and that stopped the extra brake dust.
After 100,000 mile I had a broken front spring. I heard it break and saw the broken coil bouncing along the road in my mirror. The car still drove fine (without any knocking and the suspension didn’t drop) the bottom of the coil spring still seated in the cup on the strut. I did hit a nasty pothole over 2 years previous to this, and I think that weakened the spring. I got my indie to replace both front springs.
I had Michelin CrossClimate Tyres fitted when the car was new, they did about 35,000 miles. I replaced them with another set which did the same mileage. I always found with the CrossClimates that the rear of the car seemed to break away too easily when cornering (at a very slow speed) in snowy conditions. My experience never seemed to match that of the professional reviewers. Otherwise, these tyres handled exceptionally well (wet, dry, hot and cold). Also fitted a set of Continental AllSeasonContact’s these did 31,000 miles and I felt that they performed very well too. Never experienced the rear of the car breaking away with the Continental’s, but maybe I never experienced the same weather conditions as I did with the Michelin’s. I found (both the Michelin and the Continental) All Seasons Tyres developed a drone after perhaps 20 – 25,000 miles (sounded like wheel bearings, but the drone stopped when the tyres were replaced). Never experienced this when running previous cars on Summer tyres. A few weeks before selling the car I had to put another set of tyres on it. This time I put on Nexen N Blue 4Season 2’s. They seemed ok, but didn’t have them long enough to form an opinion on them.
I had one puncture with this car (at night of course!), fortunately I had spec’d it with a full size spare wheel, so was able to change it myself and get back on my way quickly. I would recommend to everyone, make sure you get a spare wheel (and tool kit).
It passed all MOT’s with no advisories. It had no knocking from the steering or suspension. Still drove very much like a new car.
The car is still on its:- original clutch, original battery, original exhaust, original TPMS sensors and batteries, original batteries in both key fobs.
During my ownership VW group revised its guidance on when the Cam Belt is due for replacement. When contacting VW Group, they advised me that the Cam Belt is now a “Fitted for Life” item which can be considered as 15 years or 180,000 miles. As a consequence, I never had this replaced.
So, in essence I would really recommend this car. It’s never let me down.
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Even though it’s been around for a while now I still think the Ibiza is a good looking car. We also had an early (2018) one in FR trim, though ours had the dsg ‘box. I thought, and still think, it looks great in that metallic red colour. Desire red I think it was called. Ours was written off rather too prematurely, but it did its job in protecting the driver, if not the stone wall it was driven in to…. I also thought it drove well, and was very well equipped. Though I think we might have ticked a lot of options…. We would have had another, but in mid 2018 the lead time for a replacement to the same spec was over 6 months. So LV paid out the invoice price of the car rather than replace it and we bought a MINI Clubman instead.
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Always my favourite rental car in Spain should I be fortunate enough to get a 1.0 TSi FR from OK Mobility at ALC.
Sure is better than a C3 or Dacia Stepway.
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PeterS I seem to mind that story - was the Ibiza not relatively new when it happened?
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You have a good memory Bobby - it was very new. Registered on 1st March 2018 and written off on May the 18th 2018. I can’t recall how many miles it had done, but I think it was probably a couple of thousand. Of which 270odd were collecting it from a Seat dealer in Liverpool (a carwow purchase) followed by a very snowy drive home.
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>>
I'm not very good with names as my wife keeps telling me but when it comes to irrelevant car info.......
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>> Even though it’s been around for a while now I still think the Ibiza is
>> a good looking car. We also had an early (2018) one in FR trim, though
>> ours had the dsg ‘box. I thought, and still think, it looks great in that
>> metallic red colour. Desire red I think it was called.
Yes, I still think it's a fantastic looking car. Mine was also Desire Red. That colour really suits it.
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I guess the Ibiza is very similar to the Skoda Fabia I had from 2019 until early last year.
Would have kept it longer but we were going down to one car and it hadn't go the kerbweight to manage even a small caravan. Only downside was that the flip side of a truly massive boot was very little legroom in the back.
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>> I guess the Ibiza is very similar to the Skoda Fabia I had from 2019
>> until early last year.
>>
>> Would have kept it longer but we were going down to one car and it
>> hadn't go the kerbweight to manage even a small caravan. Only downside was that the
>> flip side of a truly massive boot was very little legroom in the back.
>>
Don't think it was about in 2019, but the Skoda Scala (which I'm sure is based on the same platform as the current Fabia and Ibiza) has both a massive boot and loads of leg room for the rear seat passengers. It's longer than the current Golf hatchback. Don't know what it's towing capabilities are though.
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>> Don't think it was about in 2019, but the Skoda Scala (which I'm sure is
>> based on the same platform as the current Fabia and Ibiza) has both a massive
>> boot and loads of leg room for the rear seat passengers.
My Fabia was a 2016 estate. Bought as a 'distress purchase' after LV wrote off my gorgeous 2011 Roomster. Still office based back then so needed a car 'tomorrow'.
Boot would take a Brompton bike longitudinally down either side with plenty space for bags between.
Flipside was that even with front seats well forward rear was cramped fore/aft. Female work colleague, tall but not massive, found it uncomfortable just on a lift locally after a training session.
A pair of adolescents would have struggled on the 6-700 mile a day journeys we did with our kids.
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Excellent report. Would be interesting to see more like this here. Good news about cambelt longevity. They obviously made them properly for VW, unlike the crumbly DAYCO belts-in-oil which destroyed the Stellantis (Peugeot) 1.2 puretech's reputation, although by 2019 better belts had become available. I wonder who the belt supplier was? Also, what was depreciation? How much new and how much when sold?
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>>Good news about cambelt longevity. They obviously made them properly for VW, unlike the crumbly DAYCO belts-in-oil
European manufacturers (PSA and Ford essentially) kept up a stream of innovations and new faults while for the most part the far eastern ones continuously improved what was there. How's that for a sweeping generalisation? The peak of this risky approach by Ford and PSA was surely the wet belt combined with the turbo which could ingest the debris along with its oil supply. Also used by VAG although not in the EA 211.
It took VAG a while to get the TSI right. The earlier EA111 had timing chain ("toothed chain") failures due to stretching which VAG blame suppliers for saying they had used worn tooling. It was also prone to EML lights due to the turbo boost actuator sticking. They got it right in the end although I think the (revised) boost actuator on the EA211 evo still causes faults. They also binned the toothed chain in favour of the dry belt by the sound of it.
We were lucky with our 1.2 TSI 105 in the Roomster but we only did 50,000 in it, I made sure the oil changes were done every year with proper stuff. It was a really clever but complicated engine, it warmed up in no time at all but like many small turbos of the time it rarely did more than 85% of the claimed mpg.
Pleased to have an all 'Japanese' fleet now. (Yes i know Honda tried the wet belt idea for a while and also managed to create the perfect time bomb combination of wet belt + turbocharger).
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I have never forgiven Honda for doing away with the magic seats in the Civic - these were sensational and practical design.
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I had a Honda CRV (first generation I think) when we moved to Japan, but the diff leaked all its fluid out one day and the car was whisked away never to be seen by me again. It was replaced by a Toyota Altezza (Lexus IS200 in the UK) which did a maximum of 15,000 miles in the two years I had it, and was serviced every three months for some reason. It had a dodgy auto ‘box after a year or so, which was fixed. I recall the loan car was a very odd looking thing called a Toyota WiLL.
I’d have liked to have had longer with the Seat Ibiza though; it was a nice car to drive and still looks good today I think. My Mum has the Audi version of it…that must be approaching 8 years old now as well, and while it’s smarter looking than the first generation A1 I think the Ibiza looks better. And was a fair bit cheaper! I have a scanned copy of the invoice for the Ibiza, as I needed it for the insurance claim…. List price OTR was £17,710. We managed to add £3,280 of options, get a £2,016 discount, £1,500 deposit contribution (aka discount) and £250 SEAT UK goodwill ‘cheque’. Not sure what that was for! Net cost £17,224. When I carwow’ed it at the time an A1 to the same spec was about £5k more OTR. My mums is more sensibly specced…but was still a fair bit more. Mind you, hers is still going!!
But Autotrader has the cheapest 2018 Ibiza FR Auto at £8,745 retail, and with a lower spec. If that’s a £5,500 traded-in price, that’d have been depreciation of just under £12k in 8 years. Which seems pretty good to me.
Edited to add… And if one had been more parsimonious with the options then that depreciation would probably be nearer £10k, or £100 or so a month :)
Last edited by: PeterS on Mon 27 Jul 26 at 20:04
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>> Excellent report. Would be interesting to see more like this here. Good news about cambelt
>> longevity. They obviously made them properly for VW, unlike the crumbly DAYCO belts-in-oil which destroyed
>> the Stellantis (Peugeot) 1.2 puretech's reputation, although by 2019 better belts had become available. I
>> wonder who the belt supplier was? Also, what was depreciation? How much new and how
>> much when sold?
>>
Of course the VW Group 1.0 TSi doesn't use a wet-belt. While the VW group has certainly had some problem engines, the 1.0 TSi genuinely seems to be a well regarded engine. It's quite smooth and refined.
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>> the 1.0 TSi genuinely seems to be a well
>> regarded engine.
I hope so, I've not long bought one.
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>> >> the 1.0 TSi genuinely seems to be a well
>> >> regarded engine.
>>
>>
>> I hope so, I've not long bought one.
>>
What car did you buy?
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>> >>
>> >>
>> What car did you buy?
>>
Fabia.
Very pleased with it so far, excellent performance and economical. Only downside is when I forget to turn off the default stop/start "Feature", which I find a right pain.
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>> Very pleased with it so far, excellent performance and economical. Only downside is when I
>> forget to turn off the default stop/start "Feature", which I find a right pain.
I had the same gut reaction but couldn't actually rationalise it.
Seoras the Superb does it too but it's seamless and (hopefully) adds miles to the gallon.
Only sometimes stop/start switches off and then I get paranoid about why.....
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>> >> What car did you buy?
>> >>
>>
>> Fabia.
>>
>> Very pleased with it so far, excellent performance and economical. Only downside is when I
>> forget to turn off the default stop/start "Feature", which I find a right pain.
>>
Excellent choice. I replaced the Ibiza with a Fabia too. Went for the 1.0 TSi (116PS) 6 speed manual gearbox. Pleased with mine too.
As I has stop/ start on the Ibiza, I just got into the habit of turning it off automatically.
I'll start a new thread at the weekend on the Fabia.
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Also, what was depreciation? How much new and how
>> much when sold?
>>
Don't have the invoice, but bought new November 2019 close to £18,000. Sold privately to a work colleague for £5,700 which I think is the same price I would have got from Motorway. Wasn't interested in advertising it privately and having to deal with tyre kickers.
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... depreciation?
>> ....bought new November 2019 close to £18,000. Sold privately to a work colleague for £5,700......>>
That's c. 10p per mile, which looks good. I think it's always best to keep ownership pence per mile well below the fuel ppm, which is not easy for ICE cars - and indeed some EVs if bought new.
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>> I think it's always best to keep ownership pence per mile well below the fuel ppm, which is not easy for ICE cars - and indeed some EVs if bought new. >>
Assuming that your 'ownership' includes VED and insurance, even if you have a non-depreciating car (like ours) you can easily calculate your necessary annual mileage from your typical MPG and your VED and insurance. If you are lucky enough to get those for (say) £500, that would buy you about 300 litres, which might take you 3000 miles or more. Do you consider maintenance cost as part of 'ownership' ?
Of course, if your car rarely moves, you are unlikely to achieve your aim !
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I think it's always best to keep ownership pence per mile well below thefuel ppm, which is not easy for ICE cars - and indeed some EVs if bought new. >>
>> Assuming that your 'ownership' includes VED and insurance...>>
No, it doesn't. Those are obligatory running costs which you don't have to pay if the car is stored.
>> Do you consider maintenance cost as part of 'ownership' ?>>
No. I consider service and repair costs to be separate from ownership cost. They can vary wildly from one year to the next. E.g., my 46yr old TR7 has arguably no ongoing ownership cost apart from the opportunity cost from sinking £4250 into its purchase price in 1981. Its only expense last year was a few gallons of petrol and £98 insurance. Whereas my Audi has a running cost of several hundred pounds for VED, MoT and insurance each year, plus a substantial four figure repair bill this year. Its ownership cost is the £12k it cost me 12yrs ago, which can be expressed as pence per mile (c. 40 at present, having done a mere 30k miles with me) much the same as its fuel cost per mile) or pounds per annum.
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>> Its ownership cost is the £12k it cost me 12yrs ago, which can be expressed as pence per mile (c. 40 at present, having done a mere 30k miles with me) much the same as its fuel cost per mile) or pounds per annum. <<
So in effect you have depreciated the Audi linearly to zero, while it has a notional resale value which normal depreciation would allow for ?
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>> ... depreciation?
>>
>> >> ....bought new November 2019 close to £18,000. Sold privately to a work colleague for
>> £5,700......>>
>>
>> That's c. 10p per mile, which looks good. I think it's always best to keep
>> ownership pence per mile well below the fuel ppm, which is not easy for ICE
>> cars - and indeed some EVs if bought new.
>>
I can honestly say that I've never thought about working out car depreciation in pence per mile!
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Nice write up - thanks.
I'm running a mechanically same late 2018 SEAT Ateca that's just turned 90K miles. Was our daughter's from new and she was doing 15K/yr motorway commute in it, then got an EV. With the mileage, and the fact that her car had picked up a bonkers number of car park scuffs, dings and scratches I thought it would be a tough sell so decided to keep it, especially as we weren't sure how the EV would go.
Interior is in great nick - had leather as standard - apart from the heater panel looked like it had overheated! Amazingly the dealer fitted a new one (the part was shown as £800) when it was in having the turbo actuator replaced a bout a year ago. All covered under the All In warranty. It does have a rear interior light!
Had rear pads and discs about 10K ago - it's still on its original fronts but I'll be amazed if they don't get called out at the forthcoming MOT. It also got an advisory at its first MOT for tearing front suspension bushes. After a bit of battle SEAT / dealer changed the lower arms as goodwill.
It's also on 17" wheels and CrossClimate tyres. Not had any rear breakaway issues. To be fair, my wife had a 4Motion Tiguan with full winters and the whole car could go sideways on snowy bends, so you can't go mad with them on.
I'm slightly nervous of the keyless aspect of the car - the locks sometimes unlock then sound like they're unlocking again as you open a door. I believe the door locks can be iffy and they're a not insignificant cost to replace bot in parts and labour.
I think for the size of car/engine it goes amazingly well. It's very smooth and quiet and it'll also do an easy 50MPG on a run.
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>> Nice write up - thanks.
>>
>> I'm running a mechanically same late 2018 SEAT Ateca that's just turned 90K miles.
>>
>> It does have a rear interior light!
>>
>> Had rear pads and discs about 10K ago - it's still on its original fronts
>> but I'll be amazed if they don't get called out at the forthcoming MOT. It
>> also got an advisory at its first MOT for tearing front suspension bushes. After a
>> bit of battle SEAT / dealer changed the lower arms as goodwill.
>>
>> It's also on 17" wheels and CrossClimate tyres. Not had any rear breakaway issues. To
>> be fair, my wife had a 4Motion Tiguan with full winters and the whole car
>> could go sideways on snowy bends, so you can't go mad with them on.
>>
>> I think for the size of car/engine it goes amazingly well. It's very smooth and
>> quiet and it'll also do an easy 50MPG on a run.
>>
>>
This engine suited the Ibiza very well. I had wondered how well it suited the larger heavier cars, so your experience is very encouraging.
Glad you have the rear courtesy light. I found it very annoying not having it. Just felt like SEAT were being extremely mean by not providing one. I did see on one of the Forums that owners were cutting the headlining on the SEAT Arona's and adding there own. I was too nervous to attempt cutting the headlining.
I could have got longer out of my original discs and pads, but changed them early, as I didn't want to get advisories for them at an MOT.
Regarding the tyres, I don't think I go mad with them. I'm actually quite a canny driver. I also don't doubt that CrossClimates cope with snow a lot better than conventional summer tyres.
Glad you like the Ateca.
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>> Glad you have the rear courtesy light. I found it very annoying not having it. <<
Perhaps even more annoying if the standard wiring loom was in place but not used !
Last edited by: Andrew-T on Wed 29 Jul 26 at 23:05
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SEAT - Ibiza 1.0 TSi 6.5 Years and 105,000 Miles - PeterS
