2008 SEAT Ibiza five-door hatch
April 3, 2008 by George Skentzos
Even though SEAT aren’t in the Australian market – and with no plans to enter in the future – its still worth sussing out what the Spanish manufacturer has to offer having just unveiled its new Ibiza range.
The work of renowned ex-Lamborghini stylist Luc Donckerwolke, the Ibiza combines Volkswagen and Audi quality switchgear for less than the price of a Golf in the UK and Europe.
The new Ibiza is comfortably the largest car in the supermini class, at 4.05 metres long with luggage capacity of 292 litres.
At launch, the Ibiza will be offered with a choice of three low-displacement petrol engines – one three-cylinder and two four-cylinder units.
This encompasses a 1.2-litre three-cylinder engine developing 51kW, a 62kW 1.4-litre four-cylinder engine and the range topping 75kW 1.6-litre engine.
All three engines are mated to a five-speed manual gearbox as standard, with VW’s seven-speed DSG automatic/sequential manual gearbox also available.
It is expected that the Ibiza will also include an array of turbo-diesel models further down the line.
Print it: 
*****PRIMO!*****
“Say at as it is”
Still sticks in my head.
Won’t be coming to Oz, be just another overpriced undersone Euro brand…..
Cheers
F-0
As much as I love Skoda, I actually think Seat would have been the better choice for the Aussie market! But Volkswagen has not put a foot wrong recently, so I am sure there are unknown reasons.
ALBORZ -
Its simple -
“$”
Plus we already have 50 brands for 1-million sales, doubt we need another.
The Czech product will always be the cheapest of the VW empire.Its the bottom of the VW foodchain.
Very small price gap between Skoda and VW to squeeze into.
Anyway, if the have a exclusive special model [which they dont] they can always make it and put a Skoda or VW label on it, after all the powertrain, floorpan and most gear is already the same…
Cheers
F-0
The front looks like someone hacked of a Hyundai Elantra with a machete. There are just too many intercepting curves.
However it would have been nice if the SEAT brand didn’t bait out of Australia or their was room for them to come back.
It’s definately a style hybrid, but with so many models from so many manufacturers it’s probably difficult to design anything these days, which doesn’t borrow something.
Let’s face it, they all have 4 wheels and are either FWD, RWD, or AWD, so they are all the same ? :)
I don’t mind the interior, but a 51kw 3cyl 1200cc job would be pretty crappy in Aus. Bring back the Charade Turbo rather than one of these ……
And putting the 7 speed DSG behind the 3 cyl would be close to heresy..
It looks like a hyundai. I don’t know if that’s a compliment or a slap in the face?
The side profile looks like an Impreza, sorry i30, sorry Mazda3.
Fairly generic blob really.
I hope Mazda is changing the design a fair bit for the new 3, if it comes out looking like an update of the current one, it will blend in to the crowd and get lost.
i like all but the headlights the leon looks better in myt eyes
Honey I shrunk the Impreza…
[Anti-spam word: Impreza]
Supercujo summed up the look of this pretty well. I’d add that the side creaselines look wrong. The overall design isn’t particularly attractive either. I’m not that impressed, but then again, I’ve seen worst.
VW specifically aim Seat at the sporty end of the market, whereas Skoda are more the traditional end. They are good cars and quite popular in the UK although the decent ones, like Skoda are nor far away from VW own brand prices.
Seat are currently running a diesel in the British touring car series against the petrol cars and 1st race they came 3rd and 4th.
The ibiza will no doubt have VW’s 1.4 TDi, the 78Kw 1.9Tdi, and as a Cupra version the 128Kw 2.0Tdi.
It definately looks like it belongs to the Seat family now, following on from the Altea, Leon only a little more squarish, but thats not surprising seeing who is now the head designer for Seat.
Every time i hear the word ‘SEAT’ I think of larry emder say “Come on down”.
Unfortunately the only i ever saw or heard of seat in aus was when they would give them away on the price is right.
Never did make it here, never will.
Seat were the Kia of Europe before Kia came along. Fairly ordinary cars that the Spanish buy in droves but most other Europeans ignore.
And what’s with the door handles? The way the rear ones sit on a different part of the bodies curve make it look like two different cars welded together.
Looks like a Euro version of the new Subaru Impreza
Absolutely appalled after the physical beauty that is the current Leon. Was hoping for a Seat comeback here in Oz, but now not so sure. Contrived and yet somehow bland, as is the outgoing Citroen C5. New Ibiza looks like a Hyundai i30, or, on a good day, a Mazda 3. Only the back looks reasonable, and then only from certain angles. Would’ve thought Luc Donckerwolke could have done better. How ironic that Donckerwolke means “dark cloud” in his native country’s Flemish…
I wish SEAT would come back to Aus.
I drive a Cordoba. It\’s still a reliable, well performing, good looking car, even at 12 years of age.
I would jump at the chance to purchase a brand new SEAT given the chance!