on the sidewalls

You half expect BMW’s repsonse to being asked ‘will you ever make an economy model?’ to be ‘Actually, a lot of our normal cars already have Start/Stop, brake energy regeneration and intelligent ancilleries – so that’s like asking the Queen if she’d like a crown you spaz.’. But this 320ED shows that their answer is ‘Why yes. On top of our usual Efficient Dynamics routine, we’re going to go one step further by taking a 320d, detuning the engine, lengthening the final drive ratio, fitting some aero alloys, wrapping them in energy saving tyres and lowering the ride by 15mm.’.

Which is exactly what they’ve done. So while a 320d SE has 184bhp and does 60.1 mpg, a 320ED has 163bhp and does 68.9mpg – the 280lb ft of torque and £27,245 ticket are identical. Jolly good show really. With a 0-62mph time of 8 secs, you do lose half a second to the normal car and forfeit the option of speccing big alloys or M-Sport body kits… but that seems a fair swap for covering an extra 12% of road from each drop of fuel.

And rather cleverly, it’s actually a smoother drive than the standard car. The unsung hero is an unfathomably brilliant device called a Centrifugal Pendulum Absorber, which lives inside the dual mass flywheel and smoothes out the juddering you usually get from a car when it labours at low revs. It works incredibly well, making any vibrations almost imperceptible at slow engine speeds and just as smooth at high ones – so you stay in a higher gear for longer, using less diesel. If you’re lazy, it can trick you out: approach a junction, downchange to third, slow to a crawl, then try and accelerate with the engine still smooth as it languishes at 700rpm. The moral? Don’t be lazy or you’ll bog down. A life lesson.

The rest of the car is exactly how you’d expect a mid-spec BMW 3-Series to be. A fantastically judged 50:50 weighted chassis that’s forgiving and alert in perfect measures, a stubborn resistance against understeer even on the energy saving tyres and, to us at least, no effect whatsoever from being 15mm lower and having a higher final drive ratio than normal. If anything, the tall sidewalls on little wheels make it more compliant than the typical Barry-spec 3-Series on 19″ rims and runflats.

So, what about the three other pesky German midi-execs? Audi make an A4 TDIe which costs a couple of grand less, but is 30bhp and 7mpg down on the 320ED, while Merc will sell you a C220CDI BlueEfficiency for the same price as the Audi, which has the same power as the BMW but is less economical than either. Unless the extra £2k is a deal breaker, the BMW is a no-brainer.

You half expect any manufacturer’s repsonse to being asked ‘does detuning the engine, shrinking the wheels, compromising the tyres and lengthening the gears in the name of economy make your car better to drive?’ to be a pretty straight ‘no’. But BMW actually answer it with a convincing ‘yes’.

Although it’s not due to be revealed until the Geneva Motor Show next month, Volvo are so pleased with their new S60 saloon that they’ve released a little video. Looks like they’ve attached a camera to a fly, and asked it to glide very carefully around, filming the car. What a good fly.

Volvo promise the S60 will be the most entertaining car to drive they’ve ever made, and the best handling FWD car in its class. Seeing as it’s based on a Mondeo chassis, it seems a reasonable claim – especially considering the aluminium and magnesium body parts and some trick chassis electronics. Looks smart too, if a bit gloopy of the face.

The top petrol engine will be a 300bhp straight six, which will be joined by a four cylinder petrol and two five cylinder diesels – all but the least powerful of the diesels sling the S60 to 62mph in less than 8 seconds. A Volvo with more going for it than a beautiful interior? Yes please. It’ll go on sale in the UK in the early autumn.

Very soon, V6 engines will only exist in the glowing nostalgia of our motoring minds. They’re too big, too heavy and too polluting for the stressy types that invent emissions regulations to tolerate. Like Alf Garnett, they had a time and a place – but now we need more of The Good Life. Clean, self-sufficient… and less prone to offensive outbursts of hot air.

So lets welcome the Alfa Romeo 159 with a brand new 1750TBi engine: a turbocharged, direct injection, 1742cc four cylinder unit which is basically that Barbara woman played by Felicity Kendal; green, friendly, and efficient. While the 1750 isn’t technically a replacement for the 159’s V6, it may as well be: 110kg lighter, just as torquey and despite having 200bhp to the V6’s 260bhp, still able to hit 62mph in less than 8 seconds. Perhaps more important to Felicity Kendal though are the enviro-stats: 35mpg to the V6’s 25mpg, and 189g/km of CO2 to 260g/km. On paper at least, the V6 is already dead.

But Alfas aren’t about making sense on paper. Equally important to the engine’s success is its ability to back-up the Kendal pleasing stats with some pleasing Kendal sexiness – green or not, it still needs to drive like its bright red.

The first thing you notice is that it’s got the torque response of a diesel – because of some clever valve timing and airflow, the turbo spools up and thrusts away from as low as 1,400rpm. And just as you think it’s going to run out of breath like a derv-sucker, it picks up again as the power takes over and chucks you on even further still. While the surge might not stretch much past 5,000rpm, the new engine feels flexible, tractable and linear… but somehow it misses out on the sense of drama you’d hope for. Despite the grunt, the 1750TBi doesn’t have the soul or soundtrack to tickle the synapses.

This competent but uninspiring aura is reinforced by the chassis. Thanks to some mild tweaks to the steering, the 159 is still a reasonable car to chuck about, but a soft throttle response and artificially heavy steering never offer a tingling link to what the wheels and engine are actually up to. It does have price on it’s side though – starting at £21,800, you’d have to spend £5k more to get a similarly quick BMW 3 Series.

While the smart but bland engine might occasionally leave you pining for a bout of inappropriate Alf Garnett V6ism, it has prevented the 159 from slipping too far behind its German enemies. Somehow though, the improvements make the Alfa Romeo seem topsy turvey: praised for its engineering and criticised for its lack of personality. It’s got the morals, looks and efficiency of that Kendal character – but is missing the naughty little smile.

Digesting the news… then spewing it out in 60 words

Volvo revealed the gloopy faced but nicely proportioned S60 saloon, set to politely woo 3 Series buyers next autumn. Nissan gave current GT-R owners a rare reason not to be ecstatic, by improving the chassis on new cars. And Citroen unveiled the C-Zero, an electric car based on the Mitsubishi i-MiEV, which looks a bit staid next to Renault’s Twizy.