by David Finlay (11 Jun 02)

You are now reading the first-ever published driving impressions of the European specification Daihatsu YRV Turbo, a car so new that even Daihatsu doesn't know when, or if, it will go on sale in this country.

There is an equivalent car in Japan, but it would not be legal to put it on the UK market. The car tested here had to go through European Type Approval, which involved cleaning up the emissions and reducing the noise levels.

It also meant losing a little power, but that's not a problem. The 1298cc 16-valve turbocharged engine still produces just short of 130bhp, which to say the least is well above the YRV average. Visually, the Turbo is not shy about announcing its intentions; the Euro car is painted bright yellow and has all sorts of boy-racerish styling cues such as sports sills, fog lights, fancy alloy wheels, a bonnet air scoop and so on. No wonder it attracts about twenty times the attention that passers-by would normally devote to a small Daihatsu.

As the power output may have led you to expect, this is a very rapid machine, despite the fact that the only suitable gearbox is a four-speed automatic (there are manual YRV units, but they won't handle the torque of the turbo engine.) This isn't as much of a problem as it first seems, though, because if you prod the "steer shift" button - located inconveniently low down on the dashboard - you can select gears manually using buttons on the steering wheel. 

The obvious benefit is that you can prevent the transmission from changing up as you lift off the throttle before a corner. Just as important, in real world driving conditions, is that you can force it to change up. Left to its own devices the box will avoid selecting top if at all possible. Since third gear has enough scope to take you to the far side of an indicated 110mph, you can see how manually changing up can make the journey a lot easier. I'm not a great fan of manual shifts on an automatic box, but with the YRV Turbo it's the only sensible option.

No-Change Suspension

During a conversation with the Daihatsu people it was made clear that the current suspension set-up is here to stay, which is a very great pity because this is where the Turbo falls down with a significant thud. The ride is awful - large amounts of suspension travel curtailed by a sudden crash against the bump stops - and the handling is no better. This is a point-and-squirt car, no more and no less. Try to push it through corners and you'll end up understeering into the scenery.

Quite simply there is more power than the suspension knows how to deal with (and also to some extent the brakes, which could do with beefing up). Basically the Turbo feels like a car which is at the beginning, rather than the end, of its chassis development. Even fitting slightly larger tyres would help, though there isn't much room for them under wheel arches which were designed to cover much less rubber. Having said that, the YRV 4trak actually does have larger tyres, so there is definitely room for improvement in the case of the Turbo.

Whether or not this matters depends on what the target market wants. A Daihatsu spokesman reckoned that potential buyers are people who want a city car with a lot of performance, but my own feeling is that it is more likely to appeal to people who already own a "serious" quick car - an Impreza WRX, for example - and would like a "toy" hot hatch just for fun.

What would they have to pay for it? Current estimates are around £11,500, though an actual price has yet to be confirmed. And, as mentioned before, there has been no decision about selling the car in the UK at all. That depends on whether or not Daihatsu reckons it could shift 200 a year. The importers will base their decision partly on press comments (this is the only launch I can remember on which the journalists were asked to fill in a questionnaire after they'd driven the car) and partly on their own market research.

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