New Cars: Fiat Sedici

Monday, September 12, 2011

Fiat Sedici

The Fiat Sedici is a mini sport utility vehicle co-developed by Fiat and Suzuki mainly for the European market. It was introduced at the 2006 Geneva Motor Show, and is built at the Magyar Suzuki plant in Hungary. The expected production volume is 60,000 units per year, 1/3 of these to be sold by Fiat and 2/3 of these to be sold by Suzuki, where it is badged as the SX4. The design was created by Giorgetto Giugiaro's Italdesign Giugiaro studio, and it is an alternative to mini multi-purpose vehicles (MPV), which have a more "boxy" appearance. Introduced by Fiat in December 2005, it was the official car of the 2006 Winter Olympics. As the car is four wheel drive, it is considered a 4x4. As 4x4 is 16, the car is named Sedici, which means "sixteen" in Italian. By pressing a button the driver can change between 4x2 and 4x4 transmission modes. The car also has electronic stability control (ESC) on the options list and a diesel particulate filter (DPF) is a standard feature. In November 2006 it was the second best selling SUV in the Italian market, and by June 2007 it was the best selling vehicle. The front wheel drive version of the Sedici was unveiled in spring 2008. It was available with the same engine choices as the 4X4 version and was available in two trim levels: Dynamic and Emotion. The price, in Italy, was around 2000€ cheaper than the 4x4 version.