Renault Twingo III

2015 Renault Twingo

This is the brand new Renault Twingo and it's now on its third generation for Renault's city car that is small enough to do big things even rodents can't do in their spare time. Judging by the looks of it, the new Twingo isn't as good looking as the previous one and what shocked previous Twingo owners looking for an upgrade, the new model is now transformed from front-wheel drive to rear-wheel drive and the engine is now sitting on its bum rather than on the tummy or in the face. Which means, this compact car is now comes with the same layout as a Porsche 911 because the 911 has a reputation of having its engine placed on the butt.

A hatchback with an engine on the back? Wow, that was a rare sight and I wonder how does it perform well as a tiny car with a big attitude? I'll just talk about that later but for now, let's take a look on the outside first.

It may not be as good looking as the previous generation but the new Twingo is better looking than the first generation, which is the one with the hideous-looking frog eyes that is as creepy as French cars look in the 90's. Renault says that this new boxy look draws inspirations from the two concept cars; namely the Twin'Run Concept and the Twin-Z Concept but whatever you ask, don't think this is more of a spiritual successor to the ancient Renault 5 because both of them are from a totally different league in a totally different time. What's also bizarre is that unlike it's predecessors, the brand new Twingo is now available exclusively as a 5-door judging from the implementation of the secret rear doors that provides access to the rear seats.

2015 Renault Twingo interior

On the inside view, it's not so bad to look at considering that the top-range models will feature a sat-nav for the first time on the Twingo plus Renault's R-Link telematics system. The speedo's now change featuring a very high-tech digital thingy on the middle that tells the driver the fuel consumption, temperature, distance travelled, blah blah blah... And even though it's shorter than the old one, the added wheelbase makes it more roomier for your mates at the back.

Because it's an RR compact and the engine's on the back, you might think that it has room on the front, just like what Porsches and Ferraris do but no. There is little room in the front trunk because of such sizing and because this is rear-wheel drive, the rear boot space really suffers a bit, meaning you don't get to put a certain Ross Kemp on it just like what the previous Twingo did.

The new Twingo isn't like the 5 Turbo or the Clio V6 where the engine occupies the entire back room because for a small car with a 911-ish layout, the engine is located under the boot floor rather than exposing it like what the 5 Turbo and the Clio V6 do. That sounds genius but I had greater fears about putting stuff above the boot floor where the engine is placed under but let's put this fear under consideration for us so in the meantime, the performance.

2015 Renault Twingo

Now you may have wondering how the heck did Renault managed to made a rear-wheel drive city and the main reason why is that possible isn't from Renault but a joint collaboration from Germany's Daimler. Yes, Daimler's collaboration is the main point because thanks to the new Twingo's rear-wheel drive layout, it served as the basis for the next-generation smart car, namely the forfour and the fortwo compacts. These compacts are all developed by Renault and Daimler engineers at Renault's Parisian technical center.

Despite being a rear-wheel drive, the new Twingo feels so mild to drive. You don't get oversteering but it feels so agile, so quiet, so tight, and so nimble in all the right barrels and to explain what I'm on about, kindly refer this to Ridge Racer's Wild Gang. The Wild Gang. It's that little compact with a mild handling but you get the idea while driving the Twingo because...it's like that Wild Gang I mentioned.

For engine choices, there is a 1.0L petrol engine that produces 70PS of power and a smaller and turbocharged 0.9L petrol engine that delivers 20PS more than the bigger one but with lesser emissions as well. For the transmission, it has a 5-speed manual gearbox that does pretty decent in shifting gears, which is nice.

2015 Renault Twingo

So, should you buy it? The new Twingo starts at 10,800 Euros, which is more expensive than the modern city cars of today, especially the Peugeot 108 and the Citroen C1, but let's remember, this is a rear-wheel drive hatchback and you can have fun in the Twingo as much as you like as long as you need to take good care of it, no matter the outcome.

Available Colors: Blanc Cristal, Rouge Flamme, Bleu Pacifique, Noir Etoile, Brun Cappuccino, Bleu Dragee, and Jaune Eclair.

Photo: Renault