Tigra with no claws

Vauxhall's little coupe is back, except it's now a cabriolet.

BACK in 1994, Vauxhall unveiled a cute little coupe called the Tigra. It was direct reponse to public demand, buyers having demanded to know when a concept version displayed at motor shows would appear in showrooms. The Tigra proved a big success, as it followed such small two seaters as the Mazda MX-5 in being perceived as the archetypal 'girlie car'. Plenty of female buyers ensured that the Tigra lasted until the turn of the millenium.

Now there is a new Tigra, but you will have difficulty recognising any relationship to the old one. No longer is it a coupe, but a metal-roofed cabriolet. Vauxhall-Opel has obviously taken note of such success stories as Peugeot's 206CC, the Ford Streetka and even the odd little Daihatsu Copen, and now wants its own slice of a UK buying passion for open-toppers that allows dealers to shift 70,000 cabriolets each year.

Right let's start with a positive. It may still be a two-seater but the Tigra outscores its direct rivals in the loadspace department. With the roof up you can get 440 litres in the boot and an additional 70 litres in a very useful compartment which sits just behind the seats and is protected by a net. It comes in especially useful when you retract the roof, as this does cut the bootspace to 250 litres.

Oh yes, the roof retraction process – a testament to what happens when a designer gets out of the wrong side of bed in the morning. The buttons for opening the boot and for operating the folding mechanism sit next to each other on the driver's door, and if you select the boot one by mistake you then have to get out and push the hydraulics back into place. It takes some effort too, not something girlies would be too impressed doing. To retract the roof you unclip catches either side of the hood and then the electrics take over, the rear part of the roof dropping into the boot space and the front half folding flat on top. You need to get it right a couple of times before it becomes a simple process.

With roof up the Tigra is well insulated and suffers with very little wind noise even at speed. With roof down it remains taut and stiff, with no evidence of scuttle shake, the horizontal vibration across the dashboard that for many years came as a given when you bought an open-topper.

There are two engine choices for the Tigra, both of them petrol. Entry-level is the 1.4i, with 90bhp on tap, but you'll really want to go for the 125 horses of the 1.8-litre version. Combined with 122lbft of torque, it propels the Tigra from 0 to 60mph in nine seconds and unrestrained will top out at 126mph. The smaller version by the way clocks up 12 seconds and 112mph. Nope, neither of these figures is exactly to rocketship standards, because the Tigra is not a sports car - this is a machine for summer cruising, top down (the car's that id) and with hair and tan on show. At least you get the advantage of fuel economy - 47mpg for the 1.4 and 37 in the 1.8.

Another reason you'll want to cruise in the Tigra – it's not a car for pushing on through the bendy bits. It uses a modified version of the chassis that Vauxhall originally developed for the Corsa supermini, known as the DSA or Dynamic Safety unit. Compared to the Corsa the Tigra sits 20mm lower at the front, 5mm at the back, while the wheels are also 28mm further apart. All of these changes are combined with sporty dampers and several braces (to keep the car stiff when its roof is down) in the pursuit of handling. But it never catches its prize – I found the handling skittish, the steering over-light.

You can have a Tigra for between £13,750 and £15,250 and even base models get such niceties as electric windows, heated electric mirrors and a full safety package including ABS brakes and four airbags.

No, this Tigra was not for me – I remember being impressed by the first one, but this new one disappointed in too many areas. Yet it will still become a new contender in the girlie car stakes – one young office colleague told me she wanted one even when she only had pictures to go on. It costs less than the average MX-5 (though the Streetka comes in cheaper) ,  it's bang up-to-date, and there's rather less of them around - so yes, it should sell.