Vauxhall Astra TwinTop Review

Vauxhall Astra Review

The Vauxhall Astra TwinTop made its UK debut in the spring of 2006 adding a folding hard top to Vauxhall's best selling hatchback.

Although the underpinnings are similar to the Astra, 70% of the parts are unique to the TwinTop and rather than being a ‘chop-top’ the Astra has been designed from the ground up to be a convertible.

The Astra TwinTop is a four seater coupe which at the touch of a button becomes a four seater convertible, with little compromise over the coupe.

How It Drove - Performance

We drove the 150ps 1.9 CDTi common rail diesel, which might seem like an odd combination, a diesel convertible car. For some reason it just did not seem right, but as we soon found out it makes perfect sense.

I guess we were expecting the diesel engine to be dirty and noisy; two attributes which you don’t want with the roof down. But the 1.9 CDTi was neither, in fact it was rather good. Yes, you can hear it is a diesel especially when cold or idling but once you are on the move it is no more intrusive than a petrol car.

With the low down delivery of power (a trait of diesel engines) the Astra TwinTop felt quite sprightly - on paper it does 0-60 mph in 9.5 seconds which is quicker than the petrol TwinTop variants bar the 2.0i petrol turbo (8.3 seconds). Although in practice I doubt the diesel is much slower than the 2.0i turbo. The top speed is quoted at an academic 132 mph, which is fast enough.

The 6-speed manual gearbox was smooth and well suited to the 1.9 CDTi engine making changing gear a pleasure rather than a chore.

Vauxhall Astra TwinTop