Madam, I'm Adam. Vauxhall Adam...

The curiously named Vauxhall Adam is going to be in UK showrooms from next January and here are the pics to give us a clearer idea than ever about this new "urban-chic" small car.

With a long history of Adams to live up to - Adam of Adam and Eve fame, Adam Sandler of comedies of variable quality fame, and Adam West of Batman fame - it'll be interesting to see how this one performs in the incredibly busy small urban car market.

Dimensions are: 3.7m long and 1.72m in width and front and rear tracks of 1485mm and 1478mm respectively, and a wheelbase of 2311mm.

Design-wise, Vauxhall is very proud of the two-tone "floating roof", the classy door handle as seen on the GTC and a new Astra-derived wing-shaped chrome grille bar, and they're saying that with all the personalisation options on offer there are more than a million different combinations to choose from.

Other options include an LED-starlit roof, choices of headlining, and LED daytime running lights. The three trims available from launch are called JAM (Vauxhall says this one is "fashionable and colourful"), GLAM ("elegant and sophisticated") and SLAM ("racy and sporty").

Adam will be powered by a choice of three different ecoFLEX four-cylinder petrol engines - a 1.2-litre 69bhp and two 1.4-litre engines, either 86bhp or 99bhp. These will be mated to a new five-speed manual gearbox and further down the track, a new six-speed box will be on offer.
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It's pretty much de rigeur now for cars to come with all manner of connectivity and Adam is no exception with Bluetooth and smartphone connectivity so internet-based functions such as GPS navigation can be easily used. There's a seven-inch full colour screen as well.

The instrument cluster has a new look with round, mechanical clock-style dials with chrome bezels. Other toys include the option of a heated steering wheel, optional park assist (just in case getting a small car into a parking space and away from a bollard is a bit of an effort...) and blind spot alert. The CITY mode increases the power steering's assistance at lower speeds (another toy to help with parking then).

Standard safety features include a high-strength steel passenger cell, front, side and head curtain airbags, seat belt pre-tensioners in the front, two sets of ISOFIX points in the back for the rugrats, MacPherson struts, and traction control and hill-start assist.

Order books will open after its official debut at the Paris Motor Show in September.


By Georgia Lewis

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