Summer fun

WE CAN now take the lid off the island's best-selling car of 2008. Sorry this is no Watergate, no masterpiece of investigative journalism – perish the thought. Anyone can do this expose, you don't even need £10K in your pocket.

What I am getting at is, of course, that the Fiat 500 range now includes the 500C.

That's C for convertible – hence the lid coming off – and indeed C for (even) cuter.

It's not C for cheaper, though.

Going topless does add a fair chunk – more than £2K – to the price of the equivalent in top 500.

But the extra price is tempered by extra equipment over the equivalent hatches.

The Pop picks up air conditioning and radio/CD with MP3 compatibility compared with the conventional 500 while Lounge spec models gain foglights, rear parking sensor and full climate control air con over their hard-roof equivalents.

Just like the tin top that spawned it, the modern, four-cylinder, front-drive 500C is cleverly evocative of one of Fiat's – no, make that the world's – cutest cars ever, the 1957 Fiat 500, which was born with a roll-back canvas roof.

The 2009 interpretation is much more sophisticated, though.

The fabric roof comes in three colours and retracts and closes electrically – you can even open it with the remote locking device or open and close it on the move at up to 37mph. Handy locally.

Ingeniously, the roof includes a high-level brake light that is visible whether the roof is open, closed or somewhere in between.

Granted, the 500C keeps a bit more of its metal than rivals – the roofline and rear pillar of the standard car are retained – but that does mean that it maintains the rigidity of the standard car without any significant increase in weight: it's a modest 40 kilos.

It trumps many of its more-fully-topless rivals by remaining a full four-seater and retaining a seriously usable boot, losing only three litres of loadbay compared to its tin-top sibling.

Its practicality is further enhanced by the useful square shape of the boot

and the fact that the rear seats still drop down.

Pop the boot and the hood automatically pops up out of the way – really clever stuff – allowing the trunk lid to swing up.

Most of the time, of course, the hood will be operated by the switches up near the rear view mirror – one long press will open it to the spoiler position, which leaves the glazed rear window in situ, while another puts it fully down with the roof folded neatly on top of the boot.

It can be stopped in any intermediate position, too.

We Brits – however cawdammee different we Guerns are and independent we try to be, we are Brits as far as carmakers are concerned – love to make the most of our patchy summers and are a major market for drop-tops.

That is why Fiat has released the model to the UK market first, making right-hand drive versions before left-hooker production starts.

Nice one, and the first locally-ordered cars could just be here at the end of summer, although no doubt some owners will be having to hope for an Indian summer, too.

Oh, and talking of the great British or Guernsey summer, it is worth mentioning that the roof operates PDQ, closing in a rapid 17 seconds should the need arise.

So, what else is different on the C?

As well as the extra equipment, the Convertible gains larger, comfier seats and improved upholstery and trim.

Convertibles also offer three new optional body colours, new 15 or 16-inch alloy wheels and several new ways to personalise them.

So there, I reckon, the differences end – give or take a two-decimal-place worse drag coefficient.

What's that?

Even less relevant than the 40kg weight gain, that's what.

The good news is that everything else stays the same.

It offers the same options of three low-emitting engines: 1.2 litre eight-valve and 1.4 litre 16-valve petrol producing 119 and 140g/km of CO2 respectively, and the 1.3-litre turbodiesel punching out more torque than either and emitting just 110g/km and a reassuring complement of seven airbags (two front, two window, two side and one knee).

To improve on the 1.2's combined fuel consumption figure of 55.4mpg, it can be specified with the optional Start&Stop that cuts the engine whenever neutral is selected and the clutch released.

The engine restarts automatically when a gear is engaged.

Then there's ecoDrive, available to owners of Lounge models or Pops fitted with the Windows Blue&Me system. The ecoDrive software analyses recent drives and offers advice that can achieve significant fuel savings.

Far more light streams into the cabin than with even a generous standard sunroof but very little wind does, which is good. Unlike some bigger convertibles, it is splendidly rigid – no wet-dog shake over bumps and cobbles.

Chassis tweaks from the platform-sharing Ford Ka and the hot Abarth 500 are being rolled out across other 500s but make their first appearance in the Convertible.

The steering certainly packed plenty of feel and the Convertible is at least as nimble as the original, probably more so.

The five-speed box is as slick as ever although a protrusion from the console does nag the left shin when broader – or possibly bandier types – keep the clutch covered with their left foot. Never mind. It's better to keep your left foot flat on the floor most of the time anyway.

Other niggles?

Well, with a bright sun behind you, the computer display in the centre of the stylish tacho inside a speedo can be a bit harder to read – but that's a common convertible gripe

Oh, and the folded-down hood does impinge on the view out of the rear-view mirror.

But the parking sensors more than compensate for that.

And with its body-colour fascia and other retro styling cues, this version of the 500 remains a devastatingly cute reinterpretation of the 50s Cinquecento.

A happy car, a frugal car in which I found myself unusually tolerant of all the other idiots crawling around the road.

Good for your Vitamin D, good for your blood pressure and good for the environment. It really doesn't get much better than that.