Ford Fiesta with advanced steel bodyshell

Many potential buyers of the Ford Fiesta will be unaware of the advanced steel bodyshell that makes up 55 percent of the structure of the new model.

Bernd Liesenfelder, Ford body engineering manager, said: “Small cars like the Ford Fiesta need to be as light as possible without sacrificing any strength in a crash. By using these advanced new steels, we have been able to give Ford Fiesta owners the protection of a robust safety cell, combined with excellent fuel economy from a lightweight body.”

This light weight helps to reduce fuel consumption and CO2 emissions across the Ford Fiesta range, including for the exceptionally frugal ECOnetic model, which achieves combined fuel economy of 76.3mpg* and 98g CO2/km emissions for road tax-exempt motoring.

The new Ford Fiesta has been nominated Car of the Year 2009 by Auto Express. The Ford Fiesta also won the best supermini award and the Ford S Max won best MPV. Ford has seven nominations with the Ford Ka, Kuga and two Mondeo models commended.

By Geraldine Ashton Green, motoring.co.uk