Technical Data FAQ's

Q. Where does this data come from?
A. This data comes from CAP, an automotive data specialist, who record technical detail across a huge range of cars. Their used car values are the benchmark for residual values performance across the industry.

Q. What data is displayed in the fields?
A. Information from the most recent model of a particular car. Older models may have slightly different technical data, but are still very similar, generally speaking.

Q. What is the difference between urban and extra urban fuel consumption?
A. Average fuel consumption is worked out through a series of tests. Urban fuel consumption is established through tests that emulate driving in urban environments, with an average speed of 19mph. Extra urban tests look at fuel consumption at higher speeds averaging 39mph, and the average of these figures gives the combined fuel consumption figure.

Q. How do tax bands work?
A. Tax bands apply to cars registered after March 1, 2001. All cars registered after this date are placed into a tax band (A-G) according to their CO2 emissions. However, band G only applies to cars registered after March 23, 2006.

Cars registered pre-March 2001 fall into one of two possible bands: one for cars with engines under 1550cc and one for cars over this size. Vehicles registered before 1974 are exempt from tax.

Q. What does the CO2 emissions figure mean?
A. This figure gives the amount of CO2 emitted by the car; in grams per kilometre. The higher this figure, the more polluting the vehicle is and the more vehicle excise duty it is liable for.

Q. How does the fuel type affect the car?
A. The two most common types of fuel for a car are petrol and diesel.

Diesel engines are generally more economical than petrol engines and have better 'pull' in the gears, reducing the need for gear changing. Diesel technology has come on in leaps and bounds over the past few years - turbochargers have made diesel engines almost unrecognisable and now almost all diesels have one.

Petrol engines, on the other hand, are quieter, more responsive and faster revving than diesel engines, while usually being cheaper to service. They're also catching up with diesels in the economy stakes - again, generally speaking.

In addition, there are also Hybrid and Bio-fuel vehicles.

Hybrid vehicles combine two sources of power – a battery and conventional engine. Hybrid cars produce lower emissions and are cheaper to tax than petrol or diesel powered vehicles.
Bio-ethanol powered cars run on a combination of bio-fuel and petrol. Fuel consumption for a bio-ethanol car is also slightly lower than that of petrol and diesel vehicles.

Q. What are insurance groups?
A. Each time a new car is launched in the UK, it’s given an insurance grouping rating. The higher the insurance group, the more you can expect to pay – since the premium will be high. There are 20 different insurance groups, which, according to the Association of British Insurers, are determined by:

• Damage and parts costs
• Repair times
• New car values
• Body shells
• Performance
• Car security

Q: A letter sometimes appears next to the insurance group. What is this?
A: The level of security that comes as standard on a vehicle is sometimes displayed as a suffix alongside the cars insurance group rating. The level of security represented by the suffix is dependent on the group it is displayed with, so the higher the group the vehicle is in, the higher the level of security required. The suffix definitions are:

A = Meets security requirement for this group.

D = Does not meet the security requirement for a car of this type and the group rating has therefore been increased. (e.g. A group 9 car where the security requirement is not up to the minimum standard for that group will be listed as a 10D.)

E = Exceeds security requirement for a car of this type and the group rating has therefore been reduced. (e.g. A group 9 car where the security requirement exceeds the minimum standard for that group will be listed as an 8E.)

P = Provisional - This is used in cases where the data for group rating was incomplete at time of launch.

U = Cases where the level of security for the model concerned is regarded as Unacceptable. This does not mean that the car will be uninsurable but consumers should be aware that individual insurers may insist on the security being upgraded before providing cover.

G = Import - Insurance Group Ratings are currently only allocated to vehicles built for the UK market, although our data will list vehicles that are classed as imports. These fall into two categories: -

Parallel Imports - these are vehicles that are built for and sold in Europe and will conform to European Whole Vehicle Type Approval requirements.

Grey Imports - these are mainly vehicles that are built specifically for other, non-EU, markets and are unlikely to conform to European Whole Vehicle Type Approval.

Q. What is engine power and how is it measured?
A. Engine power is the measure of an engines power without the loss of power caused by other components of the car. This is measured in brake horsepower (bhp).

Q. What is engine torque?
A. Engine torque is essentially the amount of power that is transmitted from the engine through to the wheels, and is measured in lbs/ft.

Q. What effect does the number of cylinders have?
A. The number of cylinders has an important effect on the overall performance of the engine. More cylinders mean that engines are able to generate more power in less time.

Q. What is the minimum kerb weight?
A. The minimum kerb weight of a vehicle is its total weight, plus all standard equipment, car liquids such as washer water and a full tank of fuel, but no cargo. Some EU manufacturers also include the weight of a 75kg driver.

Q. What does *Fitted as standard mean?
A. Features indicated with * are the default standard option for the vehicle. This means that there were other options available when the car was purchased at new so the features of the specific vehicle you are viewing may be different so you should always check with the seller prior to purchase

Q. Is the data given accurate for this model?
A. The data provided is representative of the most recent version of the vehicle. Specifications may vary very slightly between models of different age, so we always display the most up to date information.