Right now, there are two major trends in the automotive industry. Firstly, luxury brands have been expanding their ranges downwards with cars like the Audi A1 and BMW 2-Series Active Tourer. In particular, Mercedes-Benz is making hay with its A, CLA and GLA front- and all-wheel-drive compacts. Secondly, automakers are realising one of the best ways to improve fuel efficiency is to reduce weight. The smart ForFour was ahead of its time, offering a stylish, lightweight and fun-to-drive compact with a semi-prestige badge, but the mid-2000s were apparently the wrong time for it.
Underneath its quirky, two-tone exterior was a platform shared with the subcompact Mitsubishi Colt. Both cars were manufactured at Mitsubishi’s NedCar facility in the Netherlands. This was the same factory that had once been co-owned by Volvo, and manufactured the first Volvo S40 and V40 and the Mitsubishi Carisma and Space Star, and which will soon produce Minis now that Mitsubishi has vacated the premises.
A conventional front-wheel-drive compact with a transverse-mounted engine, the ForFour was four inches longer than a Mini Cooper; wheelbase was 98.43 inches, or around 1.5 inches longer than the Mini.
Its platform mate, the Colt, was met with a lukewarm reaction from the automotive press, but the smart was better received despite sharing 60% of its components. The shared componentry included the Mitsubishi-sourced 1.1, 1.3 and 1.5 four-cylinder engines, with power output ranging from 63 hp to 108 hp. The ForFour also received smart’s first diesel, a three-cylinder 1.5 common rail unit from the Mercedes A-Class, in either 67 hp or 94 hp versions.
The ForFour was fairly fun to drive, although its electric steering was regarded as somewhat feel-free. A sports suspension option was available, but it aided handling to the detriment of the ForFour’s ride.
The flagship ForFour bore the BRABUS badge. Fettled by the well-known, Mercedes-specialist tuning house, this cooking ForFour produced 175 hp and 170 ft-lbs from its turbocharged 1.5. All ForFours were impressively light – curb weight of 2400 lbs – so the BRABUS could really scoot. The 0-60 dash was accomplished in around 7 seconds, and the only transmission available was a five-speed manual.
Other ForFours received either the manual or a six-speed clutchless transmission that was shiftable via either steering wheel-mounted paddles or the gearstick.
The interior had similarly funky styling to the exterior, and seated four occupants. The rear bench seat slid 6 inches so that you could prioritize either occupant comfort or luggage space.
Some critics found the ForFour overpriced. Sized closer to a Fiesta but priced like a Focus, the smart may not have seemed like a smart buy but Daimler was clearly targeting the kind of fashion-conscious buyer who would opt for a flashy Mini or Beetle over a more conservative compact. In Australia, the ForFour also undercut the Mercedes A-Class by a sizeable $10k.
Whether it was the quirky styling or the pricing, the ForFour was a slow seller. It lasted just three years before being axed, but there was another reason for the ForFour’s early demise. DaimlerChrysler had agreed to buy 50% of the NedCar facility, but rescinded its offer when they refused to back a rescue package for their Japanese alliance partner. The Germans chose to extricate themselves from their ailing ally, and the smart ForFour was sacrificed in the process.
Although smart was only a fledgling brand, It’s unlikely the added prestige of a Mercedes badge would have helped the ForFour in the market. Entry-level offerings like the BMW 3-Series Compact and Mercedes C-Class SportCoupe/CLC were not the sales sensations their descendants have become. Mercedes also had the tallboy A-Class in its menagerie already, which was selling adequately but predominately to older buyers.
I’ll be honest: I loathe smart’s core product, the ForTwo. While the concept is novel if not universally useful, the execution has always been poor. Goofy styling, lousy dynamics and disappointing fuel economy render the car pretty redundant unless you really must fit into small parking spaces. The division has also been a fiscal black hole, costing its corporate parent billions over the years. To add insult to injury, Toyota developed a rival – the Toyota/Scion iQ – which was better in every way, and even it sold poorly and has now been axed. The Smart ForTwo has been offered since 1998 and it has never met its target of 200,000 annual units.
The ForFour and the short-lived Roadster showed promise as logical extensions of the very limited smart brand. The former offered quirky styling but more conventional packaging, and the latter had striking styling and excellent dynamics. Instead of building on this momentum, Daimler decided to continue sinking money into the ForTwo, cancelling a planned compact SUV that could quite possibly have taken off.
Current smart ForFour (above), Renault Twingo (below)
The ForFour name has now returned on a hatchback riding the rear-engine Renault Twingo platform. It now looks like a bloated, distended ForTwo, while its platform donor looks pert, perky and will probably age quite well.
When people hear “smart”, they picture the ForTwo. It may be the iconic smart, but it wasn’t the best. The Roadster was a helluva lot more fun, and the ForFour was a much more resolved offering. And yet, Daimler has stuck with the ForTwo for almost two decades.
N.B. The name may appear misspelled, but Daimler declared the brand should be in lowercase. As for the model name, it seems to be written differently everywhere you go: forfour, ForFour, etc. It’s one of the most frustrating examples of punctuation in a vehicle name since the Kia pro_cee’d or the Volkswagen up!
If ever a car was wrongly named it’s the Smart. I fail to understand why Mercedes got mixed up with them in the first place.
I don’t know if the first forfour was offerred with RHD – I can only remember seeing LHD ones in Spain.
As for the new forfour/Twingo , what on earth were they thinking !
There are a few RHD ones around, they certainly seem to be more common in Southern England than the Colt they were based on (or it might just be that they’re more noticeable).
A Brabus would be very tempting but the service intervals are every 6k from memory. And a colleague had a Brabus Roadster that was forever getting niggly faults (water in the ECU etc). Great concept, but poorly executed.
Here’s a Brabus roadster I shot in Brisbane a few years back.
Its the same mindset that saw Mercedes merge with Chrysler a larger range more profits, that didnt work very well either.
It is too bad that Mercedes and Swatch could not pull off a really unique offering in the new eco friendly nineties. I assume the hoped for Swatch battery tech wasn’t real or at least scaleable. That left the Smart Fortwo with a conventional cobbled together drivetrain. In theory that could have been a placeholder till the best engineers in the world got their shit together but it was not to be. Mercedes was stagering and cash poor in the nineties.
It shows how little Mercedes thought of Smart that they were willing to put the name on a Mitsu Colt. Maybe Paul will reconsider and reclassify this article a Colt Chronical.
That said the Colt looks pretty cool without that silly safety frame paint job of the Smart. I wish they had offered it here in USA. The Colt is a name associated with a fun, Japanese, economical hatch. The 79-84 version was maybe the best of its type at the time. Maybe this generation had a little of that spirit.
I honestly think it looks a whole lot better than the 2-door SMART, and both 2- and 4-door current generation SMARTs.
I always liked the Mercedes C-Class hatchback they sold over here in the U.S. in the early-2000s. Sure, it didn’t exude the same kind of “classiness” with chrome and such, but it looked premium enough to be a Mercedes and honestly was the first Mercedes I could realistically (not as just a far off dreamcar) see myself in as a kid.
Agreed.
The forTwo vioLates a basic law of marketing. People who pay a lot for a car want more acceleration. (More Gs for more Gs.)
This morning I noticed a forTwo pulling away from a stop sign, then a fully loaded gravel truck. The two vehicles had the same acceleration, the same “pushed to the limit” sound, and the same long pauses between gears.
Not the kind of action you’d pay extra for, unless you needed to carry 10 tons of boulders.
In the U.S. the ForTwo is a pretty poor ….car? There’s no real shortage of space for parking, aside from NYC, and the European version uses a diesel powertrain that’s much more economical than the gas powered version….if for no other reason than diesel is usually cheaper than gasoline in Europe.
Looking at the Colt and the ForFour, I can guess both were sales duds because they were sold by brands that had no track record or a poor track record selling small cars.
If you want an “updated” Colt I’ve noticed CarMax is selling Mitsubishi iMe-vc (?) hatchbacks that look like the “son” of a Colt and ForFour.
Exactly my analysis: Parking-deprived N.E. urbanites seem the only likely large block of customers. I suspect fuel economy nowadays is less a function of vehicle size & more about aero shape (e.g. Prius) & how much “driveline tweaking” it has (direct-injection, many gears, etc.).
You have to offer a lot before 2 seats are worth it, which is why it usually is restricted to sports cars (‘Vette, Miata, etc.).
Unless you live in Portland,Oregon which seems bound and determined to make New York, NY seem like a low density city. They want to cram everyone into 400 sq ft living quarters with 1 parking space for every 500 persons. Warning!!!!!!! Eugene(where I was born) is next on the hit list.
Our Betters need to figure out how to kidnap the middle classes & make them live in More Sustainable housing projects.
Despite resolutely non-reactionary, free-spending political leadership, Tucson still can’t deliver the goods on a downtown palatable to people besides hipsters, homeless, & gov’t employees, despite having a token streetcar system now. I use Downtown regularly for two things: Jury duty & getting to I-10.
Yeah, I’m a Portland native, and I am getting out. The Urban Growth Boundary has turned out to be a massive scam. Legalized weed has turned out terribly here, local’s rents have shot up, the new outsiders with money are making all the profits….
Diesel equivalents of most popular cars use less actual fuel cost per litre doesnt come into it.
An average driver should easily get 45 to 50 mpg (US), combined, from any B-segment (sub-compact) diesel car. Like a Ford Fiesta with the 95 hp 1.6 liter TDCi engine.
A friend who was a rep for Mercedes in Canada said the diesel smart cars sold well, but when they were introduced to the US only the gas cars were then available and sales fell off a cliff.
I’ve had to pass up parking spaces in Portland that my Versa wouldn’t fit into that a FourTwo would. I think they’d be pretty handy here, and the upcoming model will have more power and an actual five speed with a clutch while staying the same size.
2,400 pounds is not light thats the weight of a VH Commodore SLX a much bigger car 20 years older with a tenth the technological imput its heavier than my 98 diesel Citroen and uses more fuel for what effect?A poorer ride worse handling? Epic fail.
The Smart ForTwo and Toyota iQ; too small (even for Europe), too impractical, too expensive.
The “most wanted” (and cheap) minis in the nineties were the Fiat Panda, Renault Twingo (picture below) and Ford Ka. At least you had rear seats and some space for luggage or groceries. The Fiat and Renault were renowned for their versatility and space-efficiency. And the Ford Ka was a funky little go-kart.
Meanwhile a whole herd of A-segment (minis) hatchbacks has become available. With 3 or 5 doors.
I rode in a First Gen Twingo when I was in France in the mid-90s, they were appealing cars with some very clever packaging details.
The Renault Twingo II was less special. There was this 133 hp Twingo RS though ! With a decent 4-cylinder 1.6 liter engine. There you are, with your silly ForTwo / ForFour…
That reminds me of the ‘improvements’ from First Gen to Second Gen Scion xB.
This is the REAL Twingo. It will always be close to my heart. Very few cars these days exude such personality.
Of the Smarts, the only interesting one (to me) is the Roadster, Admitted, I’m not a fan of “mini” cars. Ironically the actual Mini is the only tiny car I would consider!
Interesting read on what was an unremarkable car with some individual styling cues.
Most saw it for what it was – a more distinctive Mitsubishi…
And not a particularly good Mitsubishi at that.
These always looked crocodilian to me: the front end looks tacked on much like the Buick Terraza featured recently. That said, the ForFour looks 500 times better than the Mitsubishi it was based on!
I also like the latest Twingo and dislike its Smart counterpart.
I remember when I went to Europe (first time) I saw one in traffic and remember thinking
What the hell I’m looking at?! Smart has more than one model?
I’ve seen pictures of the Smart Forfour, but for some reason, it was never sold in the USA or even Canada.
I could see the smart fortwo working in the US if there was a program like the kei car program in Japan. Make the insurance and registration motorcycle cheap and it becomes a viable second car or urban commuer buggy. In the northern US, it would have four season utility, unlike a motorcycle. Compared to a Fit or Yaris, the smart isn’t really all that practical. Compared to Harley or a Spyder trike, the smart is practical.
I bought a ForFour W454 1,3 AMT for the wife 4 years ago, It is a very practical car,seating for adults comfortably,and the rear seats fold completely forward like an estate car giving astonishing cargo room for such a small car, and in fact in some European countries it was sold as a Combi.The Passion version hasa high standard of trim, with fabric covered dash and door cards, aircon , and multi readout dash menus..
I bought a Brabus version about 18 months ago to use in AutoX. It is not only quick and nimble, but also luxuriously equipped for its time over and above the Passion trim having full leather interior and a folding armrest that can be used by either front or rear passengers either in twin cupholder guise or rotated for a padded top.
All the Colt CZT aftermarket tuning parts are available, and my car now sports an easily obtained 210BHP, coilovers, and 8 inch wide front wheels to put the power down. This Mitsubishi engine is readily tuned to 250 BHP without internal mods, and over 400 BHP is attainable .
The 3 cylinder Mercedes diesel engine in either 58 or 95 BHP form has legendary longevity and offers great economy of operation.together with sprited performance from the higher output version,
A misunderstood car in the UK, so used prices are bargain basement, but in mainland Europe prices are more reflective of the cars’ attributes.