What is it? Is a question you will become very familiar with if you choose to buy this car – a Tiger GTA.
You may know it if you’re a kit-car aficionado because that’s the market in which Norfolk-based Tiger has made a name for itself. And so of course, the new GTA can be ordered in bits for the more spanner-inclined at £13,800, or for £3000 more you can have it ready-for-the-road, complete with its 170bhp 2.0-litre Zetec motor and five-speed manual.
The chassis is taken from the firm’s established Avon model, and the glass-fibre body has been designed wholly by the father and son team that own and run the company.
Looks are a difficult thing to judge but we think that its quirky and interesting in all the right ways, though the fit and finish hints at the cost-saving that the low price inevitably forces.
You would hardly expect something high-end if you were looking at a car such as this, so many will forgive the intermittently flimsy interior, but unfortunately the way it drives just doesn’t live up to expectations. It isn’t a bad car to drive, but it lacks polish. A slightly sticky throttle, which then gives way to a very light pedal weight, makes smooth progress difficult and a heavy clutch can also become wearing in the wrong sort of traffic.
The steering is decent, turn-in is sharp enough and the engine offers a good amount of punch in a car this weight but the GTA still ends up encouraging less vigorous, more relaxed progress.
