What's the news?
It's the hot versions of the Smart range, all coming courtesy of tuning house Brabus. These little babies can rip from 0-100km/h in less than ten seconds and go on to a top speed of 180km/h, don't you know?
Exterior
Buyers can have the Brabus in any of the three Smart body styles currently on offer (not in Ireland, I might add...): so there's a Fortwo Brabus, a Fortwo Cabrio Brabus and a Forfour Brabus. It would appear from the shots that the easiest way to spot a Brabus Smart is the one-colour exterior, with the Tridion safety cell now matching the rest of the car instead of contrasting with it, although bespoke packages might allow customers to opt for the two-tone look.
Further signifiers come in the form of twin spaced exhausts at the rear, sitting either side of a matte grey diffuser, while all models get grey Brabus Monoblock IX light alloy wheels. These are mismatched on the pair of Fortwo iterations (16-inch front, 17-inch rear, with 185/50 R16 and 205/40 R17 tyres respectively) and just 17s all round on the Forfour (which has the same sized rear tyres as the Fortwos, but 185/45 R17s at the front). While the Cabrio can obviously open its Tritop to the elements, a special airy feature of the regular Fortwo and Forfour Brabus twins is a panoramic roof.
Interior
Opt for the Brabus Xclusive package and the interior of your chosen Smart gets a host of extra goodies. These include Brabus sports seats with perforated Nappa and black leather seats with grey topstitching; a Brabus instrument panel clothed in man-made leather and fabric; Brabus dials in the instrument cluster, as well as for the clock and rev counter pods; Brabus floor mats; Xclusive badges on the outside, in the mirror triangle and on the B-pillar; the LED & Sensor package; heated seats; and, in the Forfour alone, a 'readyspace' function featuring rear seats with a removable cargo box.
Without Xclusive, all Smart Brabus models come as standard with a lockable glove compartment, the Cool & Audio package, and the proximity warning function.
Mechanicals
All three Brabus models use the 0.9-litre, turbocharged three-cylinder petrol engine as found in other Smarts. In this instance, it delivers 109hp at 5,750rpm and 170Nm at 2,000rpm; that's 19hp and 35Nm up on the current range-topping Fortwo, Cabrio and Forfour versions, and also 7hp and 23Nm ahead of the old Smart Brabus, making these the most powerful standard Smart models yet built. The Brabus cars are all Twinamic dual-clutch automatics and that means the performance is sprightly, with the Fortwo pair capable of 0-100km/h in 9.5 seconds - that's 1.8 seconds quicker than the equivalent 90hp Coupé and more than two seconds faster than the Cabrio. Top speed on the tiniest Smart Brabuses is increased to 165km/h. The Forfour Brabus is less accelerative, taking 10.5 seconds to do the 0-100km/h sprint, but it has a 180km/h maximum, which is nice.
This is no simple remap, though. Brabus has increased the fuel pressure, with air supply to the rear-mounted engine optimised for the power and back-box pressure in the Brabus Sports exhaust kept to a minimum. The tuning firm has also fitted its own Performance Sports suspension, bringing in 20 per cent stiffer springs and dampers, as well as a thicker front anti-roll bar which reduces lean by up to nine per cent; even the ESP stability control has been recalibrated. As has the speed-sensitive Direct Steer system, said to offer better feedback through the steering wheel, and the Twinamic gearbox - Brabus has given it 40 per cent faster response times and shorter ratios than the same unit found in the 90hp Smarts, while there's a Race Start function for ensuring the quickest possible getaway from the lights.
Brabus quotes 4.5 litres/100km (62.8mpg) fuel consumption and 102g/km CO2 emissions for the Fortwo hardtop, with the Fortwo Cabrio and Forfour both recording equivalent data of 4.6 litres/100km (61.4mpg) and 104g/km.
Anything else?
During a 12-year association with Brabus, Smart has sold more than 60,000 of the tuning company's products and these should prove to be just as popular when they go on sale from July of this year. No word on Irish prices yet because we still don't have Smart as an official brand in this country.