There’s not a maker of small MPVs which hasn’t, at some time, looked enviously at the Vauxhall Zafira.
When the original was launched in 1999 it offered a unique proposition: not only did it have seven seats, but when you wanted extra space for your luggage you didn’t have to start finding space in your garage or front room for the heavy and unwanted chairs, you just flipped them forward and they disappeared into the floor.
That’s what made that first version the best-selling MPV in the country for several years of its life, so it's no surprise that Vauxhall left the Flex7 seating largely alone when it came to engineering the second-generation Zafira, launched in 2005 and once again based on the contemporary Astra's platform.
There's now a new, and larger, third-generation version called Zafira Tourer, but the previous model continues on sale in a reduced range powered by 1.6 or 1.8-litre petrol engines, or a 1.7-litre turbodiesel with a choice of two power outputs.
The 1.9-litre, 148bhp turbodiesel has been dropped from the range, but we'll mention it here because plenty of examples remain on the used-car market.
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