This is the convertible version of Maserati’s rather beautiful mid-engined MC20. We’ve spoken fondly of the MC20 before. It’s a car that has a rather apt place in the sports/supercar landscape.
Too many of its apparent rivals are so fast these days, and so stiffly suspended and harsh, that they’re a painful frustration on the real roads most of us have to drive on. The MC20 on the other hand can be relaxed, comfortable and genial when you’re not driving like your pants are on fire. And yet it’s also huge fun when you do give it the chance to open its lungs and tense its muscles.
So a convertible version makes a lot of sense. It widens that scope even more. When you’re just going relatively gently, a dropped roof intensifies the sound of the engine and the passing of the scenery.
It’s one of those retractable hardtops that retracts under a cover to lie horizontally above the engine. So it doesn’t take up boot space or leave an ugly hump. Mind you that’s just as well, because the boot is tiny to begin with.
The roof has another trick. It’s made of electrochromic glass. Touch a button in one of the screen menus and it instantly switches between clear and near-opaque. As for the retraction or erection, the full-electric mechanism takes 12 seconds, which is quick. It can happen at a speed up to about 30mph.
As with the coupe, the doors open more upwards than outwards. That’s good for drama. It also means it’s a surprisingly easy car to get into and out of. So when the door opening has got peoples’ attention, you won’t be embarrassed by flopping gawkily onto the pavement.
I thought open Italian cars were called Spiders? Or Spyders. What’s Cielo?
It just means sky. Maserati feels obliged to exploit its Italian-ness. And why not. Roll the word Maserati off your tongue. It sounds exotic and fast. It’s a word that makes everyone excited.
Mind you, for literally decades the brand name has been Maserati’s biggest asset. The cars haven’t been as good as the company – lost in over-optimism – thought they were. Which means not as good as they needed to be.
Finally in 2020 the MC20 coupe showed Maserati does have the talent.
Any kind of trendy hybrid power?
Nope. It’s a V6, but a new one for the MC20. It’s a 90-degree V-angle with two turbos. Thanks to an 11-to-one compression ratio it manages to be pretty responsive off boost, but when the wind gets up at 3,000rpm you’ve got 538lb ft of torque to play with, and 630bhp at 7,500rpm. That’s hooked up to an eight-speed twin-clutch transmission, feeding through an LSD for stalwart traction.
The kerb weight is 1,560kg, which is only 65kg more than the coupe.
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Maserati MC20 review: a first-rate addition to the supercar pantheon
The tub is carbonfibre, which helps keep weight down. That’s especially handy in the Cielo as its structure doesn’t lose much strength when the roof is off. Indeed it has slightly thicker lay-up in some areas than the coupe’s tub.
So the precision of the handling is more or less intact. For the same reason it doesn’t twist like an over-full foil takeaway container when the road gets bumpy. You feel the odd shudder, but it’s slight.
How does it look on the road?
Wonderful. The aerodynamic work is serious, and has been modified for the Cielo around the rear, for engine intake and cooling, and to keep the rear downforce intact. Most of the channels and ducts for downforce, drag reduction and cooling are arranged in the dark lower-body section. The upper coloured panels have a lovely, curvy classical beauty. It’s striking but stops short of flashiness or over-aggression. It suits the car’s character.
So it’s striking to drive but not too aggressive?
Yes. It has what you want from a mid-engined car: responsive steering, a capacity for pivoting effortlessly around tight bends, and lots of traction on the way out. It doesn’t feel like a serious race car, and we mean that in a good way. It’s a bit playful and engaging, even when you’re well on the prudent side of the limit. Which on the road is pretty well always.
We grumbled a bit in our coupe review about the engine’s voice. Not characterful or forceful enough. With the roof down it comes through loud and clear. More on all this in the ‘driving’ tab.
What's the verdict?
“You could use it for a recreational blast, or enjoy the slow-burn of a long tour”
It’s a car with lots of talents and dimensions. You could use it for a recreational blast and make your heart sing. It’s quick, engaging and friendly. Or – provided you have a talent for packing light – you could enjoy the slow-burn pleasure of a long tour. In each of those uses the disappearing roof would only add to the joy.
Owners of cars like this don’t as a rule drive them all that often. But we can’t see why the Cielo wouldn’t give a lot of pleasure, and little pain, if they did.
Driving
What is it like to drive?
This isn’t a harsh track-biased car. But it doesn’t filter away all the sensation. The steering has a fairly relaxed gearing, but is accurate and feeds back fairly vivid information about the tyres’ state of grip. Because the biggest mass is behind you, it takes little effort to peel the front of the car into and through a tight bend; that agility is the key to a mid-engined car’s appeal.
The MC20 adds to that by a confident sense of connection from all four tyres, a stable attitude in quick bends, and a well-signalled and progressive arrival at the limit of what it can do for you. It imparts a gorgeous and valuable sense of well-being.
Talk to me about the V6.
The engine could be highly strung given how much power it makes from so little capacity. Mostly it isn’t: it assembles the horses promptly and neatly when you floor it, and seldom snatches when you suddenly back off. There’s a bit of lag even up to 3,500rpm, but from there to 8,000 it’s playtime all the way.
Maserati says it’ll do 0-125mph in 9.2 seconds. That’s not supercar-fast, but it’s very much on the high side of ample.
Drop the roof and the characteristic, slightly edgy growl of a 90-degree V6 makes its way between the headrests. Roof up and it’s an exhaust bass.
The brakes are carbonfibre as standard. No issue with their bite and strength when you’re in the rhythm. But the first jab or two from cold does ask of you an extra stomp.
What’s the ride like?
A slightly cumbersome swipe-and-twist button on the console lets you adjust the dampers’ programme independently of the powertrain/ESP mode. But since they’re pretty good at adapting to the road, mostly you won’t need to. Just twist the knob for the usual ‘wet’, ‘GT’ and ‘sport’ options: the dampers, powertrain and ESP are altered sympathetically.
And the GT setting is key. A real suppleness is working beneath you here, a ride that’s fluent enough that you almost don’t notice how little you’re noticing it. It’s not soft of course, but it is mature. The surprising insulation from tyre noise adds to the effect. And in speed-bump territory, the nose-lift system has pretty quick wits when you hit the switch, handily placed on the steering wheel.
Interior
What is it like on the inside?
Drop behind the wheel and all the basics are strong. The seat hugs you in all the right ways, and the wheel and pedals meet your limbs. The view forwards and around the pillars presents no issues, which isn’t a given in a mid-engined car. You look over and beyond the twin hillocks of the front wings, which is both aesthetically and practically satisfying as it gives a sense of where the car is around you. Backward and over-shoulder visibility? Rubbish.
It can get a bit breezy. There’s no compulsion to raise the roof even on a motorway, but to quell the turbulence we found ourselves lifting the side windows at lower speeds than in most convertibles.
The twin dash screens are modern and have good graphics. More important with the Cielo version, they’re bright enough to be visible in direct sunlight when you’re wearing sunglasses. Unfortunately the test car’s touchscreen was a bit unresponsive to this tester’s fingertips – shall we be kind and suggest skin moisture level was lacking on the day?
You need that screen to operate climate, entertainment, navigation, roof position and opacity, and a load of car functions including driver assist. Menus are logical and easy to navigate. It’s actually a Maserati skin on the Android OS.
But physical switches don’t only give a car’s interior tactile pleasures and operating speed. They also impart visual character. In their absence, the MC20’s cabin is a mite uninteresting.
Or at least, it leans for its interest on the upholstery. Fortunately the test car’s leather has a fascinating texture, imparted by a series of slashes with contrast colour beneath like a shark’s gills. Moving down the seat, the slashes get closer together, giving an illusion of contour.
You get a phone charge pad and a tiny console box. Otherwise cabin storage is too mean. There’s nothing in the doors (they swing up so any bin would be self-emptying), no cupholders and no stretchy nets alongside the tunnel.
Which is a shame because the Cielo, like the coupe, also wants for boot space. There’s a shallow bin up front of 50 litres, half-filled by tyre-repair and first-aid kits. The rear boot is just 100 litres, and the exhaust roasts it. So you’ve basically got to get all your baggage into an unequal pair of squishy holdalls. Not very granturismo, sadly. Also the 60-litre petrol tank will have you nervously scouting for a petrol station after 230-odd miles – much sooner if you’re pedalling hard.
Buying
What should I be paying?
On the road it’s £231,885. That’s exactly £25k more than the coupe. How neat.
The carbon-composite brakes are standard in the UK if not elsewhere, as is a tracking alarm. So is a three-year service plan.
But tickle the options and you’ll cruise past a quarter-million without touching the sides. Most are cosmetic: paint and wheels. Matte paint is £27,000, and some of the stripes packs are £27,000 beyond that. Gilding the lily.
Adaptive cruise control is standard, while a pack of extra driver assist systems – surround cameras, blind-spot alert and more – adds £5,750. Ultra-light carbonfibre wheels are obviously both cosmetic and show a useful cut in rotating mass but they’re expensive and need fastidious avoidance of kerbing and potholes.
Fuel consumption of 24.1mpg in WLTP might be attainable if you’re gentle. The rated number often is in fast cars driven slowly. But in a fast car driven fast it’ll do far worse.
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