Fiat 850! Slowly I turned. Step by step, inch by inch...
If you know who used to do that routine let the rest of us know, but you'll
be dating yourself :-).
I had an 850 Sport (sic) Coupe. 5000 RPM in each gear and you're still not
keeping up with traffic. The engine would do it but it got tiring after a
while. Then if you "cruise" it at anything over 55 it would overheat. And it
had a bad distributor. And when (not if) it broke down, of course it would
choose some place like outside of Bakersfield.
Fun handling, great gas mileage, never knew if you'd get to your
destination. Drove mine all the way across the US at 55 - my god, Texas is a
big state at 55 . . .
Jim Sudduth
jims@autodesk.com
'74 TR6 CF20076U
Berkeley CA, USA
At 01:52 AM 11/28/96 -0500, you wrote:
>In a message dated 96-11-27 00:48:29 EST, you write:
>
>>
>>I would be very interested in hearing from anyone who knows of the
>>existence of one of these cars which might be for sale and in decently
>>restorable condition. It would be helpful if it is located within
>>1500 miles of Edmonton, however I would make exceptions for a decent
>>car. For those of you whose atlases don't go far enough north, we are
>>about 400 mile due north of western Montana.
>>
>>
>>Oh God, it has started to rain. It's minus 17. Blecch!
>>
>>
>
>John-
>
>You really should see someone about this masochism problem...17 below, and
>you want a Fiat?
>
>I have to confess to owning a 69 Spyder myself (can I still be on the list,
>please, please).
>
>The Rave:
>Driving that car really let you get good at cliping apexes and planning ahead
>on all the turns, so that you didn't have to move the steering wheel once
>throughout the whole turn. Why, well for one, the horn buutton always popped
>off into your lap at the most inopportune moment scaring the living beejeezus
>out of you, but more importantly, you didn't want to scrub off even the
>slightest bit of speed as it would take another hour to build it up again.
>
>The Rant:
>Talk about underpowered? The only way to keep traffic within sight was to put
>your foot to the floor and shift every so often. I raced every car on the
>road, and the only ones who knew it were other 850 drivers. Upon meeting
>another tortured soul, that maniacal look came over them, the glazed eye, the
>hint of spittle, the quivering throttle foot. When the stoplight changed,
>amid the floating valves there emerged both winner and loser, Moss and
>Fangio, together again...and no one else had a clue. Its a tough life when
>the only car lower than you on the automotive pecking order is the Subaru
>360.
>It is said that gold is the only material that can be hammered until it is
>only 1 molecule thick. Somehow the Fiat factory had discovered this
>alchemists feat, and applied it to what they laughingly called steel, to form
>the bodywork of the 850. I fully believe that the cars had rust holes in them
>before they got to the paint booth. (Anecdotal evidence does give some
>credence to this "theory")
>Whenever two or more bedeviled owners met, the talk always turned to the
>virtual cornicopia of wasted time and ability utilized in that ritual known
>as "Trying to Start the Fiat in the Wintertime" (hereafter known as TSFW).
>Folklore ranged from baking the dist cap and leads every morning to expel
>moisture, to leaving the dam**d thing running all night. TSFW was a strong
>bonding agent to the Fiatisti. (MY personal method evolved into getting up an
>extra half hour early to tow the wretched bugger with a real car til it
>started - even then if it stalled before running the prerequisite 15
>minutes-you had to tow it again (I wish I could say I was making this up, it
>would be funny if it weren't true)).All this and it never got to 17
>below...well maybe close, this was in Western New York, in what is known as
>the "Snow Belt", and with good reason.
>
>A note on the crankshaft...see bodywork, metalurgical skills applied to this
>unit also. Only crankshaft I have seen break waitin at a stop sign.
>
>Cute yes, but thankfully off the endangered list and onto the extinct
> Nick in Nor Cal
>ps really cold today hi 65 low 38, maybe i'll take the TVR out tomorrow...
>
>
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