Bangers

Twenty years ago, give or take a month, FIAT and Alpha released some new wheels for the one-day-I'll-get-a-Ferrari brigade. Alpha gave us a new, radical, GTV and its chopped-off Spider. A "GTV Cabriolet" would have been a more accurate name - 'Spiders' should be designed from the ground up, like the Duetto of 1966 and 'The Graduate' fame. FIAT, on the other hand did what FIAT traditionally do: put a fancy coupé body on humble underpinnings. Their already ageing Tipo hatchback was the mule in this instance. The Alpha was a much more sophisticated machine than the 'Coupé FIAT' and more expensive as a result; FIAT toyed with a convertible version of the Coupé but it would have eaten into Alpha's Spider sales [owned by FIAT of course] so remained on the shelf. Available in 2.0 litre 16v and 2.0 16v turbo versions [later a volvo 5 cylinder engine would replace both], you had 140 or 195 bhp to play with [150/225 with the '5]. The opposition at the time consisted of the Vauxhall Calibra, Nissan 200SX and Honda Prelude - all much more sensible options given FIAT's reliability reputation but dull as dishwater that had all the tasty impurities and funky colour boiled out of it.

Designed by Chris Bangle, [later famous for his "flame surfacing" on BMW's Z4] built by Pininfarina.

Jump forward a decade and the "broom yellow" Coupé in these pictures appears on a Norfolk forecourt. I watched it for months, sitting there gathering dust, blossom, leaves, snow, dust again... until a birthday when, mid-life crisis or no mid-life crisis, I decided to buy it.

"If that car can move under its own power, it's coming home."

The dealer claimed he had to wrestle the keys off the previous "new-baby-forces-sale" owner; unfazed by this speil I took it for a lengthy test drive. Taking heed of the warnings available on the www dot  sites, I listened for tell-tale knocks, rumbles and OH IT DIDN'T MATTER I was always going to buy it.

Standard FIAT parts abound but Pininfarina designed a special-feeling interior - note the body-coloured dash.

R35 JNV was a 5 cylinder 20v turbo with an advertised top speed of 150 m.p.h. and 0-60 in 6.5 seconds. In those days there was a phenomenon called "turbo lag"- you could plant your foot on the floor with the accelerator pedal underneath and nothing would happen for a moment then WHOOSH: the trees melted. The trick of cramming a big turbocharged engine into a small hatchback's dimensions caused one major problem: to change the cambelt you had to take the engine out. Only a Lotus Esprit or Ferrari F355 gave you a bigger bill for this job at the time. I had the cambelt changed once in the nine years the car was mine; it cost so much I had to take the car off the road until I could afford to tax & insure it again. Over the years, like Boycey's broom in 'Only Fools & Horses', I changed everything that moved except the clutch [which was about to snap when we finally parted company].

Tempted? The styling of the FIAT Coupé is gawky from some angles: "If you don't like the look of it, walk a bit further round until you do." Said CAR magazine in 1995.

One summer the sun heated the bonnet to the extent that the alarm went off. Later, a chirping noise came from the garage, singular at first, then double. We thought a bird was trapped inside and opened the doors and windows to let the stricken thing out. No bird, still the chirp. Next day the chirp was a treble, quadruple and eventually the alarm sounded constantly and only disconnecting the battery stopped it. The car alarms used on the Coupé were bolted on once the cars arrived in Britain from Italy; most owners replaced them with better examples. Eventually I became less precious and used the Coupé as everyday transport. Like all machines, it needed to be used and became very reliable. One snowy night the handbrake froze 'ON' - with older cars you should always park in gear to stop this. One long journey caused the exhaust to burn a hole in the plastic bumper - it was a neat elipse which looked perfectly fine without mending. I used to "touch up" stone chips when the car first arrived but its low bonnet was so prone I eventually lost the will...

The filler cap harks back to more exotic machines from the 60's - looks nice but requires an Alvin Stardust grip on the fuel nozzle to fill up.

One day I was driving my nine-mile commute from Hoveton to the University of East Anglia and (attention, Partridge fans) I was stuck on the ring road literally going nowhere. At the front of a large stream of traffic, the lights went green. As I pulled away I felt a bump under the car: "Oh no, I've run over a cat or something", I thought. Unwilling to look in my mirrors to see the worst I ploughed on to the campus, followed by a big 4x4 which kept flashing its lights. I reached the car park and the driver got out waving at me; perhaps it was her cat, perhaps she thought I was Kevin Keegan, no: 

"Your exhaust fell off at the lights - I managed to get over it in my 4x4 but it was chaos behind me - how did you not notice?"

I gently and, let's not be coy, illegally, drove home. I put 'JNV in the garage and decided enough was enough. The clutch was going [another engine-out job] and now this: I couldn't afford to own this car anymore. Eventually Mike [who had fettled 'JNV over the years, building a sizeable property portfolio with the takings] trailered the old banger away. At time of going to press, a friend called Keith is gradually bringing the beast back to life.

The Coupé looks exotic, but everything is easily replaceable due to it being based on the humble Tipo hatchback.

You can find examples of these cars for pennies online - they were among the first Italian motors to be galvanised so won't rust away like FIATs of old. My tip would be to try and find an early non-turbo which shows no sign of modification. They are cheap enough for boy racers to buy and boy racers love to lower the suspension and fit stupid wheels: original is best. High mileages need not be a problem; my best pal Jonesy is near the 200,000-mile stage with his red example. Use the car often, and service it regularly.

Oh, and the yellow paint attracts flies - go for red or blue.