Quote Originally Posted by Mossdog View Post
I do remember their reputation for rust. However, in 1985, or so, I bought a Fiat Uno from a lovely Irish couple who lived in Swanage, Dorset, with some 15,000 on the clock. In a bid to reverse their reputation, Fiat embalmed all of their cars in waxoil - quite a pleasant smell. That little Fiat went on to accumulate just under 200,000 miles before I gave it away, gratis, to a friend, and it lived on for a good few years afterwards. This was despite having an in-line 'tin' device, (the name of which I forget) in the fuel line when they phased out leaded fuel. The 'tin' increased the octane level. At the time, I heard about this device at a VW Beetle owners club meeting and the designer had used them during WW2, on the GB spitfires, sent to the USSR, as the Russian fuel had poor octane levels. You see, Russia again!!
My driving career does not involve that many cars, but the one that was most fun to drive by far was a Fiat Brava - it was a hire car for 2 weeks - we were staying near Naples - it handled the bends beautifully. I would never buy one though - even though it was new it developed problems during that 2 weeks: a window became unreliable, and there was an odd noise in one of the forward gears.