Half a century ago, the stylish Fiat 850 Sport Coupé was the way to go for canny buyers seeking a car that was out of the ordinary and didn’t cost a fortune. Yet, all these years later, boasting handsome lines that have hardly dated, the little Italian is difficult to find.
Torino Motors, the New Zealand Fiat concessionaire at the time, imported the two-door fastback fully built-up and also assembled the Coupé locally over its eight-year model life, yet you will still struggle to find an example for sale. The Car Jam website counts only 14 in its system.
The North Island–based Fiat Owners Club of New Zealand has only three members with Fiat 850 Coupés in the North Island and a recent internet search failed to find even one for sale.
Rust dogged the model even from a relatively early age. In 1979, the US Department of Justice filed a US$1.6 million lawsuit against Fiat Motors of North America, contending that the company failed to recall and buy back 1970–’71 model Fiat 850s for safety-related defects; rust that could “weaken the car’s underbody”. Soon after, in 1980, Fiat withdrew from the US market and did not return for 31 years.
The 850 Coupé was styled in-house by father and son Felice and Gian Paolo Boano, who were better known for their work on ’50s Ferrari road cars
Fiat built 1.78 million 850 models between late 1965 and 1973, including 342,873 Coupés and 124,600 Spider convertibles, but there is no counting the number that came to our shores. New Zealand Motor Distributors, including the large franchises, is historically notorious for simply tossing away old records.
