My wife loves Tiny Houses. Those custom recreational
vehicles that people pour their love into and are a master of small packaging. And we’re
both fans of caravans, and their ability to pack so much into such a small space. I’m
not talking about actually buying one or towing it slowly around the country – where’s
the fun in that?!? No, I just want to wonder at how a table can transform into a bed, then
a sofa, and probably a Jacuzzi or something. The Fiat 500 is also a master of small packaging.
Like the Tata Nano it was born out of making something that was so cheap it could replace
a family’s motorcycle, but unlike the Nano it was a resounding success, selling over
4M cars in just 20 years. This is the Fiat 500 story. (music) The Fiat 500 history goes back further than
you might think. A Fiat 500 concept was designed in 1915, yes – over 100 years ago! With
Italy focusing on other things, like the 1st World War, a prototype wasn’t built until
1919. Although the company kept trying different implementations as late as 1928, it didn’t
go to production. The first Fiat 500 would be produced in 1936.
Italian dictator Benito Mussolini demanded that Fiat produce a car for the masses, that
would cost no more than 5,000 lire, about £4,300 ($5,400 USD, €4,700, $7,700 AUD)
today. This would be an Italian Ford Model T. It’s said that this proclamation inspired
Hitler to ask Ferdinand Porsche to build Germany’s own People’s Car.
The first prototype in 1931 was front wheel drive, using a 500cc engine. But on its first
outing a fire broke out in the car, forcing the occupants to have to jump out. Although
probably only a trivial fuel spill, the initial design was scrapped, and Fiat turned it back
on front-wheel drive cars. Fiat continued with Mussolini’s 500 project
without much enthusiasm until 1932 when "Il Duce” would be making another visit to Fiat’s
headquarters. Working on a project that had the eye of the president was a double-edged
sword – it could lead to accolades or disaster. The project fell to 27-year old junior engineer
Dante Giacosa who’d previously been working on large trucks. Inexpensive cars need to
be small, so he focused on maximising interior space. Where a modern car is often front heavy because of the large engine, the tiny 569cc engine
would be mounted as far forward as possible, driving the rear wheels. With luggage and
two people at the rear, the engine placement provided almost perfect 50/50 weight distribution,
depending upon the weight of the occupants of course! The radiator would be mounted above
and behind the engine. By using the principle that hot water rises and cold water sinks,
it meant a less expensive water pump could be used. The radiator placement had the side
effect that the car could have an elegant swooping nose.
With an engine producing just 13hp (10kW) it wasn’t going to be the last word in performance,
but it could get up to 53mph (85 km/h) which was plenty fast for Italian roads in the 1930s.
Another cost savings mechanism was the fuel tank that was placed over the engine so that
a fuel pump wasn’t necessary. This car had more in common with a common or garden lawnmower
than a car! But in an age of double clutching, the car
had an impressive four-speed synchromesh gearbox, four-wheel hydraulic brakes, hydraulic shock
absorbers and electric windscreen wipers. Pretty advanced stuff for the 1960s, let alone
the 1930s! The initial name for the car was the Topolino,
also the name for Mickey Mouse, who in the 1930s was all the rage. Personally, I can’t
see the resemblance. Although the car would officially be named the Fiat 500, it would
still be popularly known as the Topolino. Although the company had been shooting for
a 5,000 lire price, in the end it almost doubled to 8,900 lire, almost £10,000 today ($12,000
USD, €11,000, $18,000 AUD). But this didn’t stop the car from being a big success. Soon
this two-seater was holding 4 or even 5 people, typical for Italians who seemed to love seeing
how many people they could cram into their tiny cars, and this led Fiat to upgrade the
rear suspension that just wasn’t designed to take this weight.
The 500 was be designed to be tough. Italians drove these cars hard, with long periods at
high revs climbing up hills with such a small engine. This ability to make so much from
such small engines is maybe why Italy has produced so many great racing drivers. The
first British Formula 1 world champion Mike Hawthorn was a big fan, having driven one
hard as a youth, and he said it drove like a baby sports car.
The original car was available as a saloon or a convertible – i.e. a saloon with a
canvas sunroof. Soon a Topolino van arrived with a 300kg (661lb) capacity, but most of
these went to the rapidly mobilising Italian Army. After the war production resumed, and the original car, now called the Model A, was
updated to the Model B in 1948. The 13hp (10kW) engine got a 3hp (2 kW) boost.
A new model also appeared – the Giardiniera. This now seated 4 or even 5 people in semi-comfort
– yet it was 33cm (13”) shorter than the modern day Fiat 500. This was amazing packaging
for the day. The car was initially only available as a “woodie” – after the fashion for
wooden side panelled cars in the 1930s. But woodie’s were usually limited production
runs. The Giardiniera would be one of the first if not the first mass-produced estate
car. Just one year later, in 1949, the Model C
was launched, as the Fiat 500 C. The front was updated to make it look more modern, but
otherwise it was the same old Topolino people had grown to love. And the 500 really had
become popular. By the time production ended in 1954, over half a million had been sold,
and had been produced by Fiat and other car companies in Poland, Austria, Germany, France
and even India. With an agreement between Fiat and Nash Motors, they even looked to
produce it in the USA. By the early 1950s the once Mighty Mouse was
looking like it was ready for its pension book, and Fiat looked towards its replacement.
Fiat would initially replace its Fiat 500 with the new 1955 Fiat 600. The designer would
once again be Dante Giacosa, who had done such a wonderful job on the original Topolino.
The head and legroom of the Topolino’s rear seats had been heavily compromised. The 600
was an attempt to give better seating for four, while keeping the car’s price competitive
and the dimensions around about the same. Fiat considered a new two-cylinder V engine
with a semi-automatic gearbox, but the development time would have been too long, so Dante Giacosa
created a compromise– a water cooled, 4-cylinder engine that was dubbed the Fiat 100 series.
It was such a good engine that it was still being produced as the new millennium dawned,
being slotted into many other small Fiat’s, SEAT’s and Eastern bloc cars. It was larger
than the old Topolino engine and produced a faster top speed up to 68mph (110 km/h)
– better for those fancy new Autostrada’s. It’s maybe surprising to modern observers
that Fiat, like many car companies of the time, chose to make their new car rear engined,
when front wheel drive front engined cars have become so popular today. But there were
several advantages to making a rear engined car. The first was its simplicity. The front
wheels just have to steer. You don’t have to be worrying about getting a driveshaft
in there as well. The rear wheels could just focus on being driven by the engine. And with
the engine at the back, you don’t need a costly transmission tunnel to move the power.
If a part wasn’t required it saved weight, space and more importantly cost. Having the
weight of the engine over the rear wheels also gave the car additional traction in slippy
conditions. For all these reasons, rear engined cars were a popular choice for inexpensive
cars in the post war period. The Fiat 600 was popular. Very popular! After
just a few months the waiting list was more than a year, and in less than 6 years one
million had been sold. The low purchase price and great fuel economy was its winning formula.
With small city cars being so popular in cash-strapped post war Europe, Fiat knew it made sense to
use the Fiat 600 frame to make other popular cars. The year after the Fiat 600 launched,
the more capacious 6-seater Fiat 600 Multipla arrived on the scene which I’ve already
touched on in my story of the 1990s Fiat Multipla. When you see Italian post war footage, it’s
quite often of young, happy people zipping around on Vespa’s or other motorcycles.
They weren’t all doing this from a love of motorcycling – post war Italy was a time
of frugality, and before the economic miracle that started in the 1950s, buying a car was
out of many family’s budgets. The Fiat 600 was a good start in making a cheap, practical
car, but while he was building the 600, Fiat charged Dante Giacosa to produce a truly affordable
car that could move these families from Vespas into Fiats.
The genesis of the idea for the updated 500 came from Fiat’s German subsidiary, and
one worker who sent Giacosa a design for a two-seater rear-engined micro-car inspired
by the shape of the VW Beetle. Giacosa loved the shape and tinkered with it until it was
producing a low level of drag, critical to get the most performance from the car’s
small engine. The new shape was a masterclass in compact packaging. At just under 3m (2970mm,
117”) it was shorter than many other 4-seater small cars, including the Mini that would
be released two years later. It was even shorter than the Fiat 500 Topolino, while providing
more space for rear passengers. And as a quirk of the design, the car was exactly the same
height as it was wide! Making a car cheaper than the already cheap
Fiat 600 meant cutting costs, so Giacosa’s team would create an all-new 479cc 2-cylinder
engine, producing the same 13hp (10kW) of the old Topolino engine. To combat engine
vibration, it was mounted on a spring suspension setup. This innovative and frugal engine,
coupled with the low level of drag would give the car excellent fuel economy of almost 63mpg
(52mpg US, 4.5 l/100km). But while the Topolino had synchromesh on all its gears, drivers
of the new Fiat 500 would have to double clutch. Everything was done to make this as inexpensive
as possible. The base model didn’t have hubcaps, and the four bolts holding the tiny
12” wheels could clearly be seen. The light switch was integrated into the ignition switch.
Up front the “frunk” allowed for not much more than a couple of toothbrushes to be stored
around the fuel tank and spare wheel. The speedometer showed an optimistic 100 km/h
(62 mph), which at least gave you something to aim for. The speedometer would helpfully
have marks showing the change-up points for each gear – something that would be useful
on more manual cars. The rear seat was a simple bench, so the car was officially classified
as a two-seater to encourage customers to trade up to a Fiat 600. And all 500’s would
be convertibles, in that the roof was a piece of canvas to save weight and more importantly,
cost. The car was launched in July 1957 and presented
as the “New 500” to underline its relation to the 500 Topolino. The car was soon nicknamed
“Cinquino” in Italy, a name that’s now used for a tiny Fiat 500-shaped Italian chocolate!
The price would be 490,000 lire, about £7,000 today ($8,700 USD, €7,600, $12,400 AUD),
and almost 20% less than the larger Fiat 600. Despite this lower price, sales took a while
to take off. People saw it as too unrefined and impractical, and saved up for the larger
Fiat 600. Faced with slow sales of the 500, Fiat threw
in chrome hubcaps just a few months after its release, uprated the engine to 15hp (11kW)
and offered an even cheaper version dubbed the “Economica” at 465,000 lire, or £6,500
today ($8,300 USD, €7,200, $11,800 AUD). But it did little to sway customers. Fiat
continued to add features. It got sun visors, a rear seat that could actually be called
a seat, plus front windows that actually rolled down! This made for a far more practical car,
and sales started to increase. Fiat also tried exporting the tiny car to
the US. It gained bulbous, froglike front headlights, to comply with minimum height
laws, repositioned indicators and larger bumpers. It was a fun novelty in 1957, but like “Pet
Rocks”, Americans soon tired of it and imports ended in 1961 after selling only 300 cars.
Autobianchi, an Italian car company owned jointly by Bianchi, Fiat and Pirelli, produced
a saloon version of the 500 called the Bianchina. Throughout the 60s Autobianchi produce other
cars based on the 500 as well. Another custom version was the Jolly by coachbuilder
Ghia. Meant as a fun car for the beach, they were popular with the rich and famous as
essentially golf carts, shuttling people around their large estates or to and from their large yachts.
They were sold in Europe, North America and South Africa from 1958 until the mid-60s.
To further boost sales, 1958 bought a new “Sport” model. But don’t get your hopes
up, “sport” here is a relative thing. We’re not talking Ford GT-40 speeds! The
two-cylinder engine was bored out to 499cc to boost power from 15hp to 21hp (11kW to
16kW), meaning the 0-60 time was now… possible, given before this the 500 couldn’t actually
get to 60mph (100 km/h)! If you put the word “Sport” in the name of a car, that’s
all the excuse Italians need to take the car racing, and soon it was burning up the tracks
in slow-motion races. The Sport had done away with the all-canvas
roof, using a partial metal roof that gave the car more rigidity. This was carried over
into the 1959 model year with the 500 Sunroof model. The car got another small boost in
power, now to 16½hp (12kW). The price was also more attractive, being reduced to just
395,000 lire, or £5,300 today ($6,700 USD, €5,900, $9,600 AUD).
The previous 500 had a popular estate version, the Giardiniera, something that wasn’t possible
for the new 500 as the engine was at the back. Or so Fiat initially thought. With the engine
being so small, Giacosa came up with an ingenious plan of mounting a modified engine under the
rear loading area. This allowed them to make a car with four seats and finally a good amount
of luggage space, and with a foldable back seat, this made it quite practical. While
modifying the engine, Giacosa also wrung a little more power out of it. The car was a
little longer, at 3.2m (125”) but it was still shorter than the old Topolino and new
Fiat 600. Fiat would also produce a commercial van version, making the 500 a truly practical
car. The regular 500 wasn’t forgotten and would
be updated as the 500 D, a nod to the Fiat Topolino 500 C. Engine power was increased
once more, it got a better rear seat with a folding backrest to help carry loads, and
the sunroof version was now the only option. Fiat seemed to have found the winning formula
for the cute Nuovo 500. Sales started to take off as Italians, and others around the world,
saw just how practical and fun this car could be. So, by the time the 500 F model rolled
around in 1965 sales were booming. The biggest change with the “F” model
was the removal of the suicide doors that had been a feature of the car from the start.
They would remain on the Giardiniera version until 1977, being one of the last mass production
cars that used these potentially dangerous door style. This seemingly simple door change
actually required much of the car’s body to be altered, so only the bonnet and front
of the 500 were the same as the previous model. This allowed Fiat to make other subtle changes,
such as a wider windscreen and simpler roof construction. With chrome being seen as a
premium item, more parts of the car got blinged up, but some of the metal parts were swapped
out for cheaper plastic. The fuel tank got another litre of capacity, allowing the car
to go another 11 miles (18km) when it was filled up. And the engine got another minute
bump in power to 18hp (13kW). Despite 1,001 small changes this was pretty much the same
old 500 people loved, and sales continued to boom in the prosperous 1960s.
Ever since the 500 had been launched in 1957, Abarth had been tinkering with the car. In
the process they won 28 speed records for its class. In 1963 they launched the 595 with
a 27hp (20kW) engine that got the car to 75mph (120 km/h). This was closely followed up with
the 32hp (23kW) 595 SS that got to 81mph (130 km/h). But the cream of the crop was the 38hp
(28kW) 1964 695 SS that took this tiny 12” wheeled car to 87mph (140 km/h)!
By 1968 the Nuova wasn’t so nuova, so the 500 would be known simply as the Fiat 500L,
using the new Fiat corporate graphics. The most obvious change was the additional chrome
front and rear bumpers that provided a little more protection when parking. The most obvious
change inside was the new speedometer sitting on a new black-clad dashboard. The car also
offered reclining front seats as standard and carpeted flooring. With the car still
being excellent value, sales continued to boom.
With the popularity of the 500, there were many special versions built by outside companies.
Ghia produced their Jolly, Abarth made their sporty models, and there was the Bianchina,
but NSU made the Weinsberg Limousette in 1960, Ferves the 1966 Ranger, Vignale made the Gamine
in 1967, a car that looks a dead ringer for Noddy’s Toytown car, Fiat worked with Zagato
to make the bug-eyed Zanzara prototype in 1969, the off-roading 1969 Ferrario Lizard,
Moretti the Minimaxi in 1970, and I’m sure there were many more. The car was produced
under licence by other companies, such as Austria’s Steyr-Puch and Italy’s Giannini
and Francis Lombardi. In fact it might be quicker to list cars that weren’t based
on the Fiat 500 in the 1960s! The final update to the 500 arrived in 1972
as the 500 R, probably for the best as Fiat seemed to be running out of letters! Fiat
also launched the 500’s successor, the Fiat 126. The big change for the 500 was an engine
upgrade to the same 594cc unit used by the new 126. This gave the 500 a not so amazing
18hp (13kW), but this meant the base model could finally post a 0-60 time, being able
to get to 62mph (100 km/h). In the time it took, you could probably boil an egg.
To see this undreamt of new top speed, the old 1957 style speedo was back, giving the
500 an air of retro before it was put out to pasture by its replacement. And maybe to
add to the retro, the car also lost its fuel gauge, with the driver having to rely on their memory,
simple addition and a “low fuel” indicator. The 500 R would live on until 1975 when it
was quietly retired in favour of the Fiat 126. The practical Giardiniera would
continue until 1977, suicide doors and all. And when the tools to make the 500 were put
down for the last time, Fiat had made almost 3.9M cars over just 20 years, 4.25M if you
include all the derivatives and licenced models. There was a wonderful simplicity about the
whole look of the final 500, from the simple outside to the simple, utilitarian inside.
And that simplicity, yet elegance was a fitting tribute to a car that captured the imagination
not just of Italians the length and breadth of the country, but people around the world.
A car that Fiat would continue to look back to, as the 500 had looked back to the Topolino.
I owe a lot of thanks to Italian sources for this video, but inevitably when I use auto
translate I run into some amusing translation errors. If you want to share my wry amusement,
pause the video now. A shout out to my Patrons, they’re so great.
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