Grinding gears garnish the sweet life in the classic Fiat 500

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As a young Millennial, I’m constantly informed of how remarkably little I know of the world. Like anyone born after 1993, I obviously can’t cook or drive — all I know is McDonald’s, charge my phone, twerk, eat hot chips, and lie. It’s a wonder that I’ve even know how to rewind a cassette! 

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Instead, as is expected of any typical young person, I live my life on digital screens. Instead of attending car shows or meeting people, I thus learned what little I know about cars and car culture through films like Pixar’s 2006 Cars, which tells the true story of a sentient racecar and his smalltown friends.

In an effort to break beyond the cynical stereotypes and aspersions cast by my elders, however, I’ve been pursuing opportunities to reach into the real, physical world. So when I discovered that a car company had gone ahead and made a real-life car in honour of Luigi from that iconic documentary, I knew that I had to find a way to experience it. 

As it turns out, Luigi is in fact based on an existing historic vehicle called the Fiat 500. Who knew!

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The Fiat 500, for those of us who live on our phones, is a classic car of distinct significance. Built from 1957 to 1975, nearly four million 500s were assembled in Italy and abroad under licence. Aesthetically consistent across its 18 years and so many examples, its ubiquitous shape mobilized a generation and has since come to define popular imagination of ‘the sweet life’ under the sun of postwar Italy. 

When the 500 entered production, many vehicles on European roads still presented mousey interwar designs and quaint technologies. On that end, the 1930s-era Citroën Traction Avant and the Cinq‘s little Topolino predecessor had only just left production; on the other, Lamborghini would go on to launch Gandini’s extra-orbital Countach before this 50s-designed Fiat had reached its own 18-year end. 

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That the Cinquecento received only such minor adjustments along the way is a testament to its appeal and effectiveness in addressing the needs of the Italian market. 

Debuting with a 479cc air-cooled two-cylinder, early Cinquecenti produced but 13 horsepower. Subsequent boring and upgrades stepped this to 17, 18, 21.2, and under the eventual eye of Abarth, a whopping 37 horsepower. This brawn was routed through a surprisingly modern four-speed transmission, which eventually even gained the luxury of synchromesh for modern, single-clutched gearchanges. 

An economy car in the most literal sense, the 499-kilogram 500 equipped only the most basic of componentry and amenities. Minimal vinyl upholstery and no substantial sound deadening left for a loud, resonant cabin when the rear engine turned at anything above an idle. Early cars even skipped a rear bench, and though equipped with four speeds, the traditional unsynchronized gearbox took actual foresight to shift without the painful crunch of gears. 

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Quaint as all of this may sound, it did its job.

The affordable new Fiat hit the market right as Italy’s gradual postwar resurgence accelerated to its greatest pitch. A 20-year ‘economic miracle’ second only to Marshall-era Japan’s, a rising standard of living bolstered by strong employment and expanded social security supports multiplied everyday Italians’ spending power — and with it, their appetite for personal transportation. 

As Italy caught pace with western European patterns of personal consumption and public infrastructure growth, the Nuovo Cinquecento — and, to a lesser extent, certain contemporaries — afforded unprecedented mobility across booming local and interurban infrastructure. Against an average 1971 family income of 2,117,000 lire — a full triple the average spending power of 20 years prior — the contemporary Fiat 500F and glitzier 500L started from attractive prices of 475,000 and 525,000 lire, respectively. 

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As a proportion, that’s little more than a third of the average $50,758 Canadian new vehicle purchase price to $82,436 household income in 2021 (22% vs 61.5%). Today’s nearest parallel is the Mitsubishi Mirage (17.1%), but where boomtime Italians flocked appreciatively to the 500, modern Canadians overwhelmingly turn their noses at anything less than dreary, thirsty crossover SUVs. 

The example you see here is a 1971 500L, or Lusso. This ‘Luxury’ trim equipped the runabout with tube bumpers, larger lights, radial tires, better-cushioned reclining seatbacks, chrome accents, and additional interior storage and trim. The 18-horsepower, 499.5cc engine from the ‘F’ could carry the Lusso to 95 km/h, at a claimed economy of 5.3 L/100 km. Sold from 1968 until the successor 126’s introduction in 1972 and subsequent reduction of the 500 to a spartan ‘R’ economy model, these desirable Lussi were and are held as the peak of the 500 range. 

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More important than its technical history, however, is the little car’s cultural legacy. Like Britain’s classic Mini and the French 2CV, the aesthetic charm and shared experience of this affordable icon has endeared it to millions within Italy and beyond. 

To contemporaries, the Cinquecento and its mass proliferation represented the unprecedented personal autonomy of a rapidly modernized society and the fruit of what had become a top-six national economy. To nostalgists, the 500 now symbolizes a romanticized, carefree Mediterranean life of cappuccino and ceaseless leisure. Today, whether offering an effective stock character in Radiator Springs or foiling an escape in The Italian Job, the 500’s shape has so effectively cemented its enthusiast and mainstream resonance that it has become difficult to imagine an Italian street scene without one parked crookedly on the curb.

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After a giddy saunter through the converted Turin assembly hall that now houses Fiat’s extensive ‘Heritage Hub‘ family collection, I made my way to the car that I’d come here for. 

Stepping up to the 500, it’s hard not to recall those admittedly romanticized associations and smile. As a work of industrial design, the 500 is as functional as it is charming. Finished in a bright Arancio orange, the L’s wider-eyed face is friendly, its open cabin welcoming. Contrasted with the pedestrian Panda that brought me to Turin, the 500 was at once a fraction as usable and bounds more appealing. 

My host stepped away for a moment, and unable to speak Italian to the man who works on the collection’s cars, I had to fumble.

“Synchro?”

A shrug and a smile.

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I gestured down and extended my left foot twice. “Ah, si, si!”

Though many cars have been retrofitted with gear synchronizers, this Lusso retains a traditional ‘crash box’ unsynchronized transmission. No pressure — just don’t forget to double-clutch. 

I’ve had the opportunity to drive plenty of privately owned classics, and with every turn of the key comes a pang of anxiety. Those cars are their gracious owners’ babies, and I’d dissolve if anything bad happened to them under my watch. 

Subtract that personal dimension, and a corporate-owned motor ought not to be any sweat then, right? 

Wrong: as it turns out, you haven’t known borrowed-car stress until you’ve driven a museum piece. 

Watching cordons retract and the car withdrawn from the display floor, doubts unload like a drum-fed Breda. Coming from a predominantly static life on display, has anything gone funny? Will it go? Will it stop? Will I embarrass myself in front of Umberto? Would a failure at my hands deprive future visitors of the opportunity to see, interpret, and appreciate this gloss-finished piece of history? Will I forget how to use my hands and feet and foolishly ooze into the footwell, my pooled mass seeping into crevices and staining the car’s authentic colours? Are these thoughts actually productive right now? 

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They aren’t, and I hop in. A turn of the key readies the car for startup and illuminates an ignition light. Next, a pair of levers mounted to the floor between the seats tug cables to close the choke and energize the starter, and so starts the little half-litre engine. 

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It’s a four-stroke, but it sounds like a scooter — or indeed, a tittering chainsaw. A rich startup mixture and high-set idle pumps pale smoke through the short little tailpipe until the car comes up to temperature, and the little fellow settles. 

An easy release of the clutch, stick to first, and we’re off. 

Scooting within the confines of Fiat’s Mirafiori compound, the 500 feels like an eager urban commuter. Pushing with clatter and spectacle, the 18hp in the back turns its little 12″, 125-section wheels to speed in no particular hurry. Will I make second gear before the stop sign? Nope, but across the next stretch I manage third just in time to brush up on my down-

GRRRRRRT

Dammit. Sorry, Luigi. 

Its hollow nose light enough to crank the manual steering box even at low speed, I pull a comfortable U-turn within the tight driveway and circle back. I speed up, but this round I slow farther out, find a closer rev match, and release the clutch a second time to a gentler clatter of engagement. 

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My classic-enthused pride is wounded, but healing. 

More importantly, I am smiling. No longer an object to be relied on by day and cursed at along the roadside by night, the 500’s classic status allows it to sidestep the critical criteria that I’d normally process while feeling out a car. 

Instead, I get silly. First on my mind, the thought that generations of youths got up to no good across these cramped vinyl seats is as comical as it is blasphemous. The sweaty logistics of 500 fraternization feel a foolish distraction, but are admittedly more constructive and indeed realistic than my earlier dread about the ways and reasons I might’ve melted into a pud-Elle. 

Of course, I recognize shortcomings, and pulling myself from the gutter, I imagine commuting in this dainty contraption. The 500’s rolly-polly suspension seems proportionate to the rough surfaces of historic streets, but the cacophonous ride would seem anything but peaceful after a long shift at the local mill. Interior switchgear, much of which I recognize from its licenced use in my Lada, feels brittle but reads intuitively. Up front, the shallow boot beneath that dainty nose should hold any fresh market produce not placed in the passenger footwell. Above, a vinyl top promises breezy journeys to picnic spots across sweltering Italian plains, while a broadly glazed greenhouse seems ready to offer up bright views on the descent through the sights of the country’s extensive coast. 

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It’s all consciously idealized, of course. Much like the contemporary Beetle and Trabant, the 500 is just as readily remembered for its mechanical frustrations and occasional temper when worked in the heat. Cinquecenti, like any vehicles of the era, demanded a more active role in everyday driving and maintenance, and were more vulnerable to environmental conditions such as humidity and altitude. And at the extreme, I’m well aware that even with the little fellow’s front seatbelts, neither of us would fare particularly well in a collision. The sweet life still carries its cavity risks, it seems. 

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On balance, the 500 isn’t quite bad enough for me to want in my own garage. Still, there are few cars I’d rather unhurriedly putt around Italy in. Meandering some 800 kilometres from Maranello, into the Alps, and back down to Turin over a weekend, a classic 500 would surely have been a monumentally slow, tiring, and endearingly frustrating alternative to the fast-lane-friendly, air-conditioned Fiat Panda that I picked up instead. Perhaps I’m a little more in touch with the past than elders give me credit for. 

Fortunately, I found friendly little Cinquecenti punctuating the dreamlike scenery all along my journey. And even as I overdosed on Italian motoring history in the sprawling hall of the Heritage Hub, the vibrant little row of pedestrian 500s stood out as something just as important as the Martini-liveried Lancias up front. Museum nerves overcome, concluding a first visit to Italy — and Europe, for that matter — with a taste of such an enduring, culturally relevant icon brought a satisfying conclusion in a language I speak fluently. 

And wow, wouldn’t you know — once I got a feel for it, this little orange fellow was even friendlier than the one in the Owen Wilson documentary.