Monday 2nd June 2003

Sportscar Bargain?

If may be left hand drive but it's Italian, stylish and incredibly cheap

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[danmangt40]

Fiat can get back into the US. We buy miatas in droves. If the barchetta was for sale here at those prices, it's be undercutting the miata by 4-5 THOUSAND. More than enough to silence the naysayers of their "japanese build quality." Now I realize that I think I saw somewhere that barchettas sold in numbers less than 10(!)in the UK this year so far, and in the US, I honestly think they could take as much as a third of the miata's annual sales, (which has got to be close to 80k cars). gah, this is not fair. Hell, I'd buy one right now.

[Gren]

They only sold 10 or so because they're left hand drive - you could import an identical one for a few grand cheaper.

I guess that this price/kit change is partly in response to this issue

[Mark Benson]

They're also wrong (front) wheel drive - which pretty much means anyone wanting a cheap 'proper' sports car (the type of person who might forgive LHD if the car handled well) will look elsewhere.
Fiat need a new X1/9 - I loved my old X1/9 when I was a young'un *sniff*

[robert carter]

The styling reminds me of MGB.

[gnomesmith]

They might have sold more in UK if anybody knew they existed.

They are as common as muck around Gnome Towers as Haymarket Publishing bought a barrowload at knock down prices and used them as staff cars.

Having driven a few I think they are great, they are different to rear wheel drive but equally satisfying albeit in a different way.