Car Star: Fiat Panda

I have fond and yet shameful memories of our old Fiat Panda 4×4. It was bought to teach my mother to drive when I was about 12 back in 1995. While 1995 may only be 14 years ago, it was an old enough model to still have a manual choke. I don’t know what year it rolled off the line as I can’t remember its registration plate, but even in 1995, it was old.

Our little Fiat Panda came in a hideous shade of grey, it was as tall as it was long, and it was far from ample in either dimension. It was hot and suffocating being shoehorned into the back where the windows opened only a crack by virtue of a lever. I often worried that with its primitive choke system it would fail to rise over the small hill just beyond our house, but with a quick pull it would make it over. For all I criticised it and -as pre-teen- was stupendously ashamed of it, to its credit it never had a single problem in the four years in which we owned it. By then it was probably one hundred and four years old. OK I exaggerate. But I should be far too young to remember manual choke systems, yet I do.

So why do I have found memories of it? Probably because my mother is an awful driver. Combine her unskilled steering with the amble body roll of the Fiat Panda and you actually have a very entertaining ride. I was like being on Safari, riding across open and un-sculpted dunes. Still that is no real reason to love it; I think you have to be a child to enjoy being thrown around like that. By now I would probably be moaning about mild concussion as my head repeatedly hit the passenger window. But with my Dad behind the wheel, the small and mighty Panda could do anything. As I loaned a horse at the time, forages around the countryside were commonplace enough. My Dad would take me to the farm where my horse lived and come rain, ice, snow, the fearless Panda would mount the steep and rugged incline to the yard and hold fast on a sheer ice slope on which we parked it. It would start on the coldest mornings no matter how early and somehow could lug huge bags of horse food from the merchant yard across hills and back to the stables. It was in many ways, perfectly suited to our devil-may-care attitude to motoring. Yet I cannot forgive our three door Panda for the time I struggled out of the backseat and caught my foot in the front passenger seatbelt, falling flat on my face on the pavement. By then I was a proper teenager and the embarrassment is something I have never forgotten. It should never be that difficult to exit a car without either becoming entangled or requiring you to fold in half.

But the Panda of today is a different affair, and while I appreciate that it is still not the top of everyone’s choice list, what I can’t understand is why it is so overlooked compared to the runaway success of its Fiat stable mate, the new 500. Both are ridiculously small, in fact although the 500 offers a little more width and length, in the height stakes, the Panda gives a generous 52mm more. And while the 500 range starts with a 1.2 engine over the Panda’s 1.1 petrol engine, the difference in performance is little, while the Panda eeks out 56.4mpg on a combined cycle over the 500’s 55.4mpg. For this you can pay an extra £1,350 for the 500. OK so the 500 has a more power, and the Panda entry model’s 0-62mph time of 15 seconds is shameful by anyone’s standards, not that 12.9 seconds is startlingly different. Besides the Panda actually has a little bit of more of the low down torque, needed in urban driving conditions. Up grade to the 1.2 8v Dynamic ECO and you still undercut the entry level 1.2 Pop 500 by £450, plus the Panda then generates 75 lb of torque at 2500 rpm while the 500 needs 3000 rpm to match it.

OK so it is not as cool looking as the 500 for all you young things out there and you may have to compromise on a bit of kit, but let’s face it, if you are looking at either of these cars you haven’t much cash. Personally my advice is not to follow the masses and consider holding onto that extra grand, neither these cars will make you happy. If you going to buy a soupcan, it may as well be an ugly soupcan you can embarass the kids with.

Last month the 500 made it into top ten best selling cars list for the first time. With cars sales being supported by the Scrappage Scheme, I can’t help thinking that the Panda is equally equipped to meet the needs of the mass of downsizers that seem to make up the car buying public today. Besides, unlike the 500, the Panda is still available as a 4×4 for those of you who miss the Chelsea Tractors of the pre-recession days. For just £12,850, you too can give your kids the mini Safari experience and that is why the Panda is this month’s Car Star.

Author: Faye Sunderland, November 2nd, 2009
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