After reverting to our old £20,000 budget limit for the past couple of weeks, it’s time to raise our sights again, and to one of the most exquisite cars to come out of Turin, or anywhere, for that matter.
FIAT had made some very pretty small coupés and convertibles through the late 1950’s and 1960’s, such as the 1200 TV Spyder and it’s successor, the 1200 Coupé and Cabriolet, the 850 Coupé, the 124 Sport Spider, and the FIAT 128 Coupé, all of which were based on relatively mundane saloon mechanicals, and in some cases penned by some of Italy’s famous design houses such as Pininfarina and Bertone, transforming modest family cars into diamonds. Even the bigger, stylish FIAT 2300S – a Ghia design – was based on a saloon, albeit an upmarket one.
Our Prime Find however – although it carries the FIAT badge – is anything but a standard saloon in drag, combining three famous Italian motoring names besides that of the manufacturer.
The first of those is that of Enzo Ferrari’s son, Dino. As ViaRETRO readers will know, road-going Ferrari’s in the ‘sixties were sports cars with V12 engines, but in an attempt to broaden the company’s market, Enzo was persuaded to use the V6 originally designed by his son Alfredo, who had died at the tragically young age of just 24. Variations on that V6 engine were already in use in a variety of single-seater and sports racing cars before it found it’s way into one of the prettiest road cars ever made.
Ferrari needed to homologate a V6 racing engine for Formula 2, an engine that had to be used in road cars built in quantities of at least 500 in a 12-month period, a volume that he was never going to be able achieve alone. However, an agreement with FIAT was reached to produce the 500 engines in road cars still to be specified,
The Dino brand was conceived as a way to give Ferrari a car to compete in the same sector as Porsche’s 911 without damaging the exclusive status of the company’s V12 models, and 1967 saw the introduction of the Dino 206GT, followed a few years later by the 246GT.
However, the 206GT wasn’t the first road car to bear the Dino name; that honour fell to the FIAT Dino, which was introduced to the world at the Turin Motor Show in two-seater Spider form in October 1966, with the 2+2 coupé following in Spring of ’67.
The engine was a 2-litre V6, and had been converted for road use by the second of the trio of famous names, Aurelio Lampredi, and was built by FIAT, not Ferrari, to ensure unbroken production. A 5-speed manual gearbox was standard.
The Spider, an exceptionally pretty car, was designed by Pininfarina, but the even better-looking, to my eyes at least, coupé was styled by Giugiaro at Bertone, the third of the famous triumvirate. The former has seen prices rise to the point where it is now very hard to find a decent example for less than six-figures sterling, but the coupé, while also steadily climbing the price ladder, is generally available for around half as much, and it’s one of these that is this week’s Prime Find.
The earliest Dino’s – both FIAT and Ferrari – were equipped with the 158bhp 2-litre version of the Dino/Lampredi V6, but in 1969 this unit was replaced with the 2.4, increasing power output to 178bhp, and more importantly, increased torque to make the car’s performance more accessible.
The 2-litre cars started rolling out of the Turin factory in 1966 before being replaced by the 2400’s in 1969 – when production transferred to Maranello alongside the Ferrari Dino – and lasted until 1973. Outwardly very similar, it’s apparently the case that the only identical body panel is the bootlid.
Cards on the table – I love the Dino Coupé almost as much as I do the 911 and it’s on a short list of cars I would love to own one before I’m too old that includes the Alfa Romeo Montreal – another Bertone design – and Mercedes-Benz Pagoda. It’s also – broadly speaking – in a similar price range, ie £60,000 to £100,000.
The lines are flowing and elegant, while at the same time, the Dino’s stance is purposeful, giving a hint of strong performance, which in reality was reasonable rather than rapid – top speed of the 2000 coupé was 124mph/200kmh, with the 2400 just slightly quicker. The proportions are just perfect, and nothing is out of place. The dual headlights and grille are just the right size, the glasshouse offers excellent visibility while remaining in proportion with the body and there’s no angle from which the Dino doesn’t look gorgeous. To me, it has the same combination of forward-leaning aggression combined with feminine elegance that characterise BMW’s equally beautiful E9.
The interior is comfortable without being plush, and the fascia is a typically Italian mixture of Veglia dials- mounted in a central binnacle – and wood, behind the stylish 3-spoke wooden steering wheel.
7,651 FIAT Dino’s were produced in total, of which 3,670 were 2.0-litre coupés and 1,163 2.0-litre spiders made; with only 420 built, the 2400 Spider is the rarest Dino with the remaining 2,388 being 2400 coupés, so none of these variants is exactly plentiful. There are however more than you might expect in the UK, with 45 coupés and a baker’s dozen of the Spider on the road here
All this leads us to our Prime Find, which is a 1972 2400 Coupé, finished in a gorgeous shade of metallic blue or Azzuro Metallizzato to you and me, with a black leather interior. The car was brought into the UK in 2019, having been repainted just prior to that and it has since had the underside completely refinished as well as having the engine, suspension, steering, fuel and braking systems overhauled.
This stunning FIAT sits on a nice set of non-original alloys but the original Cromodora wheels do come with the car, as does a history file including photos of and invoices for the work done since importation, FIAT handbooks, and other paperwork.
It’s on offer with Silverstone Auctions as part of their Classic sale on August 27th, and the auctioneers describe the car as one that “fires on-the-button, sounds very healthy and performs extremely well, and is now beautifully preserved for another 50 years of enjoyable motoring”.
Based on the photographs that we have borrowed from the auctioneer’s website, it certainly looks the part. The paintwork looks as good as it should being only three or four years old, and the interior looks very tidy indeed. It’s difficult to tell from photographs, but the chromework looks decent and the dash seems free from cracks. Even the clock works! The odometer reads 95,583km, but it’s not stated whether this is genuine or not.
This is, on the face of it, a beautiful car and if a 911 wasn’t already in my garage, I’d be taking a very close look at this. The estimate range is £55,000 to £65,000, which with auctioneer’s premium would take the price of acquisition to £63,250 to £74,750. This puts it at the upper end among other Dino’s for sale around Europe, but if it’s as good as it looks, may be worth that extra few thousand pounds.
You can see the full lot entry here, and as usual, if this lovely Dino is tempting you to register to bid, we recommend arranging prior inspection if possible.
With our Saturday instalment of Prime Find of the Week, we’re offering our services to the classic car community, by passing on our favourite classic car for sale from the week that passed. This top-tip might help a first-time-buyer to own his first classic, or it could even be the perfect motivation for a multiple-classic-car-owner to expand his garage with something different. We’ll let us be inspired by anything from a cheap project to a stunning concours exotic, and hope that you will do the same.
Just remember – Any Classic is Better than No Classic! We obviously invite our readers to help prospective buyers with your views and maybe even experiences of any given model we feature. Further to that, if you stumble across a classic which you feel we ought to feature as Prime Find of the Week, then please send us a link to primefindoftheweek@viaretro.co.uk