For this week’s Prime Find feature we’re taking a look at two cars that would make excellent candidates for the Festival of the Unexceptional. They’re both up for sale at the same auction with Manor Park Classics as part of their July 9th event at their Cheshire premises, they’re both being offered at no reserve, and were direct rivals back in the day as well as being directly comparable as everyday classics today.
First up is a 1975 bright yellow FIAT 128. The 128 was a more modern, boxy replacement for the FIAT 1100R, and was a smaller sibling to the FIAT 124 and 125. Introduced in 1969, it ended up being produced for 16 years, a pretty decent run, and was a major success for the Turin company, with 2,776,000 built.
It was available as a 2 and 4-door saloon as well as a 3-door estate and 3-door sports coupé, as well as a sporty Rally version. Besides being built in Turin, it was also manufactured at plants in Spain, Argentina, South Africa, Egypt, Morocco, Colombia, Poland and Sri Lanka, with a couple of market-specific variants such as a 5-door estate in Argentina and 2-door pick-up for South Africa and Serbia.
The 128 was a fairly advanced small car – it was just 3.85m long – and it’s transverse-mounted front engine, front-wheel-drive layout with transmission alongside the engine allowed for a much roomier car for its size than competitors and was one of the reasons it was voted European Car of the Year in 1970, and the 128’s technical “recipe” became a standard adopted by many other manufacturers.
Engines – designed by Antonio Lampredi – were either 1116cc or 1290cc producing 55bhp and 61bhp respectively, enough to take the small boxy saloon to top speeds of 85.4mph/137.8kmh and 90mph/145km/h, respectable enough for its class.
Our car is a 1975 example in bright yellow with a two-tone brown and tan interior that I have to say I’m not that keen on – were the car mine I’d get that changed. It’s got the base 1116cc engine, so won’t leave rubber on the road, but no-one is going to buy this FIAT for that.
It looks to be in decent condition – the auctioneer’s particulars, which you can see here, state that this little FIAT is “highly useable”, and that the engine “purrs away quietly”. It doesn’t seem to have been heavily used, with an odometer reading of 52,000 miles generated by just three owners. While it’s offered at no reserve, I have found another for sale, albeit in Greece, in similar condition for £6,000; if it goes for that amount, it’ll make a good starter classic, and is one that will stand out, this example believed to be one of just 32 left on the road in the UK.
Before we take a closer look at our other Prime Find for this week, let’s remind ourselves of just some of the many alternatives there were to either of these cars, among them, the Ford Escort, Vauxhall Viva, Citroën GS, Renault 12, Austin Allegro and perhaps above all, the VW Golf.
Some of the alternatives in a very competitive sector
If the FIAT is a little to rectilinear for your tastes, how about the rather more ornately-styled Datsun 120Y or Sunny? By the early 1970’s Japanese cars were an increasingly common sight on our roads, with a reputation for reliability, high levels of standard equipment and good value for money. In later years their levels of rust protection were found to be pretty much the same as contemporary FIATs, but that didn’t stop them being very popular in the UK.
The first-generation Sunny was introduced in 1966 with a second generation being launched five years later. By the time we get to our Prime Find, the Sunny was on its third iteration, or B210. It was launched in 1973 and was an immediate hit, its introduction coinciding with a shortage of UK-produced cars thanks to strikes at British Leyland plants in particular, which themselves combined with an increasing reputation for poor quality and reliability, opening the door wider for imports.
The Sunny came with 1.2 and 1.4-litre engines, and was available as a 2-and-4-door saloon, 3-and-5-door estate, a van, and a smart 3-door coupé. It was a much more conventional car than the FIAT in terms of layout, and found plenty of buyers, including the parents of one of my school-friends.
Motor magazine tested it in 1974, giving it praise for its performance, equipment levels, handling and economy, but criticised the Sunny’s ride, brakes and rear seat room. Overall, however, they considered it good value for money.
The car on offer with Manor Park is a very late four-door example of the face-lifted B210, registered in 1978. It’s finished in turquoise, which I think suits it, with an interior in shades of black. It has the very distinctive and original hubcaps, which some would say just add to the general impression of being over-styled – I’m ambivalent about them.
According to the auctioneer’s lot entry, which can be seen here, and which incorrectly lists the car as a coupé, the car has covered 67,000 miles on those hubcaps, and is said to be in “unbelievably good condition”, following a recent restoration, with the areas we can’t easily see claimed to be in just as good shape as the exterior. The car is offered with its original toolkit, radio, spare wheel and period brochures and other sales literature.
Like the FIAT, the Datsun is offered at no reserve and without a guide price. Despite there having been some 150,000 Sunny’s sold in the UK between 1973 and ’78, few remain, either due to rust or simply having been scrapped as they were not deemed to have any real value until recently. As a result, there are barely more 120Y’s on the road in the UK than there are 128’s -just 43. I haven’t been able to find any others currently for sale to use as a benchmark, but I would expect this exceptionally tidy Japanese classic to come in at a similar price to the 128, and as such, it would also make an excellent starter classic.
So we have two reasonably-priced (probably) everyday classics – which would you choose; the boxy but technically advanced for its day FIAT, or the more flamboyant, well-equipped and reliable Datsun? As usual, should either of these lots tempt you, we recommend that you arrange prior inspection if possible before raising your bidding paddle.
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