To Nashville in a Fiat
primesuspect
Beepin n' BoopinDetroit, MI Icrontian
So Fiat reached out to me and asked me if I wanted to drive a Fiat 500 to Nashville to attend the Fiat Freakout event. I, of course, said yes, because that's an awesome opportunity. Now that I'm a regular working schlub again, I had to clear it with my supervisors, but that went through and now I've got a shiny new 5-speed manual 2011 Fiat 500 in my driveway
Anyways, I'll be blogging about my trip on my work blog, but I'll also update this thread so that I can share with you guys.
The 500 is the smallest car I've ever been in, although the interior is roomy enough for two. It does have two back seats, but they're a little tight. The trunk is very small, so it wouldn't be good for, say, a family of four to take a protracted road trip in.
The last manual car I drove was a 1985 Jeep CJ-7, which was about nine or ten years ago, so I have nothing to compare it to, shifting-wise. It's smooth as butter as long as you know what you're doing
On a side note—”I went the "trial-by-fire" method of re-learning how to drive stick on a major freeway during bumper-to-bumper rush hour. Fun! I only stalled twice...
Anyways, after driving it around town this evening, I'm back into the swing of things and I'm finding my confidence in this little monster.
Anyways, I'll be blogging about my trip on my work blog, but I'll also update this thread so that I can share with you guys.
The 500 is the smallest car I've ever been in, although the interior is roomy enough for two. It does have two back seats, but they're a little tight. The trunk is very small, so it wouldn't be good for, say, a family of four to take a protracted road trip in.
The last manual car I drove was a 1985 Jeep CJ-7, which was about nine or ten years ago, so I have nothing to compare it to, shifting-wise. It's smooth as butter as long as you know what you're doing
On a side note—”I went the "trial-by-fire" method of re-learning how to drive stick on a major freeway during bumper-to-bumper rush hour. Fun! I only stalled twice...
Anyways, after driving it around town this evening, I'm back into the swing of things and I'm finding my confidence in this little monster.
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I can't wait to see follow how your trip goes. It's all very exciting. How peppy is the car? I know it's not a rocket, but how does it keep up with traffic?
I can't wait to see follow how your trip goes. It's all very exciting. How peppy is the car? I know it's not a rocket, but how does it keep up with traffic?
I stopped at the Michigan/Ohio border to visit this awesome homemade jerky store (I try to stop there every time I'm at the border because it's awesome). It was about 9:30am and these two locals were sitting outside a barber shop (it's a very rural town). As soon as I parked, they both got up and came over. They were old men so I figured maybe they'd say something snarky about foreign cars.
To the contrary, they were both as excited as little kids. "Oh wow, I heard of these, but I've never seen one!" "Look at the painted calipers" "That is a sharp logo!" "Chrysler is doing well to bring these here!". They asked about the performance, the engine, they looked at the interior, and were just basically really enthusiastic about the Fiat.
It was a neat experience, and it told me one thing: Americans are ready for smaller cars. We got into a conversation about the size and efficiency. The older gent said he was excited to see electric charging stands at the big-box store near town. He said he was thinking a small car like this might be nice for his wife.
Everywhere I went, between Detroit and Cincinnati, people were staring, pointing out their windows, taking pictures, and asking me about it when I stopped for gas, etc.
It's an exciting little car.
It's very peppy; I don't have a lot of experience with peppy cars (I've had a souped-up 3.0V6 Dodge Spirit, and a Saab 9-3 turbo and then a bunch of normal cars), but this one has certainly got some balls. I had no fear of wailing out onto the interstate full of giant trucks going 65MPH from the slow entrance ramp. There's a sport mode which stiffens up the steering and changes the rate of the throttle response. It's not really a serious effect, but the steering feels better in sport mode, so I keep it on.
I wish it wasn't so insanely hot out there (100 degrees, in both Detroit and Cincy).I'd have the windows down and sunroof open. Zip zip.
I have to mention the sound of the engine. It's awesome. From the inside, it sounds like you're playing Forza. It's got that "rally car" sound, especially when you're shifting from 1st to 2nd. Perry was sitting with me in it last night and he said "oh man! This is exactly like being in real-life Forza!"
Indianapolis is between Detroit and Nashville...
Edit: would be happy to help you do a couple of performance driving shorts. Nothing crazy.
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To me the Versa is a hella lot better value. better MPG, better cargo room, better reliability, and it cost $6000 less.
Oh, that totally is worth it
http://www.tmprod.com/blog/2011/nashville-bound-in-a-fiat-500/
I wish we had more US muscle cars here in RHD
at $80/litre of gas, no you don't
($80 is a fictional sarcastic price, although not too far off)
Actually, Alfas have been for sale in the US for a while now (since 2008). That is, if you count the Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione sold through Maserati dealerships. 90 coupes and 35 Spyder convertibles are all the USA ever got.
/end aside/
/OnTopic/ I am surprised that you found it so comfortable on a long freeway based journey. 500s over here (at least) are considered town/city cars.
Yesplease. That is all. Though I will settle for the 4C Spider.