Man Maths: Fiat Panda 4×4 (Type 141)

Sensibly Fiat farmed out the job, entrusting Austrian experts Steyr-Puch to come up with a new driveline that would take the drive from its 965cc (later 999cc) motor and distribute it to all four corners of the car and package it all within the diminutive dimensions of the Panda’s box-like shape. The result was pretty basic with a simple 50/50 front to rear torque split just like the first quattros, but unlike those and all subsequent 4WD Audis, in the Panda you could turn it off.

Indeed the car was intended to be used primarily as a front-wheel drive machine, 4WD only being engaged when required by yanking a lever in the cockpit, whereupon an orange dash light would tell you whether you’d been successful or not. In place of a heavy, complicated, expensive, space sapping transfer box came more commonsense: an extremely low ratio for first gear, with the remainder spaced out so in normal driving you’d start in second, while fifth carried the same ratio as fourth in a two-wheel drive Panda.

The only real drawback dynamically was that the need for a rear differential meant that when the new coil sprung ‘Omega’ rear suspension was introduced for the 1986 facelift, the 4×4 had to retain the old, coarse and bouncy leaf-spring setup.

To this day, if there’s been a lighter all-wheel drive vehicle, I don’t know what it is. I’ve seen various weights quoted, one as low as 761kg, but I think around 800kg is nearer the mark; and, as everyone should know, the single greatest determinant of how far a car will go in traction limited conditions is not how many off-road modes you have nor whether you can de-couple your roll bars, but how much work you’re giving your tyres to do. In a Panda 4×4, that amount of work can be described in mathematical terms as ‘sod all’.

To prove this point I once did an off-road twin test between a Suzuki Jimny and a Porsche Cayenne and you don’t need me to tell you which won. But a Jimny is a Brontosaurus compared to the Panda. I reckon if you got a Panda 4×4 and put it on a set of decent winter tyres you’d have the most capable conventional mud, snow or ice machine out there, at least until it ran out of ground clearance.

And so to my problems. First, I already have the Series III Land Rover in which I passed my test the year before the Panda 4×4 was born. Second, while the mechanicals are tough, the chassis and bodywork are much less so. Simply put, they rust, with a capital ‘R’ in 32-point type. Third, spares are somewhere between hard to impossible to find depending on what you’re after and, fourth, I can find a grand total of none on sale in the UK as I type this.

Fifth, and finally, while there are quite a few available in Italy, the world has woken up to them. Never in all my days did I think I’d see the acronym ‘POA’ attached to a Fiat Panda. The cheapest drivable example I could find is up for €8900 while there’s a Sisley for sale (still with almost 100,000 miles on the clock) for €13,500. So far as I can see prices have doubled, or more, in the last five years. Not for the first and I am sure not the last time, I find myself arriving not a day but several years late, and many thousands of dollars short.

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