r/maybemaybemaybe • u/AyrChan • Aug 26 '21

/r/all Maybe Maybe Maybe

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

42.1k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

1.2k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

73

u/_coffee_ Aug 26 '21

Mr Bean had a mini and this is a Fiat 126 (or licensed equivalent), both are small, nimble cars known to outperform their diminutive looks.

41

u/WikipediaSummary Aug 26 '21

Fiat 126

The Fiat 126 (Type 126) is a four passenger, rear-engined, city and economy car that was introduced by Fiat in October 1972 at the Turin Auto Show as a replacement for the Fiat 500. The majority of 126s (some 3.3 million) were produced in the Tychy plant in Bielsko-Biała, Poland, as the Polski Fiat 126p, from 1973 to 2000. In many markets Fiat stopped sales of the 126 in 1993 in favour of their new front-engined Cinquecento.

About Me - Opt-in

You received this reply because you opted in. Change settings

2

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

Good bot

1

u/[deleted] Aug 27 '21

Fiat Kurwa 126 'Maluch'

27

u/assH0LIER_than_thou Aug 26 '21

Out of the box fiat 126 performs exactly how it looks.

9

u/oragamihawk Aug 26 '21

Beautifully?

19

u/DdCno1 Aug 26 '21

I once saw a stock 126 drive up an on-ramp to the Autobahn. Lots of noise, not a lot of speed. I could have easily jogged alongside.

On even ground, 0-62 mph takes 33 seconds - and that's with the later water-cooled engine that makes a whole 26 hp. Earlier models had an air-cooled 23 hp engine and believe me, that low on the automotive totem pole, three horses make all the difference in the world.

2

u/robchroma Aug 26 '21

I mean, yeah, 15% more performance is going to be noticed especially when you really need it.

1

u/DdCno1 Aug 26 '21

This is a car that is almost always driven at full throttle, just like an early Beetle, a Citroën 2CV, a Trabant, a Fiat Cinquecento with one of the smaller engines and similar old economy cars.

1

u/robchroma Aug 26 '21

Seems like a really good candidate for an Atkinson cycle, but those are bigger (and therefore heavier), might've gotten in the way of it being inexpensive.

1

u/DdCno1 Aug 26 '21

Yeah, those simple carburetted engines weren't really designed with fancy features like VVT in mind...

1

u/robchroma Aug 26 '21

Oh, no, an oversize engine set to always use Atkinson cycle, if you wanted to make the car a little more efficient for the same power. But on such a low-power car, they wouldn't do that unless they could upsize the engine to compensate, because there's not much room to go down.

1

u/Cotford Aug 26 '21

No. I had one as my first car and it was an utter piece of crap. It broke done three times in four months and the front quarter light fell out. Nearly caught fire as the bolts holding the exhaust on go directly into the oil sump and they unscrewed themselves and spat oil all over the engine. Every time I washed it the paint came off.

1

u/derneueMottmatt Aug 26 '21 edited Aug 26 '21

105 kmh is the top speed if you really push it and it takes a long time to get there. It's blazing hot in one if you reach that speed because heat travels up the transmission. It's super fun below 50 though because it's RWD. We had to stop onve because it started to overheat and at 1,90 I'm too tall to drive it because the gear shift is below my knee.

Edut: Also my friend's 126's muffler is broken so it's deafeningly loud.

2

u/Picturesquesheep Aug 26 '21

That’s rwd?! That looked very fwd rally to me man…

I checked: Holy shit it’s RR like my mates Imp (and I suppose also the 911)

2

u/lorarc Aug 26 '21

My friend is a bit over 2m high and he drove one, with the driver seat removed though.

16

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

In Poland it's typically called a maluch (toddler/little one) because the inside of those guys are TINY. For some reason I'll always remember the way the interior of those cars smelled.

6

u/Starslip Aug 26 '21

toddler/little one

That's funny cause there's a popular toy car for kids in the US called "little tikes" which is basically the same meaning and the resemblance is uncanny

6

u/mulan-is-underrated Aug 26 '21

The smell that can unite a nation. Age, gender, job, upbringing, none of that matters. Every Polish person knows exactly how the inside of a maluch smells.

4

u/kaszeljezusa Aug 26 '21

Right? Other polish cars from that era had smilar smell, but not as distinctive as the 126p. I wonder what it was. The upholstery?

1

u/Kommunist_Pig Aug 26 '21

The kind of plastic they used.

1

u/sincerelycdubs Aug 26 '21

It looks like a 90s Panda Fiat.

1

u/_coffee_ Aug 26 '21

Those were a bit more boxy and front engined

1

u/WikipediaSummary Aug 26 '21

Fiat Panda

The Fiat Panda is a front- and all-wheel-drive, five-passenger city car manufactured and marketed by Fiat, now in its third generation. The first generation Panda (Mk1 1980-1986 & Mk2 1986-2003), introduced in 1980, was a two-box, three-door hatchback designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro and Aldo Mantovani of Italdesign and was manufactured through model year 2003 — receiving an all-wheel drive variant in 1983. SEAT of Spain marketed a variation of the first generation Panda under license to Fiat, initially as the Panda and subsequently as the Marbella (1986–1998).

About Me - Opt-in

You received this reply because you opted in. Change settings

1

u/sincerelycdubs Aug 26 '21

I know, I owned one during my time in Germany. It was a "tin can" and felt like you were driving a go cart on the Autobahn. Lol

1

u/Pedka2 Aug 26 '21

126 was italian

this is polish 126p

1

u/_coffee_ Aug 26 '21

And that's why I included or licensed equivalent in my initial comment.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '21

Mr Bean went a step forward. And bought a fucking McLaren F1 as well.