The recent hook-up of FCA and PSA has a lot of folks worried that some of the old names we hold dear are going to get the chop in due course. After all, we’re talking about an alliance of Fiat-Alfa Romeo-Maserati-Lancia-Chrysler-Jeep-Dodge-Ram and Peugeot-Opel-Vauxhall-Citroën-DS (am I forgetting anybody?), so there is cause for concern. But let’s not forget that killing off marques is a sport almost as old as the industry itself. Here’s an example from the ‘80s.
We went over the Autobianchi affair in some detail a while ago when I wrote up this chapter of my continuing European Deadly Sins series. Condensed to a sentence, Autobianchi was a collaborative effort from Fiat, Pirelli and Bianchi that was started in 1957 and began to unravel in the ‘70s, after Fiat took complete control. At the time, Autobianchi were making the very successful A112, launched in late 1969. Fiat’s answer to the Mini was largely based on the Fiat 128, but with the 850’s engine (a 900cc 4-cyl. providing 44 hp) and the Primula’s hatchback. It was a winning formula.
It so happened that 1969 was also the year that Lancia went belly up and was swallowed by Fiat as well. (This was also detailed in this other post of the same series.) Fiat found themselves with a superfluous but profitable Autobianchi and a loss-making but prestigious Lancia. Naturally, the idea of merging the two became irresistible. Lancia had a rocky time in the ‘70s – the so-so Beta, followed by the Gamma debacle, left the marque’s reputation for engineering excellence tarnished. Autobianchi abandoned their delusions of grandeur (the A111) and focused on the A112 and the Fiat 500 Giardineira, which were selling well. In the late ‘70s, Lancia and Autobianchi devised an A112 replacement, the Lambda, that might provide them with a raison d’être in the ‘80s. Alas, big momma Fiat nicked it from under their noses and renamed it Uno, leaving Lancia with a compact car-shaped gap in their production plans.
Even on factory photos, the Autobianchi name was being erased by 1983…
This is why the A112 lasted so long. Lancia and Autobianchi scrambled to get the Y10 to fruition, but in the meantime, the old A112 had to stay on Autobianchi’s assembly lines. Fiat were planning to phase out the Autobianchi name in due course, but took their sweet time doing it. And for whatever reason, they determined that they should start doing it on the sly and in selected markets first. When the 6th series A112 appeared in late 1982, the car became a Lancia in Sweden and Switzerland. By the 7th series (in 1984), only Italy, France, Portugal and Israel still called the A112 an Autobianchi.
Although I captured this 6th series car in France, it is a Swiss model with Geneva plates. This is the Elite version, supposedly the top of the range (alongside the Abarth, of course), with a 950cc engine, a 5-speed gearbox and power windows. Judging by the look of that interior though, I shudder to think what the base-spec A112 must have been like. I realize this is a ‘60s-designed economy car, but that cabin is about as inviting as a contemporary Trabant’s. No wonder Autobianchi was nixed and Lancia are pretty much dead nowadays: the whole purpose of Autobianchi was to provide Fiat with an upmarket alternative. There isn’t much of this primary objective left to be seen in this A112.
Lazy badge-engineering is one of the more dispiriting phenomena of the automotive world. It’s not uncommon, but in the present case, it’s so blatant that one can’t help but shake one’s head and curse. Fiat renamed the car Lancia, but they didn’t even bother putting the right badge on the grille. Come on, ragazzi, it’s not rocket science. You bothered renaming the rear of the car, but you couldn’t screw on a Lancia shield on the front at the same time? Porca miseria!
The A112 went out of production in 1986, after well over 1 million units were made. It was the most successful Autobianchi model by far, but it ended its reign in confusion. Autobianchi should have been put out of their misery there and then, but the badge carried on with the Y10 (in Italy and France) for nebulous reasons. As a car, the A112 was one of the best Mini-fighters ever devised. Peppy, modern, elegant (at least initially) and reasonably reliable, it was still produced for about five years longer than it should have. And the Lancia name should never have come near it.
Related post:
European Vacation CC: 1982 Autobianchi A112 Junior – Rosemma’s Third, by PN
When I was stationed in Sicily in the 70s these were everywhere. It was an unknown brand to me at the time, but my impression was that Autobianci was a sort of aspirational brand…like Pontiac or Oldsmobile were, compared to the more ordinary Chevrolet.
Funny, the lazy rebadge job had me think of my Chevrolet Alero, which has Olds badges everywhere but says ‘Chevrolet’ on the back. Better than later models which had the front rebadged by having a black oval logo (to fit the Olds logo’s place) with a picture of a bow tie.
Actually the grand father of all later created hot-hatches which dominated Europe’s eighties and nineties.
Carlo Abarth saw the thing and realized this could be the Italian answer to the Mini Cooper and S, the Abarth was introduced in 1971.
I had a modified A112 Elegante, with a Weber carburettor from a scrapyard 850 Spider and a different exhaust. I was convinced I “Abarthized ” mine quite good.
Mine was like the yellow car in the picture, an Mk1 so to speak.
Anyway, during a dragrace with a mate in his 6 cylinder Camaro dreamcar (I could never afford), my hometuned A 112 kept up with his Camaro, much to my surprise, however in a small tunnel with a right-left I lifted, the Camaro came dangerously near, it needed the width of the road and all of the drivers skills to keep it under control.
Shortly after this incident he changed the Camaro for an old 911.
These were real sporty lively shopping trollys, an uncle of a girl I knew her grandpa had one, in winter time he drove it with a quilt on his lap to keep warm
I rented an A112 in Eilat, Israel in 1979. Enjoyed driving it down the coast toward the Sinai desert. Great fun and economical too.
Ye forgot Holden, now a dead brand down under and just rebadging cast off SUVs to keep the light on barely.
I thought Holden was still with GM. They sold it to PSA along with Opel?
No, but shut down all Australian manufacturing. So only rebadges remain.
Indeed, England, Germany (via French owners), Korea, Mexico and a little USA. Truly engineered for Aussie conditions, and Aussie-made.*
*badges only. Attached cars may be made overseas and on production lines that may contain traces of nuts.
So what’s with the VW convertible in the last shot? Some sort of faux patina? or?
Very surely faux. This is a faux beetle after all.
Yeah, it’s faux rust. Looked like glued on vinyl, like Importation suggests below. Weird.
That’s some serious rust stain (?) on the New New Beetle.
Very nice “Super Mini” with minimal “tumblehome”
Never understood why some small cars have severe space-rubbing tumblehome.
Yeah I have the New Beetle question too. If I had to guess, I would think it is a faux patina wrap printed on clear vinyl, though why one would do that I don’t know.
Absolutely agree with you re: the Autobianchi/Lancia transition.
I’m a bit confused by the 2nd sentence, or perhaps I’m just ignorant.
I thought DS was a model of Citroen, but it is listed as a separate marque.
DS is like a sub-brand of Citroën. No Citroën badging on them, AFAIK, but based on Citroën models. Has been like this for a few years now, initially with some success, but now not doing so well. Might go the way of LaSalle in short order.
Ah, thank you.
So, the swankier Lancia-fancier was left a hankerer by all that Autobianchi hanky-panky?
No, I think the title of this piece is unlikely to be topped this year. (One can but amatuer about before conceding gentlemanly defeat, what).
Congratulazioni, Signor T.
Part of me wishes production of the A112 was continued up to 2000 (albeit updated) in place of the very mediocre Lancia Y10 or given its related underpinnings with the 127/128 at least was produced as an entry-level Yugo/Zastava (replacing the 600-based Zastava 750) below the 127-based Koral (and 128-based Skala) until late-2008.
The UK certainly missed out on the A112, along with the original Renault Twingo and Peugeot 309 GTi16, etc (plus lemons like the Lada Oka).
I remember seeing a lot of Autobianchi A112s in Israel in 1982, the Lancia rebadge is news to me.
I’d like to see an A112 play up the bicycle connection with a Bianchi Celeste paint job, tricolore stripes and Campagnolo wheels.