I haven't trusted my 1995 Fiat Coupé 16v for nearly a year. After an hour behind the wheel over the weekend, I'm beginning to think I was wrong.
The rot – never a great word to use in the context of a Fiat – set in on the way back from a photoshoot in October 2025. Photographer and great bloke Simon Thompson requested – nay, demanded – that I drive it to our rendezvous in Oxfordshire, where he was shooting a Mitsubishi Celeste for Classic.Retro.Modern. magazine.
It was shaping up to be one of those drives. Instead, I was just a few miles from home when the Fiat developed what can only be described as a hissy fit. Erratic revs, several warning lights on the dashboard and an increasing sense that I might not make it home.
It did, but only by restarting the engine whenever the revs dropped. After that, the running problems became sufficiently irritating that I stopped wanting to take it anywhere important. Meanwhile, pressures beyond the car world meant that it, along with the rest of the fleet, was mothballed until the new year.
Eventually, my relationship with the Fiat descended into driving it around the block and filling it with fuel via a jerry can, rather than risk turning it off at pump 10.
There's something uniquely joyless about driving a car you don't trust and are frightened to switch off, so time passed. And passed.
Meanwhile, the MOT expiry date at the end of September was getting steadily closer – a problem I was addressing by not thinking about it.
Under normal circumstances, this would probably have triggered the traditional Petrolblog pre-MOT ritual: several weeks of procrastination, a sudden burst of concern about things I'd previously chosen not to notice, followed by some frantic preparation shortly before the test.
Instead, an opportunity presented itself.
Friend and A-Z of Petrolblog partner Matt had booked his 406 Coupé in for an MOT at 9am, only for the garage doing some work on it beforehand to let him down at the last minute. Suddenly there was an empty MOT slot, and Matt knew of a Bangle-designed shape that could fill it.
There was no time for weeks of planning. We simply fitted a new set of spark plugs and leads in the hope that they might cure the running issue, then set off for an exploratory MOT, more in hope than expectation. Heck, I didn't even crawl beneath it, which, after last year's adventures with the welder, felt like something of a gamble.
The first sign that things might not go entirely smoothly came when the MOT tester emerged from the garage.
She saw the Fiat.
Stopped in her tracks.
And let out an audible “Ugh” as her shoulders visibly slumped.
Then she carried on walking.
I'm not sure this is included in the official DVSA testing procedure, but it didn't exactly fill me with confidence.
Still, by 10am the Fiat Coupé had a fresh MOT.
And a clean one at that. I expected to be travelling home either by bus or armed with a long list of advisories. But no, it was much better than that. And the tester was smiling when she handed me the certificate. Forget the Lynx effect...
Better still, at least for now, the plugs and leads appear to have sorted the running problem, although a dim battery light on the dashboard suggests that a new aux belt might need to go on the shopping list. The battery and alternator are fine, so that's good.
Of course, a clean MOT is no guarantee of mechanical reliability. But the last-minute test was the nudge I needed to stop avoiding the car, sort the running issue and actually start driving it again.
So a car I'd spent the best part of year worrying that it was going to leave me stranded at the side of the road, probably in the dark or the rain – most probably both – sailed through an MOT with next-to-no preparation. I should have had more faith.
Admittedly, writing that sentence about a 1990s Fiat feels like tempting fate on an industrial scale, but after an hour or so behind the wheel on Saturday, my confidence in the Coupé is definitely returning. Still, I reserve the right to delete this paragraph when the Coupé throws its next hissy fit.
In the meantime, I'm determined to drive it as much as possible, because as I've said in a previous post, few cars have got under my skin quite as quickly as this one. I adore it.
After spending the best part of a year finding reasons not to drive it, I think I've got some catching up to do.
