Car number six was purchased quite by chance as a cheap car, to have some fun with, to work on and fix up, it was of course a Fiat X1/9 1300 one of the best handling affordable sportscars of its era. This car needed a little more doing to it than I had anticipated having had the usual treatment that sportscars recieve but was never the less great fun to drive. During the time I owned the car I replaced the shock absorbers, head gasket and found that the car was originally metallic bronze and was hiding a lot more rust than its external polish gave away but it still passed its MOT so can't have been that bad.

Its cornering prowess was in those days akin to the likes of Lotus and was the next best thing without having to shell out the money, it was possible to scare many a repmobile pilot with its rock solid grip and pin sharp turn-in, the main thing the car lacked was power, its 0-60 in 13.8 sec and 100 mph top speed (if you were lucky) were rather lack lustre, acceleration was slowed by the presence of a four-speed box that had 3 short ratios and one long so 75mph could be reached by thrashing up through the gears only to grab fourth and virtually grind to a halt (well it felt like that anyway). However, it's Targa-top roof made the car so enjoyable that any dry (or even wet) day could be enjoyed to the full with the top off and wind in the hair, there is nothing like it.

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