mx5cartalk.com

OMG the exhaust is to die for.
Riley and I were out for a spin when Riley spotted a red and black Abarth in a house driveway. A knock on the door and the custodian was a local dealer who showed us over her.
Didn't get a drive but had an invite to come back for a test drive when he could organise insurance.
The exhaust is awesome and these are fully loaded with goodies. Optioned, this one was going for A$45K. Forgot to take a pic.
At least hear one before you die.

Went and had a look at one of these in the lot at Moorooka Fiat.

Fiat have done a pretty impressive job making it look completely different to the MX-5. It's visually flatter and wider, with the collection of original Fiat 124 Spyder cues (twin bulged bonnet, squared off rear tail lights) also bringing to mind the Chrysler Crossfire (bonnet) and Maserati GT (rear end treatment and proportions). It's actually a pretty good looking car....except...

The giveaway to the donor car is the short cockpit, and it makes the proportions of the car weird when the angle of approach includes a significant view of the cockpit. This was with the roof up, but I suspect the effect will be worse the roof down, which is when I'd noticed in photos that they hadn't been fully successful in styling around it.

Still, kudos to Fiat for managing to make the 124 look so different (well, not the interior, obviously) when essentially they're contributing an engine and some Fiat badges to the process. If it's provided enough volume to make the platform viable, so be it.

Given the curiousities arising from performance testing, I do wonder if as part of the agreement Fiat's had to ensure the 124 doesn't outperform the 2.0 GT model of the MX-5. Be interesting to see what the aftermarket manages.

There was one of these things down at Phillip Island track on the weekend. (just visiting, it didn't run on the track)

IMHO, The looks of the ND when it was released wasn't quite right, with funny looking little headlights and taillights, that didn't match the rest of the car. Having now seen them in the flesh it looks much better than the pictures did. (and will probably be my next mx5)

OTOH, again IMHO, the Fiat 124 was dog ugly in photos prior to release, (looked like something Dodge would design in the 1990's) and now having seen it in the flesh, I can only say the pictures were flattering.
Add to that the fact that the car is slower than the ND (despite turbo power, with more kw and 25% more torque) and requires extra coin to buy, makes a hard case to buy one over an ND.