An Appia or a Fulvia as an everyday car, advice please.

[the.cern]

I am biding my time and waiting until for a rare combination,

a) available finance AND b) a reasonable chance of not being lynched by Mrs Tait for buying another Lancia.

In the meantime I am trying to prepare ......... the B20 and Gussie are being restored and my everyday transport is a Transit, practical but only in some respects !!!!

The question is, for general use and, say about 5000mls a year, which should I opt for, a Fulvia Berlina or an Appia Berlina ?  or is there something else I should consider ?  I would prefer a pre computer car that is relatively simple to service and carry out simple repairs.

Budget is up to say £8000, I would prefer to spend much less, say £5000, for a car that is ready for use with a good MOT and is sound. Two restoration projects are too much, I MUST NOT add to them !!!!

Any advice would be gratefully received, but probably cannot be acted on immediately.

              Andy

[fay66]

Andy,
 if you can make it to Brooklands for the autoitalia day on the 30th April I'd be happy to let you to have a Drive of my Fulvia 2c Berlina.
At present there is a a very rare Fulvia GT Berlina on ebay, I spoke to the owner the other day and if not sold he maybe bringing it along as well, now that would be a nice buy if it's as nice as the pictures, and my recollections of it 10 years ago.
I suppose Don Cross is as qualified as anyone to answer the question being that he has an Appia Berlina, and a Fulvia Series 2 1300cc Berlina, both of which he uses on a regular basis, and boy doesn't his 1300cc Fulvia go!

Brian
8227

[the.cern]

Brian, thank you for the offer a drive in your S2, I may well take you up on that.

I've had a look at the Fulvia GT on ebay and there seems to be no supporting information which is a little disconcerting. At present there are no bids and 6hrs to go. Unfortunately I'm away for a few days and its not appropriate to bid blind, so, if its not sold, I may well contact the owner upon my return, its about 65mls from here so not that difficult.

Thank you for your help and advice, let's see what develops.

Regards,

             Andy

[lee69]

Buying my 67 Fulvia 2C would leave you with plenty of change to do the work that's needed! It's got the bigger 1300 engine, but with the original 4 speed column change. It also comes with lots of history, back to it's original import into the UK in 1973. Presently, it's mothballed pending the funds to do the work (sills, door bottoms and a few other bits of bodywork). But if anyone fancied taking it on as a relatively easy project I could be parted  

[westernlancia]

I am biding my time and waiting until for a rare combination,
a) available finance AND b) a reasonable chance of not being lynched by Mrs Tait for buying another Lancia.
In the meantime I am trying to prepare ......... the B20 and Gussie are being restored and my everyday transport is a Transit, practical but only in some respects !!!!
The question is, for general use and, say about 5000mls a year, which should I opt for, a Fulvia Berlina or an Appia Berlina ?  or is there something else I should consider ?  I would prefer a pre computer car that is relatively simple to service and carry out simple repairs.
Budget is up to say £8000, I would prefer to spend much less, say £5000, for a car that is ready for use with a good MOT and is sound. Two restoration projects are too much, I MUST NOT add to them !!!!
Any advice would be gratefully received, but probably cannot be acted on immediately.
Andy

My advice would be to use an Appia, but get two - a nice one for summer and a scruffy one for winter!

Appias are great to drive, very simple (simplest Lancia made after the war), go like stink, have those wonderful suicide doors, handle really well, have dual-circuit brakes if you get an S3, the parts are relatively easily available and cheap, and they make very practical daily drivers in mechanical terms, but unless you dismantle the entire car, paint the insides of all the box sections, and then bathe the entire vehicle in waxoyl, it will rot out faster than you can say Jack Robinson if you use it in winter.

The salt gets inside all the box sections, coats the chassis of the car, and then attracts moisture and causes corrosion even when it is not actually wet (because of condensation that forms inside the salty box sections when the temperature changes). If you want to keep a nice car nice, salt is absolutely to be avoided like the plague.

The amount of salt that they slather all over our roads in winter is criminal (and even up to now - the roads are still coated with it, because it was spread several weeks ago but there hasn't been enough rain to wash it away). So if you have a nice one, just make sure that you stop using it between October and April, and switch to what the Americans call a 'beater' for the winter months.

Cheers

Alan

[westernlancia]

the roads are still coated with [salt], because it was spread several weeks ago but there hasn't been enough rain to wash it away

Meant to say - I don't know how well up you are on how to identify if the roads are salty (most people aren't!), but I spend most of my time fixing rust damage that was caused to Lancias because people didn't know how to recognise it! I am going to do a session on preserving cars at the AGM (I have two, one from 1937 and one from 1954, that are almost all original; the 1937 one is almost all perfect too, and neither has been restored, and I have my work cut out if I want to keep them like that!).

So if you want to keep your classic rust-free it is a useful skill! It is often not obvious, especially at times like now when the salt has been there a while and people tend to think it has gone away. But it doesn't go away by itself - the only thing that makes it go away is LOTS of rain.

Here are some things to look for:

a) random 'wet spots' on the pavement or at the sides of the road when it is otherwise dry (these are bits of grit or salt lying uncrushed by car wheels, and attracting moisture from the air)
b) the road looks wet or damp at night even when it hasn't rained for ages (this is the salt attracting mosture from the dew)
c) the main roads are 'wet' and the side roads are dry (this is because there isn't any salt on the side roads and so they don't attract moisture from the dew!)
d) when you begin a journey your tyres look as if they have just been done with rubber dressing (all shiny) - this is because the salt has attracted moisture and it has made a glossy-looking film all over the rubber. As soon as you drive off and the wheels heat up from the brakes, they begin to look all white, which is the dry salt. But as soon as you stop and the dew falls again it all happens all over again, because the moisture in the atmosphere searches out the salt and reconstitutes it (which is why it is so damaging and corrosive - it does this EVERYWHERE on the car, inside and out, underneath and on top).
e) on a damp road, cars make wet tracks instead of dry ones. Usually, when the road is damp, cars going along it tend to make dry tracks, as the heat of the tyres evaporates the moisture. But when there is salt present the opposite happens. The car's wheels crush the salt granules and spread them, and they form a film where the wheel tracks are, and this film attracts moisture. So you tend to get the odd effect of a quite dry road with two wet strips along it, even when there is no water for the cars to spread.

That's what it is like here (Dartmoor) tonight - I just went to Okehampton Services to get a pint of milk, and the road was like it the whole way there (needless to say, I am in a scruffy old Mk 3 Golf rather than a nice classic).

The other way to identify road salt is one I discovered by mistake, many years ago. I had driven my Fiat Uno, which was then nearly new, to Derby, and when I got there I saw that, although it hadn't rained, the car was all wet and white down both sides (this was the salty film that had got thrown up from the road). As I got out I accidentally caught a 'dirty' (which was what I though it was) bit, and then I caught my lip with my finger - and it tasted of pure salt.

I was appalled (I hadn't realised they were even salting!), and ever since then (1985) I have made sure that I know if the road is salty or not. And if it is, I don't go anywhere near it with a nice car if I can help it. And if I absolutely have to, I wash all the salt off very thoroughly afterwards and then dry the car with the compressor.

Cheers

Alan

[will]

An Appia or a Fulvia are really no longer suitable for everyday use in the damp salt coated roads of the UK.
Ideal for the summer months,  I have had an Appia since 1970 and have rebuilt more times than I can remember.
Yes I did go to work in the car but how it suffered. These cars are so rare and very expensive to repair. It would
be unwise to drive it on an every day basic so why destroy our heritage. 

[St Volumex]

Thanks to Alan for that enlightening info on salt.  Now I know what to look for when I come to the UK!

Andy, we have some Appias and a 1.3 S Fulvia coupe 5 spd and we love them, but for very different reasons.

The Appia is made like an old fashioned pocket watch with loads of character, bits of brass, real good quality steel (some of it stainless) and no expense was spared in the thoughtful design and manufacture.  I like to think of it as a mini Aurelia because it's that good!  

But it's a problem driving one in traffic where I've been hooted at by road hogs in Audi Q7's and the like because it doesn't go fast enough by today's standards.

The Fulvia is a delight and still has loads of character but bean counters were beginning to look at the cost of things, and quality declined as a result, especially with the later models which have plastic bits...

I've ridden in Don Cross' and Chris Hopkins' Fulvia Berlinas; they are very practical and really do GO, but up until a month ago my daily driver was a Thema 16v ie Turbo.  This was written off in an accident when a Kia Picanto drove through a red traffic light and hit me.  

Having said that, and if I had a real (sane) choice of a daily driver, I would NOT be driving even a 20 year plus Lancia, because when things break (and they do, remember if it's got four wheels and a skirt...?) it takes too long to get the parts and fix it.  e.g. It once took 3 months for me to get a proper new radiator for my Thema.    It also put a dent in my Lancia soul when my Thema was written off, and driving in traffic - the risks are high.  Where I live, they are ENORMOUS.

My advice is to buy something simple, cheap, reliable, expendable, and even disposable, and I don't think a Lancia fits that bill.  

Kindest regards,
Guy.

[westernlancia]

Thanks to Alan for that enlightening info on salt.  Now I know what to look for when I come to the UK!
The Appia is made like an old fashioned pocket watch with loads of character, bits of brass, real good quality steel (some of it stainless) and no expense was spared in the thoughtful design and manufacture.  I like to think of it as a mini Aurelia because it's that good!  
But it's a problem driving one in traffic where I've been hooted at by road hogs in Audi Q7's and the like because it doesn't go fast enough by today's standards.

Thanks Guy

I've got a thing about rust, and I have been working out how it forms and trying to combat it since I was 10 (I was a very sad school kid!). I remember standing outside Wykeham Motors in Winchester in 1973 when I was 15, looking at a stunning dark blue 130 Coupe and feeling sad because I knew someone would buy it and not look after it and ruin it - even at that age I had worked out where and why our 125 was starting to rust, and how to combat it, and I knew that the owner of the 130 would just use and abuse it. But there was nothing I could do to stop it - it was £8000 and my pocket money was £1 a week - and even my dad's Fiat 125S had only cost £1100!!

You're right about the big bullies in their enormous tanks trying to crowd us off the road, but with petrol at £55 a litre surely their day must be over soon? Although even a 'small' car nowadays is big (you could fit two or three old Fiat 500s into a new one, and the new one weighs almost exactly twice as much as the old one).

But for summer motoring and a fair bit of short-distance daily use an Appia is pretty O.K. - I don't mind going to and from the supermarket in one (and they fit beautifully into the spaces because they are so narrow).

And I will be shot for saying this because it is sacrilege, but I find the construction standards on Appias at least as good as Aurelias - they are so beautifully made and watch-like, and they contain aluminium parts in quite a few places where even Aurelias have chromed steel. My Appia Furgoncino (van) was hand built - they turned them out at the rate of about 1 a day, and it shows everywhere. For a van the construction standards are insane!

But it is a bit scary being on the motorway in one, and the scariest thing is the non-collapsible steering column with the steering box right at the front of the car (more than about 6 inches of rearwards deflection in an impact and the column starts to move backwards towards your chest!). In fact I sold an Appia few years back to a bloke, and when I pointed that out to him it scared him so much that he fitted a custom-made collapsible steering column using the centre section of the column from an old Jaguar!

Cheers

Alan

[westernlancia]

remember if it's got four wheels and a skirt...?

Isn't it four wheels OR a skirt?? Otherwise that restricts you to a fairly small selection of old F1 cars, or some very odd-looking women...

 

[St Volumex]

Alan, I've always liked women who have their OWN wheels, especially Lancias, which is why I love Carol.

Skirts on a woman or an F1 car? I like the (re)movable variety. 

[St Volumex]

You're right about the big bullies in their enormous tanks trying to crowd us off the road, but with petrol at £55 a litre surely their day must be over soon?

Unfortunately these pigs will always have the money for petrol no matter what the cost. It's people like you and me that will be using shank's pony... 

[St Volumex]

And I will be shot for saying this because it is sacrilege, but I find the construction standards on Appias at least as good as Aurelias - they are so beautifully made and watch-like, and they contain aluminium parts in quite a few places where even Aurelias have chromed steel. My Appia Furgoncino (van) was hand built - they turned them out at the rate of about 1 a day, and it shows everywhere. For a van the construction standards are insane!

Alan, it's not sacrilege, it's the truth, and only some poncy toffee nose would want to shoot you because you'd be rocking his self-created imaginary pedestal.  

[the.cern]

Well gentlemen, what a lot of advice, it all started out so positive and then suddenly there was the rust situation and the suggestions that neither would make a suitable everyday car for the whole year, but I do get the feeling there is support for both vehicles for use in the summer months.

I really am so grateful for the advice because I now have something to mull over. I already own a 'beater' (thank you Alan for introducing me to that term), my late mother's 1992 Citroen ZX, one owner, 34000 miles,  on a SORN for 3yrs, time to get that up and running and then a ......... ?

I am tending towards an Appia, but can't really identify why, we will see.

Thank you again for the advice and comments, time will tell !!

                     Andy

[DavidLaver]

I tend towards Appias as they remind me so much of Aurelias.  With average speeds, even on motorways, declining year on year the lack of power is less and less of an issue.  With petrol prices as they are there's a strong case to present indoors alongside the lack of depreciation and simplicity.  It would also be an absolute pleasure to work on when it needed it.  Rust is an issue, but if you really went to town with the wax and underseal and kept on top of it?

The other one to ponder is a Flavia Berlina for that bit of extra space for people and luggage as much as for the bigger engine over an Appia or Fulvia.

...and what about a Gamma Coupe?  There's plenty of help out there to keep one going, and bags of character.

David