CarBrandLogos archive · Abarth · 1976

AbarthFiat 131 Abarth

A three-box family saloon that won three world rally titles.

Photo: davocano · CC BY 2.0

The story

A defining chapter in Abarth history.

Explore the ideas, engineering and context that shaped the Abarth Fiat 131 Abarth, then continue into its specifications and place in the marque's lineage.

Origins

The Fiat 131 arrived in 1974 as the plainest kind of product: a three-box family car to replace the 124, sold as a saloon, an estate and a van, with engines from 1.3 to 2.0 litres and a life that ran to 1984 in Italy and far longer at Tofas in Turkey. Nothing about it suggested a rally car.

Dashboard Fiat 131 1st series · No machine-readable author provided. Tasma3197 assumed (based on copyright claims). · CC BY-SA 3.0

Design and engineering

Fiat's motorsport politics supplied the rest. The group already had the Lancia Stratos, a mid-engined machine with a Ferrari V6 that won everything and sold nobody a Fiat. Management wanted titles won by something a customer could recognise in a showroom, so Abarth was told to turn the 131 into a competition car. The homologation version kept the silhouette and threw away almost everything else: independent rear suspension in place of the live axle, a 16-valve twin-cam with fuel injection, lightweight panels and plastic arches, with Bertone assembling the run of road cars the rules demanded.

Dashboard Fiat 131 2nd series · No machine-readable author provided. Tasma3197 assumed (based on copyright claims). · CC BY-SA 3.0

In production

It worked. The 131 Abarth took the World Rally Championship manufacturers' title in 1977, 1978 and 1980, and Walter Rohrl won the drivers' championship with one in 1980, with Markku Alen among the drivers who made it quick on everything from Portuguese gravel to Finnish crests.

Fiat 131S 1600 Mirafiori Jasło · Pitak · CC BY-SA 3.0

Legacy

Ordinary 131s carried none of that. Most were used up as taxis, driving-school cars and family transport before rust finished them, and the Regata replaced the range in 1983. But the Abarth cars gave Fiat the rare thing a mass-market saloon almost never gets: a competition record its rivals could not match.

At a glance

The facts that define it.

Produced

1974–1984

Engine

Petrol engine

Body

4-door Saloon car

Technical specification

The Fiat 131 Abarth, in detail.

Production: 1974–1984; 1977–2010 (Tofaş)
Class: Family car
Body style: 4-door Saloon car; saloon; 2-door Saloon car; saloon; 5-door Station wagon; estate; 3-door panel van
Layout: Front-engine, rear-wheel-drive
Engine: Petrol engine; petrol: ; 1.3 L Straight-four engine; I4 ; 1.4 L I4 ; 1.6 L I4 ; 1.8 L I4 ; 2.0 L Fiat Twin Cam engine; Fiat Twin Cam I4 ; 2.0 L Fiat Twin Cam engine; Fiat Twin Cam Supercharg
Transmission: 4-speed Manual transmission; manual; 5-speed Manual transmission; manual; 3-speed Automatic transmission; automatic
Assembly: Italy: Fiat Mirafiori; Comprensorio di Mirafiori, Turin; Colombia: Bogotá (Compañía Colombiana Automotriz; CCA); Indonesia: Jakarta; Morocco: Casablanca (SOMACA); Poland: Warsaw (Fabryka Samochodów Osobowych; FSO); Spain
Manufacturer: Fiat