Hi All,
Well Up until a few months back I had owned a 2001 Chrysler PT Cruiser which I had spent too much money on customizing it! Anyway my wife and I decided that we had had our fun with the PT (more me than her!...LOL) and it was time to move onto something else...Neither of us wanted just a standard type car, I had mentioned that I wouldn't mind getting a more 'classic age' car that we both could enjoy driving and having some days out in it just the two of us. I happened to be watching TV one afternoon, when it was suggested that a good entry level classic car was a Fiat 124 Spider. My wife didn't mind the Spider, but was not wrapped in having a car with a soft top. I then came across the X1/9, I loved the styling straight away, I did some reading and realised how much fun they were to drive. I mentioned it to my wife and she also liked the look of the X1/9 and also that it had a 'hard' top which was still removable.
We were fortunate to find a 1979 X1/9 1300cc 4 speed which was owned by an elderly man who was very sad to see the car leave his driveway. It's a great car that we both enjoy driving, As my wife said "Everyone who drives the X1/9 gets a big smile on their face" and I reckon that is so true.

I'm guessing I bought mine in a moment of insanity, probably not the brightest choice for a first car but I love it

My exxey ownership started nearly 10 months ago. I was forced into buying a car, my allegiance has always stood with italian and British scooters. The story begins last june.... I was riding my vespa px200 when a bit of a kid in daddy's subaru overtook me at speed, clipped the kerb then flipped on its roof. All this happened 3 feet away from my front wheel. All in all i broke my arm, did lots of damage to the left hand side of my body and doctors orders i couldn't ride a scooter for 12 months after 3 days in hospital i arrived home unable to play guitar or anything i decided it was now the time to look for a mechanical quadruped steed. Being British an in the scooter scene i was drawn towards the the iconic Mini. Easy machanicals, cheap to insure etc etc but £1200 buys you a lot of rusty A-panels. THEN THE DAY OF CHANGE CAME... I remember it well... the whistle of the postwoman... the clunk of the letter box... the thud as the magazine hit the floor and then my frantic run downstairs to get to this months practical classics before my fiance's big black dog gets to it. I then started a quick flick through when i came across a piece about 'bertone style cars through the 70's and 80's.' I looked at the pictures, read the write up about how good the x1 9 was and thought 'mmmm...a scooter with 4 wheels.' the research began...

For 3 weeks i refined my buying techniques, realised that i can buy a lot less rust with £1200 and that the insurance was £250 cheaper than a mini. Then i found her... 30,000 miles from new, solid body, £3000 worth of bills replacing bushes, gaitors and other perishables and the car had covered 50 miles in 5 years where she slept in a heated garage, red with cream interior and it was about 30 miles from my home (it was in st helens nr. blackpool) but the major issue still still loomed... i had to persuade my loverly missus. We drove up to look at it, took it for a test drive (sunny day... roof off thank god) apart from the brakes being crap (because they were unservoed) she concieded at trusted me 1 week later me and my brother (he was driving as i was still in cast) were roaring down the M6 at 110mph bringing her home. It was on the way home that the first problem emerged... while driving towards the blackburn roundabout of the A59 my brother told me to be careful in the wet. 'Why?' i ask, he then put his foot down and doughnutted the roundabout TWICE! with my missus watching/ laughing in the car she drove us up in. The problem is that i now must try and kick the arse out on every roundabout... its going to cost me a fortune in rubber.... :devil:

The first time I saw this car, I was 14. I spazzed out and turned my head farther than an owl just to keep looking at it. I liked the size and shape of it and started looking at triumphs and other things like it. I nearly forgot about it and started playing Forza Motorsport 2 for the Xbox 360 and would play with Ferraris and other mid-engined cars, and after realising that mid-engine was the way to go, I found that I liked the Lancia Stratos for a while(I liked the way it handled as a drift car because YOU had to MAKE it drift, but the second you wanted it to stop, it simply would and do what you told it to. Around when I turned 16, a guy moved into a rental house down the street and had an X1/9 1300 in red and I bugged him about it but he simply wouldn't even THINK of selling it, and that made me more determined to have one, so I started looking them up and didn't get a whole lot, just pocket bikes, (this was last August(2011)) and now when I look them up, I find quite a bit. Anyway, I looked and I found a 1982 Fiat X1/9 1500 VS on Craigslist for $1500 and ended up talking the man down to $1300 and bugged my dad about it for a while and he bought it for me without me knowing but kept it in his garage until Christmas and gave it to me then. I nearly cried. I originally intended on putting a 5 cylinder turbo from a Marea in it, then decided that'd be too hard and after a little bit decided that a K20 Honda V-tech but when I got the car home I noticed that on the dash it said Nuccio Bertone 155/500 and after about a month of searching, I realised that I STOLE the car for $1300. It was already a rare car but now it's a rare car that's part of a series of 500 Fiat to Bertone transition cars and was one of the first cars to be sold under Bertone. I'm going to restore this one to the original factory condition. I may eventually buy another X to play with or go with a Mazda mx5 or some older roadster. I thought I might add that I STILL don't have a license and I don't care. I'm glad I got the car before I got the license.

Well with me i actualy stumbled across my first x1/9 by sheer luck, i had read about it on the net but id never had been lucky enough to see one, so one day i decided to service my uno pacer, then i forgot to refit the sump drain plug, i put in some oil the i started the engine then the engine got damaged so i decided to buy a new engine altogether, i put an advert in the wantd section and someone told me they were selling a complete engine for a fiat. I got to his place and to my surprise there she was, my beautiful xxy. He was actualy tryng to remove and sell me the x1/9 engine so I ended up buying the whole car for a song and I don't regret buying it at all, its my little ferrari

I used to do a paper-round as a boy in Coventry circa 1979 and used to walk past an Ice Blue 1500. I spent more time looking at that car parked in the road in the light of dawn than it took me to deliver the round. Being Italian, that wedge-shape, Pop-up headlights, exotic sounding name like Bertone I thought it was fantastic. This was the era of futuristic 70's wedge exotics and prototypes (and Top Trump Cards!) and I just thought it looked like a mini-supercar...... Still loving them 30+ years on....

I do recall the very first X I went to look at to consider buying.......a Green 1300 Serie Speciale (like I have now!) - it was at the rear of a shop abandoned on waste land. The car actually had grass growing through the floor where the floorpan had rotted through. Looking back X1/9's only came into the UK in 1978 and this must have been no later than 1984!

Radbourne Racing were bringing X1/9s into the country long before Fiat actually started selling them here - they did very well out of it, even to the point of running an X1/9 race car purchased from Dallara as part of the publicity.

My dad owned a string of Fiats in the seventies, 850, 128 Sport & 124 Sport Coupe. This meant regular visits to the Fiat dealer, I always went with him and would pick up an X1/9 brochure and and pin the pictures to my bedroom wall. Then a neighbour sold his Alfetta and bought a new 1300 Lido and that was it, the X1/9 was imprinted in my memory. In 1998 I finally bought my Gran Finale and have owned it for 14 years now. Can't see me selling it, its become part of the family after all these years.

Aware of that Jim but that car was definately an official UK Serie Speciale as it had the deckchair seats. Amazing decay in such a short space of time...... and not in a good way!

Gonna bring this thread back to life, I like zombies.

My first X1/9 was because I wanted something with a bit more power than the 850 spider I had at the time. My second X1/9 was because one wasn't enough and those 1300's had such a nice look. 20 years later, I bought my third because when I moved to England my thought was, damn these roads would be awesome with an X1/9.

My first x19 WAC 480S. Was a bright red 1300.
It cost me £600 and another £600 to Insure.
I loved it, so much better than the mini & beetle I'd had before.
Unfortunately it failed its first MOT with me very badly and I swapped it for a scooter!!
I bought it because it looked like it cost £6k.... And I loved posing in it as I drove up and down Blackpool promenade in the summer.
Since then I've had 8 others, but none since 2005. I'd love to find a rust free example!
Typically now I can afford a good one, there aren't any left.

Well I've always been a Nissan/ Datsun guy, having owned several Z-cars (including two currently), but a couple years ago I was looking in the classified for a used pick-up, and just happened to notice an ad for an '84 Bertone with just 15,600 miles.

I wasn't real familiar with the cars but the fact that it was mid-engine and Italian, appealed to me, so I went and had a look. This elderly guy had it, and he had health problems including a bad back, and simply never drove it anymore. I took it for a couple test drives and really enjoyed it.....but it took me three months to finally make up my mind to make the purchase....I was just uncertain about Fiat, having heard some horror stories.

Well that was back in October, 2011 and I still have it and love it! I don't know if I'll be able to ever part with this car, just too much fun! She now has 18,600 miles.....and I've not had one single problem with it. Now, its hard to believe I took that much time to make the decision to buy it....

PASSION... Like all here posted, I love the X dearly.. Myself, first carwanted was a Datsun 240Z, my dad couldn't find one but came home one day fromwork saying he had a line on a 1973 Celica. (my first car), I had theCarlesburg Beer Sponsored toy X19 and boat w/trailer. It was a dream toy and Ioften wondered as a child if this car actually existed.

I saw my first one in 2005. A bodyshop given it to me if I could get ithome. I learned really fast how the FI system worked. Under two weeks oftinkering, I drove it home. This X19 had perfect trim pieces and 70k on theodometer.

In 2010 I bought my second one for $750.. drove it home, has a perfect bodysince it was "amature Rallied" and abandoned for 5 years in a fieldFULL of mud dried in our arid Alberta climate. The guy I purchased it from wasa BMW 2002 fan and didn't have time for this car. The mud preserved the body.Only 70k on this one too!

In 2013 I bought my third one for $525.. USA spec w/ AC and RARE 'Fiat' (notBertone) power windows. Towed it home for parts. It has 100000 miles... but agood body to make a Dallara replica.

Only driven this car twice in the 8 years of owing a X19. I'm 60% completeon my full resto... I love this car (brings tears to my eyes) ... I cannot waitto share it with all. It is the second lowest production year, 1981 1500 FI, w/power windows. Additional accesories include the 1984 Bell remote radardetector, 1982 Classic Alpine cassette sterio w/ vintage Alpha sonic Amp andsmall Alpine Amp.. w/ 6" sub. My goal is to produce a complete stk 1981X19 to better than the factory had put together.

The HISTORY! Malcom Bricklin was the importer to North America for the X19.John DeLoren's first test prototype was the X19. The X19 spent the most time ona race track than any other production model to date.. due to the track on theTurin Factory. When imported to North America in 1972 it shared the best crashtest ratings next to Volvo.... so much that the Americans had to lax theirlaws, they couldn't produce to the new USA crash standards. ALCAN, a CanadianAluminum company produced 3 unibodies.. promotional, they had two beautifulladies (in the day) holding the body off the ground. Mr Agnelli (Head of Fiat)parked the limo and drove the X19 religiously because of the way it handled.And of course "DALLARA" and "ABARTH" made this car reallyfast and adorble. The X19 was one of the first 'tuner' vehicles next to theDatsun 240Z. The X19 was the best handling sports cars well into the 1980's...even beating up Ferrari's and Lambos on the salom course. The 'DARDO' is aproduction replica for Brazilian market.. (a cousin of the X)... not to mentionthe other cousins... Ferrari 308.. Lamborgini Countach (same designer).. LanciaStratos. The X19 shares some parts with some of these exotics!
In closing, the X19 is versatile, can be veryfast, and gets the most looks of any true sports car. Definitely a chickmagnet!