500 Meet Gina

Gina recently joined us, a special edition Spiaggina ´58 in volare blue



She is a 1.2 8V with most extras and some special trim included (sadly not the Xenon headlights).

Early Mods:
Nice leather seats were added instead of the original grey/beige cloth





Moon caps to give it that "classic" touch (and to hide the ugly steel rims for the winter tires). For the summer in case we get one, it has the original Fiat "retro" rims

Space saver wheel and tool inlay came from a Punto for small money via ebay



And, since the wife did not want anything with a plug for Christmas, she got the extra classic touch for the dash

Those wheels suit the car very well.

I must say I really like the retro look. Looks clean and crisp. Well done

Thanks for the positive feedback.
Here now with the summer wheels - finally the winter seems to be over

Looking very nice. Such the classic look. All blends very well.

Gina got a boot rack recently. Made of stainless steel, it adds to the classic look. Not that it will be used much in winter, but it will definitely not rust



It does also come handy as a handle to close the boot lid, which wasn´t all that easy with the normal chrome handle.

As the damper is at its limits already with the lid alone, I fitted a second one on the left side. The holes are already there, all it needs is the ball joints (the holes will take M6 or -barely- M8) and a second damper. That brings the lid with the rack up very well and probably has some reserves for a lightly loaded rack. I assume it is better for the joints anyway if the lid is lifted symmetrically.



One thing to note: With the normal dampers, the upper bar of the rack presses onto the roof just above the bottom edge when open, means the boot opens slightly too far. To correct that, I fitted a shorter damper (normal one is 288mm fully extended, new one is 270mm). That holds it away from the roof. Downside is the lid angle is now good for short people, not so good for taller ones. (We´re both on the shorter end, fortunately ).
A damper with 275 to 280 mm would probably be the best choice to stop it "just barely" before the bar touches the roof. It´s a bit difficult to find exactly what you want, since dampers are usually sold by car model and technical parameters are not always given. The standard one for the 500C is 288mm and 370 N.

ok, turned out the Mrs didn´t like the limited opening angle. I knew I shouldn´t have gone for those long legs when I was out proposing.....
Anyway, I extended the new damper slightly (probably + 8mm), which brings the opening angle up quite bit and still keeps the bar off the roof.



So the final recommendation is a 280mm damper, a possible option is the boot damper for the Alfa 166 which has 280mm and 390N