General Panda-monium!

[Dark_Crusader]

Hi Guys

Joined FF just recently, have seen that some of you here are still quite fanatical about the Panda classic as you call it here.
I used to own a '89 Panda 1000 F.I.R.E in fire engine red right up till 2001 when it started to let me down :bang: I did own that car for 10 years and it more or less did me proud at the time. Anyways one of the reasons for posting the pics was to show you what my motor looked like as I had modified the wheels for alloys which was risque and recieved mixed reactions at the time because it's bigger brother Uno was the modifiers choice so why would you stick nice alloys on a Panda when only Pug 205's,Ecorts, Fiesta's and Golf's were the main modifiers choice at the time?....

Why the hell not? I thought, So I did, and general feedback at the time ('93) was good because there was nothing like it to my knowledge at the time.

Since there were virtually no mods or a decent body kit for Panda I left it at the wheels. However around late 90's SEAT motor company produced a concept version of their FAKE PANDA the Marbella with 'Porsche technology' :yuck:

They cut the back half of the Panda's shell but retained the back seats and the hatch had been replaced by a tailgate door with spare tyre attatched and roll bar attatched on the back half of the vehicle where the roof mian beam used to sit (very much in the Suzuki mk1 Jeep style).
You would think that this would destroy the image of their fake Panda, but with the colour coded alloy wheels, side skirts they designed and the sports style deep rounded colour coded bumbers that you would have found on the 16v Fiesta's of that era coloured in an eye blistering yellow, you know what....

It was f***in cool! :slayer:

If I find the picture of this concept Marbella I will post it on this forum, and believe me it would defintately make you think about the possibilities. I think Fiat lost out to SEAT on that one and could have really reaped some profits if they took that concept further and produced a road going version!

Sadly the vehicle nor that body kit were made available, but all in all I don't think my tough lookin little Panda looked bad without the kit anyway?

What do you current classic owners think? Let me know!


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[BenW]

I quite like it, nice wheels. What size are they?

For the non technical minded people, you need to download the zip, extract the panda-monium file and add a .jpg on the end of the file name before you can view it

 

[default_user]

Piccies:

 

[default_user]

Mods:

Sorry, I've only just figured out how to get the thumbnail thingy to work! Please delete my previous post.

Cheers,

Rick

 

[Alan.D]

Nice looking panda & welcome to the site.

 

[Dark_Crusader]

Hey guys, thanks for the feedback and comments. I apologise for giving you guys such a headache with the Jpegs! This was the only way I could get it to post without an 'invalid file' coming up for the past FOUR DAYS and the formats are Jpeg? :bang:

In answer to that question about the wheel size I think they were 6x14's made by Smith Wheels, costing back in '93 with 165/65 r14 Hankook tyres £336-.Although later I had to come down a size as the back tyres kept rubbing on the inside of the arch if I ever had passengers . I cant imagine what it would cost to buy now?
Also I could not afford it at the time but Prism Motorsport who used to be basd in Edmonton were willing to do me a customised exhaust system for the Panda but I think you would then loose the cat if I had decided to let them go ahead as the standard fiat pipe could not seem to handle the high temparature that the car dished out. I think i must have gone through 4 exhaust front down pipe because of splitting in the forked section of the exhaust.

Anyways like I mentioned if I find those pics of SEAT's 'fake Panda' I will post them.If any of you have got an easier technique then please let me know as zips seem to be the only method that works from my mac running Os9 (yes I know pretty old).

Hope you enjoyed the pics, seeeing some of your threads brought back some fond memories!

 

[JimMagill]

Yes, we enjoyed the pics... Do you know where it is now?

(BTW, welcome to the panda part of the forum!)

Jim

 

[Tony M]

Hey guys, thanks for the feedback and comments. I apologise for giving you guys such a headache with the Jpegs! This was the only way I could get it to post without an 'invalid file' coming up for the past FOUR DAYS and the formats are Jpeg? :bang:

try taking the 'e' out and making it a small 'j'
otherwise make sure they are 'rgb' not 'cmyk' format
and you aren't facing north...

image formats are older than OS9, so shouldn't be a hinderence

 

[Dark_Crusader]

Thanks for the advice Tony M. Also in answer to Jims question as to the where abouts, I owned the vehicle up to 2001 when I traded for a '99 Punto.
It then got sold on by Perry's car pavillion to auction, someone bought it in South London Southwark area I believe did NOT register it, drove it round for a month accumilated a few parking tickets which DVLA tried to send to me but I got out of it . Then they promptly dumped the Panda on the way to Cambridge . Cambridge City council were the ones who let me know about it's whereabouts, but I did not want to stomach seeing what state my old Panda had been left in. So for all I know now it could have been disposed of and made into anything from a galvaised bucket to a tin of soup by now .
However if you see a Panda with the reg F137OLP, then that was my old motor. I am quite sure it's gone to that great Fiat scrapyard in the sky, but if you have seen it somwhere recently let me know!

 

[panda nutter]

F137OLP ran out of tax on - 28 02 2001 according to the DVLA

 

[posh pandas]

hi 'dark crusader' ,
great seeing your piccies - love those wheels
dont you feel tempted to return to the wonderfull world of pandaring ?!
gina XXX

 

[pandamonius_maximus]

I think your panda looked awesome! Love those wheels Shame you sold it, you've gotta get another now.
Ive just got some new wheels for mine now, nothing fancy and i have no pics of them on yet as one of the alloys is a bit corroded so goes down very quickly
I will post pics up asap. Nothing compared to those beauties tho. but they'll do
Cheers
Si

 

[Dark_Crusader]

Wow again thanks for the feedback. Panda Nutter, don't quite know how you got that info but at least I know now . Gina, it is very tempting to get back in the saddle again, but I am having too much fun with the HGT I got this year! . However it's nice to know I was not the only one who has done it. I came across this website whilst looking for the other bit I had mentioned in my blurb: www.fiatpandaclub.nl . Click on the little green Panda icon near the top and you see some pics (only two) of some other alloy wheeled Pandas if you want further ideas for modifications and prior to opening the page a list of other websites for enthusiasts round the world!.
Any other interesting bits I will post here. Keep up the Panda-monium guys and Si I look forward to seeing those pics when you're done!

 

[petebarchetta]

HGT in a panda:idea:
now wheres my angle grinder

 

[Dark_Crusader]

Mmmmm a HGT in a Panda Petebarchetta?:devil: Wouldn't that take to you the dizzy heights of Mach 1 if you did?, would be great for showing company car beemers a thing or three , but ultimately you'd end up as pizza on some bit of motorway wall somewhere!

....So I think I'll pass thanks.

Speaking of which.....

Found this on Cardomain.com, some guy in Malta wants to turn his car into some mad road-chomping beast. Makes my old motor look like a ***** cat till I realised that he had done this on PHOTOSHOP. He says he wants to save up for the project and he has a bog standard super 1000 @ the mo but the pic represents what he would like it to look like after he has finished.
Not a bad effort, car looks like it is a wee bit too low. If that Panda was on UK soil it's belly would be getting kissed by a lot of speed bumps me thinks!
Would be interesting to see the end result!

 

[pandamonius_maximus]

Hmmm, could be interesting lol. He had better do stuff to the engine, unlike pimp my ride UK where they did a 750 lol. I think that plan has been on the net for a while. i spotted those pics about 1-2 years ago im sure. So dont know how serious that guy is.

I will be doing the panda HGT conversion in the next 10 years, or something like it. but first i get my engineering degree sorted and get myself a good job and a place with a garage I do have the number plate C***HGT that'll go on it nicely MWahahahahahaaaaaa

Cheers
Si

 

[Dark_Crusader]

You guys , I can see it in your eyes...yes hungry for power, Panda POWER!!:devil: :slayer: .....

and mechanical mad super-villan laughs

Will send more bits under this heading as I find them!
btw
What do we think of the new Fiat Panda sports version with 0-62 in 20secs (somethin that small should be quicker than that surely?).

Also I missed that particular Pimp my Ride U.K, (maybe because I did not have sky or a digibox). Was it any good or pile of Poo? Be gentle now....

 

[pandamonius_maximus]

Well it was quite cool, but as you may expect impractical. It saved a very much dying panda anyway. So cant complain. you can watch them online i think at mtv.com/pimpmyride i think it is. if not google it! its in series 1. i'll have a look now!

 

[pandamonius_maximus]

You can download it here, couldnt find a streamed version

http://www.snarf-it.org/viewTorrent/676070-Pimp+My+ride+UK+s1e1-6.html

 

[Dark_Crusader]

Great,thanks for the info on the expo!:worship: