FIAT

Fiat 500 Hybrid test

What happened instead was an utter collapse in sales, as buyers defected to petrol alternatives such as the Kia Picanto or something larger.

That forced the Mirafiori plant – Fiat’s crown jewel, in its home town of Turin – to idle for months, building precisely zero cars and furloughing workers while dealers cleared their surplus of 500es.

With the power of hindsight, Fiat Europe boss Gaetano Thorel calls the electric-only move “suicide”.

To right the ship, Fiat opted to perform the unprecedented and convert a bespoke EV to ICE power. That meant both 500 variants could be built on the same production line, giving Mirafiori the shot in the arm it desperately needed.

Twenty months after making that bold decision, Fiat’s efforts have borne fruit.

The conversion required the near-total redevelopment of the 500e: new subframes are located at the front and rear ends to accommodate a petrol engine and six-speed manual gearbox, and a fuel tank has been subbed in for the EV’s traction battery.

Even with the 500e’s diminutive motor removed, space under the bonnet was severely limited. The 1.2-litre Puretech petrol engine deployed in a range of Stellantis models, including the larger Fiat Grande Panda, simply wouldn’t have fit. Developing something bespoke would have been too costly.

That left the naturally aspirated 1.0-litre three-cylinder used by the previous 500 Hybrid and updated for the Italian-market Panda in 2024 as the only option. This includes a 12V starter-generator hybrid system, and puts out a total of 64bhp and 68lb ft.

Inside, there’s a revised dashboard to accommodate a gearlever, mounted high as in the previous 500.

Otherwise, the 500 Hybrid looks almost identical to the EV, with its front end only gaining a 'moustache' grille to provide sufficient cooling to the engine and its gubbins.

On first impression, the 500 Hybrid feels surprisingly complete for something rushed into production as a sticking plaster for its maker’s misfortunes.

It’s a mature, easygoing product that will carry much appeal for the legions of buyers who wanted a new 500 but couldn’t put up with the compromises required to live with such a short-ranged EV.

That could well prove to be what Fiat needs on its road to recovery. Whether that will be enough for this new car to match the lofty sales of its predecessors remains to be seen.

The Kia Picanto and Toyota Aygo X are perhaps more rational alternatives, and although this new 500 is certainly more fashionable than those cars, I'm not convinced it appeals to the heart quite as much as previous iterations.

Given that Fiat thinks this car will sell on charm alone, that could prove a challenge. Let battle commence.

Autonews