Honestly, I shed a Tear when I saw this!

[churp]

Originally Posted by Pavel Olavich

Then how come they left the US market? How come they NEVER made a profit here in the US? How come the Japanese succeeded here? How come while they were in the US market, ConsumerReports and many other car magazines found them to be shit? Oh wait! Maybe it was a conspiracy!

Hello?!?

Personally I would say the roadsters, 124 sport coupe, and X19 of the 60's thru early 80's were the best of their class for the times. The US had nothing to compete with them and the Triumphs and MG's were dying antiques. The US government was starting to dictate emission and safety standards which the 'world' car companies, which had a very small percentage of their market with the US, felt weren't worth their trouble to change for such a small market. Fiat was one of the worlds leaders for cars and trucks at that time. Look back at the US autos at that time and you will see a very dark period for them also....terrible gas milage, 85 mph top mandated speedometers, and I almost wouldn't consider the Vette a performance car during that period.....all because of government mandates. The Japanese started taking over at that time and there probably wouldn't be a US manufacturer left if Japan would have opened factories here in the 70's.

Way to much history to look at for that time to say Fiat pulled out due to lack of sales because of reliability. The government with the aid of our US carmakers did it....the then big 3 publicly whined, but they we niaeve enough to think they would get rid of their competition, but Japan proved them wrong.