SOLD

It was the end of the 70’s when Fiat launched the Ritmo, a Bertone designed hatchback. A car with some interesting design developments being one of the first cars fully assembled by robots which was the beginning of a new era in the automotive industry.

As with the majority of the hatchbacks on the market those days, a sport version was also developed by Fiat through the Abarth division which was part of Fiat since 1971. With a long history of race and rally successes you knew a car prepared by Abarth was something special. That’s also is the case for the Ritmo.

In 1981 the first Ritmo Abarth was launched, the 105 TC which used the 1.585cc engine with 105 Bhp from the 130 series. A bit later the 125 TC was introduced with the 1.995cc engine which reached up to 125Bhp and had several improvements over the 105 TC. It was with the 2nd series Ritmo in 1982 when the Abarth 130 TC was introduced. Beside some exterior and interior changes the engine was the biggest change. Although based on the 125 TC it replaced the single Weber carb with either twin Solex ADDHE or Weber DCOR40 carbs and further improvements were made to the manifold and camshafts resulting in 130 Bhp/ 175 Nm and 0-100 under the 8 seconds. Serious numbers those days!

To date its rare to find a good and honest Fiat Ritmo. Full stop. Its even more rare to find an original 130 TC with Solex carbs which has been kept standard, not being raced with and solid in terms of rust. At Modern Classics Automotive we have found one although we really had to go to the very south of Italy to get one.

In the summer of 1983 the first owner registerd the Ritmo in the Turin area, then it moved to the Reggio Calabria and stayed there within one family who commissioned the car to local Fiat Abarth garage (Autolipari srl) where we found and purchased it from. Although the low read on the odometer of 57.000km we decided here in the Netherlands to carry out a full engine service including cleaning and prep of the carbs.

This Ritmo Abarth 130 TC is ready to be enjoyed and driven or can be a perfect base (and worthwile) for a serious concours restore. True collectors car.