FDR Jr was the US importer of FIATs from the 1960s into the early 1970s until FIAT set up their own distributorship, FIAT Motors North America. FIAT-Roosevelt Motors was the importer prior to that.
@@mongrelmotorsports Yes. before that it was Hoffman Motors, also in NJ. Mr. Hoffman was the first to import many European makes into the US through a flimsy network of dealers.
Having owned 3 Alfas and also a FIAT over the years I’ve had to put up with more than my fair share of Italian car rust and reliability jibes. Fact of the matter is that modern Italian cars don’t rust at any faster rate than any other. The facts that pub bores always conveniently forget is that during the 70s, the supposed bullet-proof VWs, Fords and most Japanese cars were also rot boxes.
My granddads datsun bluebird estate was a prime example of rusting badly but most cars well into the 90,s suffered rust all 3 of my mk2 cavaliers were rust buckets .
I purchased a new Fiat 850 In Wolverhampton in 1968. It lasted 2 winters before the whole floorpan had to be fully re-welded. My cousin had purchased a similar vehicle in Milan which did not rust for 10 years. I can tell you the reason, and it's not Russian steel. The West Midlands salted their roads so heavily that ALL cars at that time rusted away. In the 1980s my Alfa Sud showed signs of rust after 3 years. But subsequent Alfas and Fiats that I owned showed no signs of rusting in SW England. I conclude that SALT played a major role in rusting for cars not prepared or galvanised for this British practice. In Italy, snow chains and winter tyres have been long-used in winter, instead of salt.
That must have been the only Niva in the world. We in the Eastern block know it just as a rust bucket. Even today, first thing what will your seller sell you with car is an additional rustproof coating.
My father, a steel merchant in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, was often talking about the steel cookers adding scrap metal, recycled steel, to their mix. He explained to me, not that I was all that interested, that most of the problems with rusting cars would occur because of problems related to the "pickling" and subsequent processes but not indicative of inherently poor steel quality.
Your father was right. In the 70s, conflict in Italian factories was at very high levels. There was a lot of sabotage and it was very difficult even just to verify the correct execution of the work, especially in the departments where product damage could be maximized
Aah, that's been a satisfying video to watch, as I've been fighting my own personal battle against the "soviet steel" legend for a while now. Very good research Jack, well done!
Russian steel may be no best nor worse than any other steel, but as I always say to people that agree with me on not buying russian steel: You don't want russian steel because you think it rusts easly I don't want russian steel because I hate Russia We are not the same
You like what you WANT to hear !!! Truth is; Russian Steel was used and cars rusted from the INSIDE out. i.e.: EVEN a galvanised chassis made of Russian steel by Fiat or Alfa Romeo in the 60's and all through the 70's would have rusted. But Hey: It give your mate reason for a video and thats how he makes a living. Gotta wonder why the subject even interests anybody anymore since the cars have ...... rusted away. LOL.
If you're of a certain age, one of your rights of passage, was the Isopon filler & spray can paint 'apprenticeship, whatever car you owned'! Thanks Jack🙏
Thinking back to MOT testing in the 1980's, the most common rot boxes were seventies Escorts and Cortinas that would be beyond repair at 8-9 years old. Minis were rubbish, early Golfs pretty poor but surprisingly, the dear old Allegro would rarely fail on rot. Alfasuds normally failed on the circular jacking points on the four corners of the floor and the inner wings where the outer wings bolted on, assuming there was still enough of a wing left. Bodywise they were shite and the Sprint version was even worse. They were also very inconsistent - I used to test a bright yellow 1979 saloon that even after seven or eight years was still in good condition. Another Sprint actually broke its back when it was jacked up. A split in the front chassis rail opened up and the front wing separated from the rest of it as the inner wing/strut top area caved in. It failed of course. :-) More recently I've seen a couple of 159's that are as rusty as an old horseshoe underneath. I don't recall ever seeing a rusty 75 or 164 but they were built in Milan with rather more care.
The allegro if I remember correctly used to rust badly across the rear suspension mounting panel.That's if the mounts them selves didn't break first.It also was the subject of a few recalls ie front tie bars and brake hoses and of course who can forget the quartic steering wheel.
Being from the Netherlands, that import cars from all over Europe and are the perfect test bed for car rustiness, I can personally testify that the 70's rust problem wasn't limited to Italians. The French and British cars at the time had EXACTLY the same poor reputation. Hope that makes you feel a bit better ... The better reputation for steel quality was with Swedish cars and (surprise!) with Lada's ...
There are many reasons italian cars of the 60's 70's and 80's and even before that as well rusted like crazy. The list can be long, and explanations likewise. The story of Russian metal is widely spread and often mentioned, but it wasn't just the Russians. All manufacturers suffered more or less the same problems, WHY? (I remember looking at my friends 1984 Ferrari 308, and it had rust in its fenders around that little round blinker in 1987. I was appalled that a Ferrari could rust, but he just replied it's a used car, all used cars rust... Well getting into the 60's rationing of goods were finally lifted, and demand for materials skyrocketed. Steel Mills where producing as much as they could. I have heard from a metallurgist that in order to make "steel" less prone to rusting, a good portion of it needs to be recycled metal that has fifnished it's propensity to oxydization. But also the content of different metals to create the best mix, like Chromium, Molybden, Cobalt, Zinc, and other metals weren't all that well developed. We have done quantum leaps since the 80's, but that's only part of the answer. Metallurgic advancements are important, but also the manufacturing process. The design was done on paper by hand, and not by computers. The manufacturing of parts was done the cheapest way like today, but involved metal bending as well as stamping. Some of these processes meant that some of the metal was thinner in some places and thicker in other. Then it was the little helping parts that were added in order to make it possible to weld them togehter. All these little areas of butressing created pockets that were impossible to reach with rustproofing once welded up, but water eventually found it's way and then the car was lost to the steel worms gnawing from the inside out. And paint was bad, rusting all by itself. Now we have acrylic paints that also have been improved, but also doesn't rust like the old paints that oxidized and rusted. Today all is CAD and these "helper pieces" are no longer necessary since glue is being used instead, and the pieces are stamped out as an integral part instead of being welded. So weak areas of welding that were extra prone to rusting are gone in most cars (not all, and these cars rust more). Rememeber welding areas/seams that rusted first? Also you had lemons, some call them monday cars or lunctime cars etc. This is because much was made by hand - remember human intervention? Well humas forget, robots don't. So today all cars from one process are either good or bad. Mostly good since bad processes show up more easily. Metal thickness is more even, preparation is more even, rustproofing is more even, paint has the same thickness and so on. Add everything up, and there you have it. It's called progress. BTW I used to own an Alfa in the form of 1979 Alfetta 1.6 in a subtle red color that tends toward burgundy (it was a different name), but beautiful on that car. I got it in 1984 and it was badly rusted in the usual places (door bottoms). It had so much rust in the front subframe and steering gear that the previous owner had welded the dampers in place !!! But fond memories. Someone had tuned the engine to the max with oversized DellOrto's, triple valve-springs and a full exhaust from Ansa that ensured it sounded like a race car. It went like one as well. The redline was well beyond 10k and the needle just swung around and pegged against the stop. It sounded glorious and went like stink. It scared most people but I remeber it fondly for how it went, and how much space it had inside. Alfa knew how to exploit available space. HUUUUGE trunk, and extremely roomey inside the cabin, way beyond what the dimensions would call for (why don't they build cars like that anymore? Fun engine, fun capacities, and lots of space. Maybe my memory serves me wrong here...) I would like to attach a list of Italiano sport car manufacturing that I found while seaching the problem that may be entertaining. The Six Laws of Italian Sports Cars 1) THE LAW OF PLEASING DESIGN WHERE IT REALLY DOESN’T MATTER “The inside of cam covers or other relatively innocuous areas, shall be laced with buttresses, cross-bracing and all manner of esoteric stiffness-with-lightness design, while something like connecting rods shall self-destruct at redline plus 1 rpm due to a basic lack of strength.” An example of this Law is the stunningly beautiful Lamborghini or Ferrari V12s of the late 1960s. They were famous for wearing out all four camshafts in 10,000 miles or less. The cam’s metal appeared to be recycled coathangers, which coincidentally are still in short supply in Italy. 2) THE LAW OF NON-FUNCTIONAL APPARATUS “All Italian Sports Cars, regardless of age, shall have at least one system or component which does not work, and cannot be repaired. Such a part shall never be mentioned in the Official Shop Manual, although there may be an out-of-focus picture shown.” It goes without saying that such parts should never under any circumstances be removed, lest the natural balance of the car be upset. 3) THE LAW OF ELECTRICAL CHAOS “All Italian Sports Cars shall be wired at the Factory by a cross-eyed, colour-blind worker, using whatever supplies are within reach. All wires shall change colour-code at least once between energy source and component. All grounds shall be partially insulated.” This tends to guarantee that the owner of such vehicles will eventually be intimately familiar with its electrical system, since he will need to trace out each wire, then rewrite his Official Schematic, which will differ from all others in at least one area. 4) THE LAW OF PERSONAL ABUSE “The more an Italian car breaks down, the more endearing it becomes to its increasingly irrational owner.” For example, you purchase an Italian Sports car, for all the money you ever hoped to earn, and receive a ticket for air pollution on the way home from the dealer due to the vast clouds of smoke that follow you. Several return trips to said dealer, accompanied by your rapidly dwindling cash reserves, cures the smoking. But now, the engine sounds like a food processor full of ball-bearings. After replacing every component in the car, including the radio speakers, the noise vanishes and is replaced by an odour reminiscent of a major fire in a goat-hair mattress factory. You still keep trying, God help you. 5) THE LAW OF UNAVAILABLE PARTS “All parts of an Italian sports car shall be made of a material that is available in inverse proportion to its operating half-life.” Thus, the speedometer hold-down screws are made of grade 8 cold rolled steel, while the valves are of fabricated Unobtanium, made only at midnight by an old man with a pointy hat covered with moons and stars. Such parts will be backordered during the design phase of the car, and will remain so forever. Bribes, pleading and threats will be ignored. 6) THE LAW OF CRYPTIC INSTRUCTIONS “Any official publications dealing with repair, maintenance or operations of an Italian sports car shall be written such that every fourth word is incomprehensible to the average owner. In the event that a random sentence is understandable, the information contained therein shall be wrong.” This is also known as flat-tyre English, where a sentence flows along nicely, then - Kaboom!
You forgot rule 7! All Italia sport cars are to be exported to customer countries as deck cargo on submarines therefor ensuring a continuous customer base!
Cars are also often designed poorly, even in the age of CAD, with some spots prone to holding water and eventually rust(no amount of epoxy primer can prevent the metal from rusting if it holds water). I've had a ton of 80s to 00 BMWs- E31, E32, E34, E36, E38 and E39. Most of them are relatively modern(I meantechnogical process) and generally won't rust on their own, but all of them have these "dumb spots" that will always eventually rust. Usually where metal profiles are drilled to fit some plastic skirts or trim pieces- if not flooded with wax, they are gone.
@@karolmalinowski9097 I agree with you 100% I have also had a number of BMW's for more than 20 years starting with e21 and e30 which rusted badly, thrunk was especially prone. As did e9 and e24 especially at the bottom of the firewall. the e34, e39, e38, e65, e91 and ending up with f20 and f22. The newer ones don't rust yet. and the e39 and e91 that I still own have been protected regularly with tuff-kote dinol. They don't have a spec of rust. BMW has become better and better over the years, and lots of the subchassis and wheel/suspension system being made of alu/mag alloy rust or rather corrode very little. But as you say, poor design where you have water pockets still make cars rust. especially when driven on salty roads, which we have at least 6 months out of the year where I live.
Great vid Jack... it's not often a youTuber not only listens to their subscribers [like me and Chris] but then carries out a lot of research to self correct and does a vid to set the record straight. Massive kudos to you sir !
Soviet steel had less carbon and nickel in its composition, and this can speed up the oxidation process. But the biggest problem for Alfa's south Italy factory of those times, was the storage of the steel sheets outside/outdoor before they were pressed, and the poor anti-corrosive protection associated with the painting scheme, at the level of the primer layer (and the incorporation of zinc as a constituent), and other anti-corrosive compounds on the chassis, before painting. This problem was also common on Fiat 127, 128, not only on this Alfa-Romeo model, and also on some Lancias. Do not compare this, in general, with the German and Swedish standards, saying that they also suffered from the same problem, in the same way. That's not true, and it's already a subject known to everyone who knows the reality of the European automotive industry since the '60s.
The Russian steel was also hot rolled-unlike the common cold rolled stell. Hot rolled steel is less string and more probe to flexing. My experience with rusty cars is extensive-one of the best American makes (oddly enough) was AMC-they did a body primer dip before painting, my AMC had very little rust at 12 years old.
You are ignoring that the involvement of Russian steel was debunked. Further more, if the steel sheets were stored outside then Moroni would have picked up on it and that would have been the end of the rust issues. The real reason can be found in the car specifications: the 1st series Alfasud weighs only 730 kg whereas the Volkswagen Golf Mk 1 is 790 kg, but unlike the tiny Golf the Alfasud is in fact a proper size family car featuring an impressive boot space. How do you think they managed to loose weight? Sure they won some on the more modern engine design, but what really did it was thinner sheet metal and that's where car building techniques from that era bit back because you cannot paint the inside of hollow sections. Every car from that era (roughly '70-'90) I ever owned thus eventually suffered from the same issue: condense in hollow sections evolving to rust that at some point would break through to the outer shell. On cars from more conservative manufacturers it just took longer to show, but had MOT existed in those years the differences would not have stood out as much as they are presented today.
From what I have seen on my Italian cars of that era if you could not see the surface from the outside it was not painted. Not even primed. Plus they also use double skinned panels which become dirt and moisture traps especially around edges like hoods (bonnets) and wheel arches etc.
@@johnmcdermott5505 Exactly, the fitting of wheel arch liners solved a lot of the problems. No cavities for the road dirt and mud to build up and never dry. I'm old enough to remember when viewing a slight accident on the street, the amount of dirt that fell from the wheel arch area. Of course now bodies are dipped to prevent corrosion but I run an old Land Rover Defender which has the same issues with dirt build-up in the chassis box sections. Jet washing regularly is a must to keep things under check.
soft steel ? so tooling lasted longer and possibly the body lines were more crispy? than if using say SS 304 or 308 that's way harder as ford found out on Lincolns and mustangs but quick quite after less than 200 cars in as it ate the tooling
Jack, I've owned a few Alfas, and whilst I acknowledge that Suds did sometimes rust in the center of panels for no apparent reason, their rust was always worst in cavities that Alfa had filled with a porous spay foam. The foam acted like a sponge, and ensured that the panel that it was supposed to protect always remained wet, thereby promoting rust. I was hoping that you were going to tell us the story behind the introduction of the foam.
dad had two and yes it was common.we had no Idea these were made from Russian steel to be honest.Look at any Sud Sprint from the first half of the eighties sold in Australia and compare it to any Fuego,Prelude,Cordia,Laser S later TX3(I am measuring class of similar vehicles)from about the same era 1980-1985 and the condition after three years and the french and japanese cars would be in better condition when it is time to trade up.we looked at a Laser in 85 out of interest to replace our second Alfa due to the Europeans not offering anything affordable by that stage.
The foam in the sills trick was introduced in 1976 (I think) and yes, it did makes things worse for a while, but Alfa fixed that and it did improve. The extreme rust cases that nearly bankrupted Alfa were the early 'Suds from 1972 to '76, before the foam injection was thought of.
@@chrismartin9421 My 1978 Alfasud Ti literally dissolved between 1982 and 1983...not sure if it had the foam but either way it was a painful experience...mechanically and to to drive it was fabulous though...felt so sophisticated after my first car...a 1972 Triumph Spitfire...which to be fair was by comparison completely corrosion free...
My dad bought a 1978 Alfasud Ti when it was only 2 years old. Fantastic little car, but despite being treated with "Ziebart" from new, it rusted really badly while we had it. I remember helping him fill the holes and repaint bits before we sold it on!
Thank you for another very interesting video Jack. As a child, growing up in both the UK and Germany, I can confirm that the German cars of that time were indeed just as bad as anything else in the rust department. The two biggest culprits were BMW and Opel. Merc were a close second. My family had a Fiat dealership amongst its members. I can clearly remember my cousin showing my father rotten German coachwork in the body shop. Those were the days. Another large contributor were the many built in water traps to be found in areas of the body containing areas of multilayers of steel welded together eg. scuttle-wing-A pillar. All this in no way stops me adoring Lancia, Abarth (olde) and Fiat. Just love 'em and get on with them very well indeed. Bw Mike.
This explains why my dad bought a new car every 2-3 years when I grew up in the 70's and 80's in Germany. He bought Simcas/Talbots/Peugeots from the same family owned dealership every time, and undoubtedly got a good deal for being a loyal customer with the trade-ins and new cars. I assume French cars were no better in the rust department. Fast forward to today, and I'm driving a 24-year-old Honda with no rust issues whatsoever. Granted, I live in the American south, where snow is extremely rare. But still, times have changed for the better.
Thank you so, so much for having researched this and corrected the record, Jack. Jay Emm’s response when I pulled him up on this was underwhelming, to say the least. Thanks, too, to Chris; it seems that his book informed a lot of your work. I’ll be sharing this video to my Club Motori Italia mates and amongst the X1/9 and 128 communities.
I`ve owned over 200 cars, a good percentage of them were from Italy, but also Britain, Germany, France etc. I can tell you that all of them rusted at similar rates, the only manufacturers who were proactive when it came to rustproofing for longevity, was Mercedes, especially post 1975 & later Audi post 1982-ish. By the end of the 80`s, pretty much everyone else had caught up to greater or lesser degrees. Until that point, cars were routinely rotted to the point of failing MOT`s by 5 -7 years old, some even had holed outer panels at 2-3 years old! Your only real option was to have your shiny new car rustproofed immediately with Zeibart or similar (or filling your box sections up with used engine oil every year or 2).
Not true! I have owned a junkyard since 1985 and the Mercedes is the worst rusting cars of all makes. Some survive only bacause of the owners meticoulus care. In general though they are horrible and the most overrated car ever built. I bought 2000 cars once that had been sitting on the ground without wheels for 5-10 years and you couldn't lift an MB with a loader without it braking in half. So also the Citroen ID/DS and Japanese trucks. If I lifted a Vaz Lada they looked like new underneath.
@@mossig Mercedes did suddenly get very bad for rusting when the accountants took over from the engineers, circa 1995 (not just rust issues either). What I did find when I was in the motor trade, was that a lot of older Mercs that had been crashed (& all German cars) were repaired with cheap pattern panels in the 90`s (when "Euro Car Parts" took off in the UK), this led to a lot of them rusting out quickly, especially front wings, which were much thinner metal than the originals, & were made of poor quality steel.
@@MrPabsUk I don't know about the pre WW2 cars but from the Ponton, w110, w115, w123, w201, w124 they rust badly. A Lada cost 25% of the cheapest MB:s and consequently got washed and maintained a lot less, but rust less. My experience is that if you go buy an expensive car you tend not to talk it down until you are fed up with it and went to another brand. Yesterday I junked a 1998 w202 wagon and it had fotball size rust holes in many places. The rear suspension (hydraulic) was completely not salvageable due to heavy rust. MB:s rear axles are a nightmare to work with. I mean two days ago I junked a 1983 Escort and it was 99% rust free! Both of them was parked in my lot on wheels for about 6 years and I drave them both to their resting place years ago. I used to drive a 1974 W115 lang 220D. But one day it broke in half while driving it. I do have a almost rust free MB though. A 450slc 1980. But that is mostly because it was inside for many years and not used. But there is always an exception to the rule.
@@mossig I don't know about the early ones, but the 114/5, 123`s & 124`s I worked on were always better than their competitors, as you say, they tended to be owned by wealthy people who looked after them well, & tended to keep them in garages. I`ve only owned one Lada, I got it stupidly cheap, it was about 6 years old & I paid less than £100 for it. Nearly all the panels had rust. It wasn't "normal" rust though.. Like, at the top of the front wings, the entire length had small bubbles, which went all the way through the panel. I took a screwdriver banged it with the heel of my hand between each hole till the whole wing was cut through at the top.. It was like a perforated stamp! I had other cars with rusty front wings, but the rust would be concentrated in 2 or 3 places, either at the top corners &/or the bottom corners of the arches. The Lada metal also felt like lead, so if you hit the middle of a panel with a hammer, the damage would be very localised, whereas if you hit most cars panels with a hammer, the damage would extend 5 times further... I did have a similarly aged (& stupidly cheap) Skoda 120 around the same time as the Lada, & that had no rust whatsoever. I also had Escorts, including the Mk3 & 4, & they rusted everywhere! The worst place was the battery tray, which would then allow water into the car, rotting out the floors. This was partly because the scuttle & wings had no lip, so all the rain went directly into the engine bay, including onto the horizontal section under the battery, which would suffer acid damage from the battery itself. The last one I had, an 89 1.6 Ghia had suffered VERY badly because the owner used to park on a very steep driveway with the cars nose facing upwards, so the battery tray always had a pool of water on it, till it rusted through, then all that water would go into the car & make its way to the back. As a result the entire floorpan had rusted through.. That said, I also had a Porsche 924 that had rusted the battery tray (which sits in a similar place to the Escort), the difference was, the RHD 924`s had the fuse box directly under the battery tray inside the car, so when the battery tray rusted out, the water would then fill the fuse box, causing many, many issues. I`ve also had several 944`s, but they never did that.
A friend of mine had am Alfasud in the late 70's. It was a lovely car and really sporty compared to the offerings available from other manufacturers at that time. I remember a large rust spot breaking out in the middle of the roof, not where you expect rust to start, it appears the rust was built in from new.
Perhaps around the interior light area, that causes the formation of vapour, when the light is on, for a certain time and the temp outside is cooler (?)
In the mid 70’s, my older brother worked as a mechanic at a MG/Fiat/Lancia/Jaguar new car dealership in central Illinois. The Fiats needed rust repair immediately after delivery to the dealer, before they could be placed on show room floor. Apparently, the sea voyage allowed lots of sea water exposure.
In any industry or process I've been involved in, there are myths that untrained people begin to parrot to feel that have a knowledge of the concept. I watch videos of the wine industry (No wine is worth more than $30, they are just ripping you off" and the aviation industry (If it ain't Boeing, I ain't going), both of which I have been involved at a deep level and they both have comments making those ridiculous claims to false knowledge. And don't get me going on "Fix It Again Tony". I had an early 70s Fiat 124 Spider that was bullet proof and a fine road machine. When people know nothing about a subject but want to impress their friends they just repeat the cool sounding bad information they heard at the bar.
The rust problem in Italian cars in the 1970s was related to poor quality steel sheet from the Taranto steel works supplied to the Alfasud works in southern Italy and other car plants as well as poor rust proofing, which could be remedied.
My father bought a Fiat 124 Sport Coupe (AC version) in 1969. Here in Canada where snow abounds and salt is used with great abandon, the poor beautiful car lasted about 3 years before it was a rusted through mess, even with dealer applied rustproofing, although mechanically it was perfect. In reality, most other brands of cars here suffered the same fate, but it usually took a few years longer. My mother, being a firm believer in customer service wrote multiple sternly worded letters to the Fiat Canada head office, which was conveniently located not 4 miles from our house, about the disappointment in the corrosive abilities of the car over several years. Finally tiring of the constant communiques from Mum, when a representative from the Fiat head office in Italy was visiting, he was sent to our house to inspect the car. He agreed, with my mothers beady eye glaring at him, that it was indeed not acceptable. A deal was then made that they would offer full trade in value for the car provided they purchase another brand new Fiat. They then purchased another 124 Coupe, a 1975 model (CC version), which ran beautifully for 10 years and over 100,000 miles with no real corrosion, 7 years with them, and 3 years as my first foray into car ownership. While I owned it, I decided to purchase a 1973 Alfa Spider, which while looking great, hid a huge amount of rot. A fresh coat of paint hid it beautifully. I agree that while most all cars rusted in those years, Italian vehicles really took the trophy in spectacular fashion. I do think that the cause of it was a terrible workforce, with apathetic concerns of build quality, and all the other things mentioned about the workers.
My dad would disagree that Italian cars were no worse than others in the 70s. He had several brand new fiats that simply dissolved despite his best efforts with waxpyl. Rust would break out in the middle of a panel for no obvious reason. They were truly shocking and far worse than BL or ford of the same era.
Interesting video. 70's cars of all makes and models tended to rust thanks to mud traps, umpteen separate pressings being used due to how cars were designed and built back in the 70's, lack of arch liners and splash guards, car bodyshells being stored outside, workforce strikes (if going on strike was an Olympic sport British Leyland would win gold) and lack of proper anti-corrosion systems. I can still remember my dad having to underseal our R reg Escort MK2 a couple of years after buying it new because it was starting to rust.
Nobody denies that most cars of the period rusted, the point is, the Alfasud (particularly before 1977) was far worse. I worked for a major London Alfa dealer and we had a queue of cars in for repair that were still within their 12 month warranty.
My 1974 Sud SE, rusted very badly, the brilliant dealer in York (Alwyn Kershaw) gave me the option of a swap for another Sud, in white, or he would repair my green one. I didn’t like white so the green one was welded back to life. It lasted for about an 18 months before the suspension turrets rusted through and leaked water into the cabin. I traded it for a Renault 5, this rusted the rear wings ! However my following four Alfas , two Suds, a Guilietta and GTV6 never rusted. I also had a 1974 Rolls Royce Shadow, which had rusted sills and rear arches. Maybe Alfas not so bad after all. Ho
Good video, Jack. I decided to research Russian-language sources so see if I could find info about exports of steel and other ferrous metal to Italy during that time but came up with nothing. Much more info about oil exports. A bit of background. The USSR faced a problem with workers holding massive amounts of cash and little to buy. Until the late '50s workers were required to buy government bonds in value equal to 1/12th of their annual salary. Finance officials forecast that beginning in the mid '60s payments on mature bonds would exceed the amount the State received by the forced annual purchases. Someone had the bright idea to pitch to the workers they ought to patriotically donate their bonds to the State in gratitude. When this was proposed to workers it was immediately rejected. The Government decided to cease issuing these bonds and freeze their repayment and interest for 25 years. No longer forced to buy bonds, personal savings increased even more. An absence of borrowers meant this capital was gathering dust. Because the state had made no promise of providing the proletariat cars, it was thought this would be a good way to get capital moving in the economy, the state to earn a tidy profit, develop a new industrial sector, increase exports, and narrow the lifestyle difference between capitalist-state workers and those in the USSR. A foreign marque was sought because the USSR didn't have drivetrains suitable for passenger vehicles as well as know-how in other automotive technologies. Ford Taunus 12M, Morris 1100, Peugeot 204, Skoda 1000MB, Renault 16, and Fiat 124 were purchased and shipped to the USSR for evaluation. The Renault became the favourite of the engineers. They were told the Government decided the contract would go to FIAT. The Italians offered better financing. The politics were better too - the USSR had identified Italy as the weak link in the Nato chain, the Italian Communist Party was the largest in Western Europe, and communist politicians had been appointed government ministers, making the Party influential. During tests at the Dmitrovsky test site of the Central Scientific Research Automobile and Automotive Engines Institute, the 124 showed itself poorly. After the first 5000 kilometres driven, it became absolutely clear that it was impossible to operate the model on Soviet roads without modifications, for example it lacked towing eyes and the low ground clearance was too low - at 120 mm this made it difficult to travel country roads. Engineers claimed drivers wouldn't be able to park in the city without the risk of damaging the car on the kerb. In addition, the car frame was not robust enough and began to crack. Italian engineers made about 800 changes to the design. The VAZ 2101's engine was modified to an overhead camshaft. In addition, the rear disc brakes were replaced with drum brakes, and the thickness of the critical elements of the load-bearing body was increased. The most noticeable external difference is the clearance was raised by 30 mm. On 20 July 20 1966, the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted a joint resolution 'On the construction of a plant for the production of passenger cars' as part of its Eighth Five-Year Plan. The decree provided for the construction from 1967 to 1969 a plant in Tolyatti, Russia (a company town named for Italian Communist Party leader Palmiro Togliatti) for the production of passenger cars in the amount of 600,000 units per year, as well as the organisation of the production of components for them. Over 1200 hectares of land were allotted for the construction of the car factory, related facilities, and infrastructure such as housing.
Great investigation work Jake. Back home in Portugal i know ,my dad had a Sud,some new cars were taken apart and rust treated and that's why there are still nice Suds around there. The last Alfa Romeo made before Fiat takeover is one of my favourites too, the 75 :)
In Canada in the first half of the 1970s, it was a bit of a rust-fest. Datsuns were famous for visible rust, Toyotas for secret rust, the Brits for slow steady rust, and Fiats for complete rust. The Fiat 128s were so bad that there was a buy-back program. Luckily any car they bought back had turned to lace, and so Fiat Canada did not need to spend money on using crushers to dispose of them! That era pretty much spelled the end of mainstream Italian car sales in Canada.
Hi Bob, that's very interesting. I came to Canada in the mid eighties from the UK and had often wondered about the lack of Italian cars here. I had assumed that with the smaller population the market was too small. Perhaps that is the case for French manufactures?
@@iansmeath8674 the French had a solid niche market here in the 60s, especially in Quebec. However, their dealer network declined as the dealers defected to higher volume brands. Japanese competition pushed them out of the entry level market. Personally, I have a Citroën 2CV, and am part of the teeny tiny French car community that still exists in eastern Canada.
@@bobmcl2406 Thanks for the info on the Canadian car market Bob, very interesting. So you have a 2CV quite a rarity though I have seen a couple here. One had a brilliant license plate "ESCARGOT" priceless!
Very interesting car production history, Jack. And it's right on the spot what I have heard. The late father of a close friend of mine was head of the Austrian Alfa Romeo importing company. He told me that because the paint shop in Pomigliano d'Arco was often out of service, due to strikes or other reasons, the raw Alfasud bodies were stored outside and often without any protection and were subject to weather. And note: Pomigliano d'Arco is close to Napoli and Napoli is on the Calabrian coast. So there is always a little bit of salt in the air's vapor.
Very interesting vid. You say that pretty much all cars of the era rusted, and I would agree, but…. Most cars rusted in places where you would guess that they would, areas exposed to water a lot, inner wings, cills etc. But Alfas, Lancias and Fiats would rust pretty much anywhere. My Alfasud had a hole right in the middle of a door panel, it started as a bubble under the paint, so it’s origins were before the paint was applied. But it was a great drive!
A schoolmate's father had one of the early Giuliettas in the late seventies. Wonderful car, fast and impressive for the time, but that also had rustholes in the middle of the panels (doors, wings) develop after only 2 - 3 years. I think it was connected with new technologies for spraypainting. The old paints (solubles) were very unhealthy for the workers, as well as very bad for the environment so new products (based on water?) were used. But on the other hand, French and German cars did not rust in that way at the time...
Great history Jack, thanks for this video. I owned an 83 Sud Ti in Sydney with minor corrosion, they no doubt improved rustproofing towards the end. Our Pomigliano built 156 still has no issues. Cheers.
Well documented Jack and it’s great to see myths like this one explained and with facts, rather than simply opinion and copied thoughts. I have owned Fiats and Alfas built in the ‘60s, 70’s, 80s and 2000s. Asides this our family over the years has owned, Australian, Japanese, English, German and Italian built cars across the decades, all of which have had rust issues at some point in time. The very simple observation I can make is that rust protection, eg on the undersides and in cavity sections, historically was very poor and thankfully has improved. If Soviet steel had been the issue why would rust still occur in cars built from the 1990s onwards. So yes, it’s a myth just like numerous other ones exist. The use of salt on the roads in many parts of the world (though not here in Oz, NZ etc) also has a significant part to play in why so many cars rust.
im going to help dispel that myth about tanks as armour steel is actually high quality but probably would eat the tooling to make the body's so like quality low carbon local cheap steel was probably used and by the sounds of it probably wasn't even up to the lab report aka what we sold the factory isn't what you though you bought so maybe junky steel will impurity's ect. that wasn't supposed to be in the steel add on it looks like from the pictures it's thin gage metal so rust is more of a problem to begin with design wise of the body work even if SS was used
I was in the motor trade at the time, and we never actually thought that they were made of Russian steel. What we did know without doubt however was that all Italian cars rusted horrendously, not just the Alfasud but all Fiats, Alfas, Lancias and even Ferraris etc. Yes, all cars in those days rusted but Italian cars were by far the worst. I even knew of Fiat Stradas which had rust holes in them at 18 months old. We used to say that they were 'dehydrated bodyrot, just add water for instant rust!'. We used to believe that they were made for the sunny Ialian climate, as soon as they saw British rain they fell apart. They were pretty useless then and they're not much better now.
I had a Strada that i really liked, but was lucky with that one as it had a manageable level on that car. But the rust thing of those days was all over the place & a case of what impurities exist in the next cauldron sort of thing. It did get me with the jumping out of reverse thing.
I’ve followed Roadster Life on RUclips for some time now and his video on the Sud put the Russian steel myth to bed for me . Great to see you’re honest enough to correct yourself Jack . Really well researched video 👍🏻
It was partly that which led me to investigate further. Like Jack, I have to admit I had long believed the Russian myth but it did seem to only apply in English books and magazines. As I had to learn some Italian anyway in my research I soon found other clues. There is much Italian government documentation available online if you can read it. And Matteo at Roadster Life was also a help.
I owned 5 Lancias, including 2 Betas and an HPE. I didn't keep any of them long enough to see any rust. However the last was a Gamma coupe which I believe was built in the Ferrari factory on the 400 production line. That car was pretty rust free after 18 years so that seems to validate the working practice theory. Thanks for a very informative video.
My mother in law's Fiat Doblo had amazing body, one of the best I've known, infinitely better than contemporary German cars. It's reliability was amazing also.
In around 1980, every Alfa Romeo GTV chassis were sent to the small town of Hässleholm in Southern Sweden by train. There, they were treated in the Tuff-Kote Dinol plant and subsequently returned the same way. Tuff-Kote Dinol was a pretty popular corrosion maintenance system in those days and you could could see the Dinol sticker on many cars. In the end, I believe the Italians built their own processing plant. In any case, the train traffic ceased.
You are quite right that most cars rusted badly in the 70s. Audi had a particularly bad reputation. My cousin in Hamburg had a Fiat Mirafiori 131 and an Audi 80 at roughly the same time, both rusted away at the same rate. I heard a rumour that the Russian steel/Fiat thing was that Fiat facilitated the use of Russian steel for the Yugoslav built Zastavas.
The Lancia Beta HPE was an absolute master class in kerb side design, it always looks 'just right' and as it should be. It is a shame they are practically extinct now due to the rot problem.
Hi Jack , I,m glad your studying has highlighted other issues that lead to the “Italian Rust Scandal “. Our UK motor industry was not the only country with poor management relations as often quoted by British TV media, and this vid highlights this particularly with the Italian cars. In the Lancia Beta case , it was discovered the shells of cars were often left outside either in primer or without whilst production was on strike , which as you say , was frequent. Similar pattern here in UK happened in Rovers plant with the SD1 production , the car had an excellent process for paint , provided we had continuity of production , well we all remember what happened there! Another factor, which has been overlooked was with the introduction of both the Alfasud and the Lancia Beta models coincided the with the Oil Crisis early mid 1970’s , so they sat in UK docks for ages , as cars were not selling awfully well , a similar thing happened to 1st Ferrari 308 GT4s , and you don’t hear many slagging them off for rust! ( But they did) . With both the Beta and the Sud aiming for a different market to their predecessors, also the with Uk joining the Common Market meant their pricing was more advantageous, having had the big Import tax removed, which existed since Clement Attlee put it on after WW11 , this made previous models in Jaguar E type territory . It can be argued for this reason that buyers of the new models may not have had so fastidious owners than were before. Either way, people seemed to forget premature rusty subframes on Minis and the ADO 16 models, we still bought them . Rusty front strut mounts on Escorts ,Cortina’s etc; we still bought them , and what about the metallic Silver Fox paint on 1600E and 1300E Fords which literally flaked off before your very eyes! It’s obviously a very fickle world in motoring folklore. Really liked this vid. P.s You ought to try a really well sorted Beta they are quite brilliant
My dad tells the tale of when he had a puncture on his 1956 Vauxhall Wyvern. He put the jack in the offside rear jacking point and started Jacking the car up. The jack went up but the car stayed on the ground lol. The floor completely rotted out!
This is absurd. As the former finance director of the largest steel trader in the world I can tell you that Soviet, and now Russian, steel is of the highest quality, right up there with Germany and Japan. I remember chartering a vessel from the Black Sea to Australia which we loaded with steel to be used in the Bushmaster, for example.
In the 70’s my father worked in a large steel components supplier for the automotive industry in The Netherlands. At a certain moment Mercedes Benz did abruptly stop the production of their steel products. All produced steel part het to be scrapped. Later on other ca brands did the same. However the high standard Mercedes Benz quality control carried out by Mercedes Benz themselves was the first to spot the rise problem. What happened was that the whole car industry started to buy recycled steel what was a rather new phenomenon in the early seventies. The Russians offered it for a very good price (better then the rest of the steel market). How they were able to do so turned out later on. The Russians did not recycle the steel a temperature that high enough to have all impurities come floating op tot the surface. Therefore the new steel had a ha the corrosion already in it when it came straight out the Russian steel factories. This problem hit most car factories not only the Italian car factories.
I remember watching a UK TV show in the '90s about car rust, and exactly this was described. Mercedes were cited as being effected, surprised and traced the problem to poor steel manuf. Rust was described as existing throughout the metal. Funnily enough, Italian cars not mentioned. After saying that, I remember a less-than-1 year old Alfa Sud with both wing indicators missing, as the rust holes where they should be were so big the lights no longer fit!
What a load of nonsense. Provide evidence in the form of scientific analysis of steel samples before you spout your garbage. I bet you never melted anything harder than a candle in your life. You have merely repeated the exact myth that this article debunks.
if you have ever taken the fenders off of an italian car, you'll immediately see why they rust - the only surfaces that were painted were the visible body panels. Inside the fenders is bare steel. Couple that with the majority of the cars being sold in the Northeastern US where everything rusts, it makes them all look bad.
I don't know about Alfa Romeo, but I have read in several books on Volkswagen cars that VW bought cheap steel from the Russians, though they don't mention anything about it being recycled. This combined with poor rustproofing techniques meant that early Rabbit/Golf, Scirocco, and Jetta cars were often rust buckets. Great video!
Informative video on an interesting subject, thanks. We had a couple of Fiats in the family, a 1980 127 and a 1981 128, and both of them rusted quite badly. It's definitely true to say that pretty much all cars from the late '60s to early '80s had corrosion issues to some degree, but I think Italian and Japanese cars were at the 'serious rust' end of the spectrum. In other words, all cars rusted but some were noticeably worse than others. I agree that the Soviet steel story is probably a myth and the issues were down to poor management and manufacturing practices within the Italian motor industry at that time. A shame as the cars were so cool!
Oh dear Jack, you spent a video correctly pronouncing the likes of Lancia Beta. That's only going to even more annoy the Porsche snobs that hate how you say that. One minor correction, that Franklin Delano Roosevelt referred to here is the son of the former President (with the same first and middle name). His father, the President, died in 1945.
I keep hearing about Porsche pronunciation being Incorrect. Which is correct Porsche or Por-sha...? . Apparently the Germans pronounce Volkswagen as Folks - Vagen
I always get annoyed when people say FIATs rust. I have owned 4 FIATs: a 1975 128, a 1986 Regata, a 1995 Uno diesel and a 2003 Punto diesel, of these the only one that rusted was the 1975 128. By the time the 80's came along the problem had been solved by zinc coating the steel.
I spent the greater part of the 1970's welding rusty cars, and there was many Fiats among them, the fiats rusted in the same way all 1970's cars rusted, perforation from the inside out due to lack of internal primer in the hollow sections and almost total lack of any underbody sealant combined with multiple underbody mud/water traps. The Alfas were different, and different in a way that showed the steel was badly made, wherever it originated from! Bad storage and bad industrial relations may explain the reason for some Italian car problems. but on the Alfas I saw something I had never seen before or since, with one exception! We bought a low mileage Alfa Gulietta 2 door, what a lovely car, front engined, rear gbox and wearing twin webbers (Dellortos?) on its 1.8 twin cam engine, unfortunately both rear shock absobers were hanging loose in the turrets in the back wheel arches! when repairing it I noticed that the steel I was removing looked like it had been rolled with layers of slag between seperate sheets or layers of metal and it was clearly delaminating into four or more seperate thin sheets, the rust was coming from inside the steel! Wherever there was a poorly protected cut edge, the moisture seemed to be drawn into the "slag" layer by capilary action and the whole part would begin to swell and delaminate. It may not have come from Russia, and it may be coincidence but the only place I saw similar delamination of steel was in the Moskovich vans and pickups, imported by my part time employer in their thousands! At the time a Moskovitch van or pick up was £1300 new , signwritten if required and including towbar and electrics! Moskovitch didn't actually make a pick up, they were all bought as vans, and most were "converted" at a bodyshop somewhere in East Yorkshire Where the importers were based! Phil
My 850 FIAT was a terrible rustbox, I had an Accident with it requiring me to replace the front panel, it was the totally useless painting that allowed condensation to eat it from inside the box sections and under the reinforcing of the other panels where they were spot welded and nothing to protect it. However my Ford Anglia 105 of ten years earlier had NO paint at all in the chassis box panel nor inside the door and body. The paint was also cellulose and that has sod all protection from water. Dip treatments with good paints, means that modern car do not suffer from this problem and now depend on sensors and electronics to cause them to be scrapped.
Very interesting and very informative Jack ...I like these history presentations from you .. As a huge Alfa fan and owner I too believed the Russian steel story ... Anyhow excellent ...well done
I really enjoyed this perspective and it would be interesting to know which Fiat models were from which factory over the years. Before we were married I bought a 5 year old 1973 Fiat 126 to fix up for my girlfriend and the front end was full of holes and required many new panels. After I fixed that she progressed to a Fiat 127 in 1982 which was also 5 years old and the bottom 4 inches of the driver's door skin had been eaten away so a bit of progress in a way as the rest of it seemed ok!
We had both a 127 and a 128 in the family in the early-mid '80s when I was a youngster. They rusted quite badly despite being Ziebarted but not as bad as your experience. I remember the bottoms of the door skins, all the hinges in the cars and along the lip of the hatchback (127) and boot (128) being the worst. Surprised the doors did not fall off as the hinges were so weakened by rust. The undersides were OK so the extra rustproofing must have had some effect.
Fantastic video as always. My dad bought a Lancia Beta in the 70s. A truly gorgeous car but it was rusting within weeks of delivery. My Alfas (916 Spider, Giulietta QV and Brera) have all been free of rot. Things have definitely improved.
Fascinating video Jack. Interesting to set the record straight. It's clear most manufacturers in the 70s were having rust issues. It wasn't until early 80s that galvanized steel started to become the norm. I think there may be a way to settle this once and for all. ... If small metal samples taken from Alfa's, Fiat's, Lancias made from 70s and have all these individually metallurgically tested. This would identify the elements within the steel. As mentioned in the comments, Russian steel lacked high quantities of Nickel and Chromium as these were expensive. A test would clearly identify the type of steel used by each manufacturer. I suspect you'll find they'll all match. ... They did this metal analysis on metal fragments from the Titanic as there were rumours of poor quality steel used in construction. This was being (recently) considered as one of the reasons for the sinking. They found the steel was excellent quality high carbon content. Later research found rivets used on the bow of the ship were of a lesser quality than used elsewhere on the ship. Not necessarily a structural issue, more facilitated the break up when the Titanic started to sink. ... Mate had a W reg Fiat Strada.1.3 in the early 90s. It was a bit of a jalopy and of course rusty..he never locked it - no one stole it lol.. Engine was sweet thou.
I worked for Fiat/Lancia at the Brentford and Alperton UK headquarters in the 70's and 80's. Rusty Lancia Betas were bought back from customers on the quiet and disposed of in clandestine circumstances. There was a secure compound at Alperton full of them and the state of some Betas had to be seen to be believed...
Thank you for laying that one to rest. Selling Lancias in the mid 80s I realise the fall out from the whole 70s corrosion fiasco. I also loved everything Italian and it really hurt that in the UK we laughed at Italian cars whereas nobody mentioned the suspension turrets corroding in Escorts or the Pinto engines that suffered oil starvation to the camshafts. The Chevettes that rotted behind the headlights and so on. In more recent times we've had a FIAT 128 Punto, 2 X Pandas, a 156 and a Giulietta Multiair. They've all been good cars.
I well remember going to the Motor Show at some point in the 1970s when everyone was laughing at Porsche for declaring their intention to galvanise their body shells. It was just accepted that cars would rust through in a few short years. I had a four year old Ford Cortina in 1980 and it had a hole in the front wing that you could put your fist through.
Are you kidding me? The document dated 1965 names a Franklin Roosevelt and you say he wasn't yet President?. Lol. That Roosevelt was never President. Franklin D. Roosevelt was President during WW2, a couple decades previous. Rust in late 60's and early 70s cars was probably due more to poor design of box sectioning sheetmetal for chassis strength. Leaving areas with poor drainage of water and poor rustproofing. By late 70's most cars had much better rustproofing as well as additional dealer installed rustproof materials at extra cost. MG's, Triumphs, Volvo, Chevy's, Fords,Chrysler, etc all rusted out just as bad, especially if they were in rust belt areas.
Couldn't agree more, with your thoughts! Well done. Didn't know about the Mafia, but it's obvious in South Italy. Had a friend who had a new Fiat 1100, in the late '60, with a rusty front bumper (new), so he had to complain (fight) with his dealer and he was told that the bumpers were left out side in the rain, befor getting chromed!
I had a B prefix reg (1984) Alfa Sprint 1.5 ti Cloverleaf and a mate of mine had a 1982 Alfasud 1.5 ti Cloverleaf (W suffix reg) and we used to nickname our cars Alfa-Seltzer as they effervesced in the rain ;-) Loved my Sprint. The sound of the twin Weber carbs on over-run...Music....
Interestingly, my father who was a mechanic in the 1970's-1980's had a slightly different version of the myth: He told me that the steel came from recovered shipwrecks and they somehow screwed the melting process, leaving sea salt in the steel, thus leading to the panels rotting from the inside. I can't wait to tell him the truth :-)
Where did they recover all those shipwrecks from? It's expensive to do and there are millions of cars to recycle right on your doorstep. Economically it would be insane (you only recover shipwrecks if they're an obvious danger to very high value shipping routes or you want uncontaminated steel if it wasn't exposed to fallout from nuclear explosions - or historical wrecks for museums).
Very interesting. I was fooled by that rumour as well. I love the way you pronounce all the Italian names so well and yet use the English pronunciation of Lancia.
This story reminds me of a - probably - other urban legend: According to it, Volkswagen used Polish steel up to 1984 - which is why they did rust like crazy. I think in 84 they did invest in rust protection - wax conservation, sealing welds etc.. I owned a 1991 mk2 Golf - which was known (except the very first ones) for really good rust protection. Even today, you can see brown lines of wax under the rear hatch on a summer day. Unfortunately, VW had the bright idea to save on that in 1993 - they hired Ignazio Lopez (who previously did cost-cutting at Opel/Vauxhall, the first Astra was a perfect lemon) making the Golfs of that year rust like crazy.
All 70s cars were pieces of crap that rusted while you watched. They'd have rusting wings and door sills well before they were 5 years old. They hadn't mastered the preparation and painting process and the necessity to shield stone damage from the wheels. There were mud traps everywhere which held damp and road salt. Of course so long as they all rotted this was just fine for the manufacturers.
Alfa cured their rust problem in about 1987 when they launched the 75/Milano which had better panels and better treatment. The Alfa 164 is one of the best rust protected production cars ever. They've slipped back a bit these days, but are no worse than anybody else now.
All cars rotted in those days, my dad had to scrap a 68 singer vogue in 73 ! Completely rotten underneath, and my first boss had spent two years restoring a 68 Jag 420 it was rotten right through by 76 when he started work on it!
It's been known for years in tank community that Italian iron ore is oxide rich and prone to rust. And actually soviet cars from early 70-ties rust less than early 80-ties. I'm lucky to own few Moskviches from 1969 to 1987 in original factory paint so got a lot of evidence on that.
As a past Alfa Sud owner (5) the rust was no greater than other cars of the era. The last one was a beauty, though. A white 1.5 Ti. Waxoil dripping out of it. A really fast car but also pretty good mileage. The first to second was always a bit hit or miss. Cool vid.
My dad had a 1970's Alfa Sud. The biggest problem with it was keeping the engine cool in traffic jams. He had to add extra fans with switches on the dash board. I learned to drive on that car, it was lively and fun but i bought myself a Mk1 Escort as soon as I could.
Hi Jack, couple of points. I bought (actually my dad did) a Ford Crapi (sorry Capri) in 1970 in the states. Literally within 8 months the rear fender (ie wing) began to rust. In 2 years the car was very rusty. And in December 1984, I was in MIrafiore and other Torinese plants with company big wigs (I was just a small guy) and we toured the zinc coating bath which Fiat had put in place to solve the rust issues. I think their system was licensed from Porsche.
Very interesting video, having grown up in the 80s this rumor has been around. In reality the same problems with early Japanese cars (Datsun I'm looking at you) and a lot of British layland products as complete bear metal bodies were transported uncovered on a flat bed truck in the rain and snow to be painted in another factory nearby in the midlands. Great video Mr 27.
The boxer engine also had a problem with insuficient engine protection. Many engines broke in parking lots during winter, because owners drove into snow piles that melted from engine heat and then later the water froze in the timing belt and at start up the belt jumped on the sprockets and bent the valves. Also they used foam for insulation inside tight body spaces. This is still done in many makes but the material is now incased in plastic bags so that they don't collect water.
I bought a brand new 1981 Lancia Beta Coupe back in the the day. It was my pride and joy for 16 years, and i looked after it very very well. I always lived one street back from the Ocean in Australia, in what is a very salty environment, with car only under a carport. I detailed the car myself monthly including waxing it about 4 times a year. Throughout its whole life with me, I only ever had about 3 rust spots develop around the windscreen at different times, and each time they appeared i would have them properly cut out and re-done....this was all i ever had. So considering, i think mine did as good as any decent car would of this era, so mine bucked the myth trend for sure.
My parents had a Ford Corsair from new and the top of the front wing perforated in 18 months. However Alfas and Lancias were spectacular in their ability to disintegrate before your eyes 😄
As I understand it, the main issue with the Beta was a poor design for the back part of the subframe that housed the engine/gearbox. This was a huge water/mud trap, resulting in that particular area rusting and in some cases the engine mounting was so damaged that it failed. Lancia bought those cars back from customers, but that gave them terrible PR, and so even after the subframe was redesigned and the cars went back to being as rusty as most of the other cars of that era, the damage was done. Lancia being a fairly pricey marque probably didn't help their cause. After the Beta, most Lancias were galvanised and rust became much less of a problem, however the damage was done. (I had a 1992 Dedra and now have a 1993 Y10 which is remarkably solid, shame about the interior plastics, though at least some of that can be blamed on a previous owner.) Jack - I have a question about your pronunciation of Lancia - I've heard various pronunciations of Lancia, and the one you use seems to be the anglophone one - have I got this wrong?
As an auto parts and car dealer I can state categorically that all cheap production cars from the sixties to the late eighties were rust buckets…for whatever reason I don’t know why but even Hondas from the early days were rusters…
In one of Jeremy Clarkson’ shows he said that the Lancia Beta’s electrostaticly charged painting system had the polarity connected the wrong way round, so the paint had very poor adhesion.
It seems the Dutch steel plant Hoogovens Estel based in IJmuiden made steel for Alfa Romeo. On Alfa's request Estel added more rusty scrap to their steel to keep it cheap. Another story is that due to the local salty sea breeze they unpainted bodies of the Alfa Sud started to rust inmidiatly. Actually this happened to the FIAT 126 in Poland too. These bodies stayed outside waiting because the new line for the FIAT Cinquecento had to be build and starting up this production was key. But, well, this procedure was common at British Leyland too. Lots of unfinished MINI's were victim of the harsh Britich weather!
I used to work at a Lancia dealership in the early 80's just before Lancia stopped trading in the UK. I remember seeing new cars arrive on the transporters with rust on them. I have seen pictures of 100's of Fiat x19 body shells sitting in primer out in the open with snow on them. That would not help the rust problem they had.
What a great video, Jack! Interesting topic, great production quality and thorough research. I hope this video does well on RUclips because you deserve it! Can't wait for more from You, especially on the Influenzo. Kind regards, Albert
This was very interesting! I think you should do more of this on your channel, talking about the car industry and history, especially when you find new facts instead of repeating the stories we have all heard before. Thanks! :)
@@Number27 Lol it certainly isn't all that usual to attempt a neuro linguistic restatement concerning russian steel that becomes italian for no knowable reason whatsoever.
I bought an alfa 33 Trofeo new in the 90s. When I picked it up at the dealership, I noticed that a piece of bodywork around the headlight was starting to rust because the varnish had peeled off. Of course I brought it back and they painted it for me under the warranty. The body was guaranteed for five years against rust. Otherwise it was a beautiful car full of sensations and its boxer engine was a marvel.
I had the first and second Alfasuds registered in the UK, TAN41M and 42M. I bought both by accident as spares cars from different places and both had catastrophic MOT fails in 1977/8 so were scrap at 4-5 years old. Both were nailed together enough for an MOT with some very creative welding to take the number plates off 30 years ago and then thrown away. Back then there was no interest in rescuing stuff like this.
As a student my chums had Alfa's. A brown Sud that even as a 17yr old I could see was full of filler, and a Guilietta (dark blue, did its engine and got sold to the college's agricultural workshop worker for £100). Anyway, a year later (1988) I bought a rusty W reg Sud 5-dr for £150. This eight year old / very low miles car was so rusty that the top of the front strut towers had ripped away, hinging up from the inner wings. It was the only car I've owned where the bonnet was a structural member: you had to jack the car up a bit to close it, and when you released it (with a hefty tug) the car would drop by a bit. I blobbed some plates at it, gave up and got my money back from someone who simply drove off in it: bonnet straining, no MOT. A year later I got an '83 (Y) Sud Ti Green Cloverleaf with 140,000 miles. Not a spot of rust anywhere and a wonderful car. That red Alfa introduced me to car restoration though, and for the last 20 years I've done 45+ early 911 shells, plus others. Would now love a Sud / GTV for restoration for myself! Great film and very interesting, thank you.
When I was with German Air Force in 1978, one of my pals owned an Alfasud about ~ 3 - 3 1/2 years old. He bought it when it was 2 years old. He was told it was refitted on behalf of Alfa-Romeo Germany by the dealer. It received new front fenders and was partly new painted (especially the roof). When I met my pal, his Alfasud was rusting all around. There was a BIG hole just above the exhaust / silencer. Rear fenders, doors (especially lower parts, but surprisingly the roof on top and the hood showed brown rust blotches under the paint. On the other hand the engine was brilliant, the gear was great, handling of the car superior. But everything made of sheet metal or tubes was just scrap. His car did not survive the 4-years TÜV inspection. It was scrapoed. BTW a inspector of Alfa-Romeo Germany told my friend: „ I have never seen such badly rusted new cars before the Alfasuds. They must have used badly rusted material producing them.“ Most probably he was straight on the point. The Alfasud could have been a cash cow for Alfa-Romeo, had it been built even to their own standard. It was a good car brought down by shoddy workmanship. How they built them was straight for the scrapmetal man.
I've owned 7 ALFAs, from the 69 1750 Berlina to the 82 Milano. A little rust problem on the 74 2000GTV (my favorite). Entirely worth it. No one would believe a car could have "soul", but ALFAs could to a Mechanical Engineer.
Golly - thanks for this - fascinating and the only film out there which has truthfully tackled this subject . I have read various bits about 70's Lancias suffering from 'mixed' batches of steel and of course as you say the Alfa tinworm stories but this has been a great bit of investigation by you and Chris, the Alfasud author. Nice !
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Franklin Roosevelt the president died in 1945. I think you got the wrong Roosevelt. Otherwise another very interesting video.
Yes! My mistake on Roosevelt! Thanks for watching!
@@Number27 Jr. FDR's son - he was never president.
FDR Jr was the US importer of FIATs from the 1960s into the early 1970s until FIAT set up their own distributorship, FIAT Motors North America. FIAT-Roosevelt Motors was the importer prior to that.
@@mongrelmotorsports He also raced Abarths here in the US
@@mongrelmotorsports Yes. before that it was Hoffman Motors, also in NJ. Mr. Hoffman was the first to import many European makes into the US through a flimsy network of dealers.
Having owned 3 Alfas and also a FIAT over the years I’ve had to put up with more than my fair share of Italian car rust and reliability jibes. Fact of the matter is that modern Italian cars don’t rust at any faster rate than any other. The facts that pub bores always conveniently forget is that during the 70s, the supposed bullet-proof VWs, Fords and most Japanese cars were also rot boxes.
As an owner of a 10 plate 159 for the last 4 years, (which has no rust whatsoever), I agree.
All cars from the seventies were rot-boxes, even Rolls Royces.
My granddads datsun bluebird estate was a prime example of rusting badly but most cars well into the 90,s suffered rust all 3 of my mk2 cavaliers were rust buckets .
My 1981 Honda Accord did not stop rusting …
Literally the only cars I ever saw that didn't rust like mad are the old Audi 80s and Peugeots from the early 80's onwards.
I purchased a new Fiat 850 In Wolverhampton in 1968. It lasted 2 winters before the whole floorpan had to be fully re-welded. My cousin had purchased a similar vehicle in Milan which did not rust for 10 years. I can tell you the reason, and it's not Russian steel. The West Midlands salted their roads so heavily that ALL cars at that time rusted away. In the 1980s my Alfa Sud showed signs of rust after 3 years. But subsequent Alfas and Fiats that I owned showed no signs of rusting in SW England. I conclude that SALT played a major role in rusting for cars not prepared or galvanised for this British practice. In Italy, snow chains and winter tyres have been long-used in winter, instead of salt.
In late 70’s, cars serviced at my garage were all rot boxes. Except one. A Lada
Niva!!! Yes it had some surface rust but nothing like the rest.
Superior Paint Protection then
@@GunitEngage "really thicc steel" maybe.
Yes, Lada’s had thicker steel that the FIAT 124.
That must have been the only Niva in the world. We in the Eastern block know it just as a rust bucket. Even today, first thing what will your seller sell you with car is an additional rustproof coating.
My father, a steel merchant in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, was often talking about the steel cookers adding scrap metal, recycled steel, to their mix. He explained to me, not that I was all that interested, that most of the problems with rusting cars would occur because of problems related to the "pickling" and subsequent processes but not indicative of inherently poor steel quality.
Well, "scrap" metal is needed for high quaility steel products. Just to get the alloy right. Nowadays Recycling is a must anyway.
Your father was right. In the 70s, conflict in Italian factories was at very high levels.
There was a lot of sabotage and it was very difficult even just to verify the correct execution of the work, especially in the departments where product damage could be maximized
Aah, that's been a satisfying video to watch, as I've been fighting my own personal battle against the "soviet steel" legend for a while now. Very good research Jack, well done!
Thanks for your help too Matteo
Russian steel may be no best nor worse than any other steel, but as I always say to people that agree with me on not buying russian steel:
You don't want russian steel because you think it rusts easly
I don't want russian steel because I hate Russia
We are not the same
You like what you WANT to hear !!! Truth is; Russian Steel was used and cars rusted from the INSIDE out.
i.e.: EVEN a galvanised chassis made of Russian steel by Fiat or Alfa Romeo in the 60's and all through the 70's would have rusted.
But Hey: It give your mate reason for a video and thats how he makes a living.
Gotta wonder why the subject even interests anybody anymore since the cars have ...... rusted away. LOL.
If you're of a certain age, one of your rights of passage, was the Isopon filler & spray can paint 'apprenticeship, whatever car you owned'!
Thanks Jack🙏
Thanks chap!! Have a great weekend!
@@Number27 👍
Love your comment, thanks.
Thinking back to MOT testing in the 1980's, the most common rot boxes were seventies Escorts and Cortinas that would be beyond repair at 8-9 years old. Minis were rubbish, early Golfs pretty poor but surprisingly, the dear old Allegro would rarely fail on rot. Alfasuds normally failed on the circular jacking points on the four corners of the floor and the inner wings where the outer wings bolted on, assuming there was still enough of a wing left. Bodywise they were shite and the Sprint version was even worse. They were also very inconsistent - I used to test a bright yellow 1979 saloon that even after seven or eight years was still in good condition. Another Sprint actually broke its back when it was jacked up. A split in the front chassis rail opened up and the front wing separated from the rest of it as the inner wing/strut top area caved in. It failed of course. :-) More recently I've seen a couple of 159's that are as rusty as an old horseshoe underneath. I don't recall ever seeing a rusty 75 or 164 but they were built in Milan with rather more care.
Very interesting. Thank you for posting.
I own a 164 from 1988. All original paint, has always been kept well but it's passed all its life very near to the sea. No rust at all! ;)
Those were the days ! I used to be an MOT inspector as well. Good memories
The allegro if I remember correctly used to rust badly across the rear suspension mounting panel.That's if the mounts them selves didn't break first.It also was the subject of a few recalls ie front tie bars and brake hoses and of course who can forget the quartic steering wheel.
@@alanbicknell7696 That was the 1100/1300. They rusted so badly the rear subframe would break loose.
Being from the Netherlands, that import cars from all over Europe and are the perfect test bed for car rustiness, I can personally testify that the 70's rust problem wasn't limited to Italians. The French and British cars at the time had EXACTLY the same poor reputation. Hope that makes you feel a bit better ...
The better reputation for steel quality was with Swedish cars and (surprise!) with Lada's ...
There are many reasons italian cars of the 60's 70's and 80's and even before that as well rusted like crazy. The list can be long, and explanations likewise.
The story of Russian metal is widely spread and often mentioned, but it wasn't just the Russians. All manufacturers suffered more or less the same problems, WHY? (I remember looking at my friends 1984 Ferrari 308, and it had rust in its fenders around that little round blinker in 1987. I was appalled that a Ferrari could rust, but he just replied it's a used car, all used cars rust...
Well getting into the 60's rationing of goods were finally lifted, and demand for materials skyrocketed. Steel Mills where producing as much as they could. I have heard from a metallurgist that in order to make "steel" less prone to rusting, a good portion of it needs to be recycled metal that has fifnished it's propensity to oxydization. But also the content of different metals to create the best mix, like Chromium, Molybden, Cobalt, Zinc, and other metals weren't all that well developed. We have done quantum leaps since the 80's, but that's only part of the answer. Metallurgic advancements are important, but also the manufacturing process. The design was done on paper by hand, and not by computers. The manufacturing of parts was done the cheapest way like today, but involved metal bending as well as stamping. Some of these processes meant that some of the metal was thinner in some places and thicker in other. Then it was the little helping parts that were added in order to make it possible to weld them togehter. All these little areas of butressing created pockets that were impossible to reach with rustproofing once welded up, but water eventually found it's way and then the car was lost to the steel worms gnawing from the inside out. And paint was bad, rusting all by itself. Now we have acrylic paints that also have been improved, but also doesn't rust like the old paints that oxidized and rusted.
Today all is CAD and these "helper pieces" are no longer necessary since glue is being used instead, and the pieces are stamped out as an integral part instead of being welded.
So weak areas of welding that were extra prone to rusting are gone in most cars (not all, and these cars rust more). Rememeber welding areas/seams that rusted first?
Also you had lemons, some call them monday cars or lunctime cars etc. This is because much was made by hand - remember human intervention? Well humas forget, robots don't. So today all cars from one process are either good or bad. Mostly good since bad processes show up more easily. Metal thickness is more even, preparation is more even, rustproofing is more even, paint has the same thickness and so on.
Add everything up, and there you have it. It's called progress.
BTW I used to own an Alfa in the form of 1979 Alfetta 1.6 in a subtle red color that tends toward burgundy (it was a different name), but beautiful on that car. I got it in 1984 and it was badly rusted in the usual places (door bottoms). It had so much rust in the front subframe and steering gear that the previous owner had welded the dampers in place !!! But fond memories. Someone had tuned the engine to the max with oversized DellOrto's, triple valve-springs and a full exhaust from Ansa that ensured it sounded like a race car. It went like one as well. The redline was well beyond 10k and the needle just swung around and pegged against the stop. It sounded glorious and went like stink. It scared most people but I remeber it fondly for how it went, and how much space it had inside. Alfa knew how to exploit available space. HUUUUGE trunk, and extremely roomey inside the cabin, way beyond what the dimensions would call for (why don't they build cars like that anymore? Fun engine, fun capacities, and lots of space. Maybe my memory serves me wrong here...)
I would like to attach a list of Italiano sport car manufacturing that I found while seaching the problem that may be entertaining.
The Six Laws of Italian Sports Cars
1) THE LAW OF PLEASING DESIGN WHERE IT REALLY DOESN’T MATTER
“The inside of cam covers or other relatively innocuous areas, shall be laced with buttresses, cross-bracing and all manner of esoteric stiffness-with-lightness design, while something like connecting rods shall self-destruct at redline plus 1 rpm due to a basic lack of strength.” An example of this Law is the stunningly beautiful Lamborghini or Ferrari V12s of the late 1960s. They were famous for wearing out all four camshafts in 10,000 miles or less. The cam’s metal appeared to be recycled coathangers, which coincidentally are still in short supply in Italy.
2) THE LAW OF NON-FUNCTIONAL APPARATUS
“All Italian Sports Cars, regardless of age, shall have at least one system or component which does not work, and cannot be repaired. Such a part shall never be mentioned in the Official Shop Manual, although there may be an out-of-focus picture shown.” It goes without saying that such parts should never under any circumstances be removed, lest the natural balance of the car be upset.
3) THE LAW OF ELECTRICAL CHAOS
“All Italian Sports Cars shall be wired at the Factory by a cross-eyed, colour-blind worker, using whatever supplies are within reach. All wires shall change colour-code at least once between energy source and component. All grounds shall be partially insulated.” This tends to guarantee that the owner of such vehicles will eventually be intimately familiar with its electrical system, since he will need to trace out each wire, then rewrite his Official Schematic, which will differ from all others in at least one area.
4) THE LAW OF PERSONAL ABUSE
“The more an Italian car breaks down, the more endearing it becomes to its increasingly irrational owner.” For example, you purchase an Italian Sports car, for all the money you ever hoped to earn, and receive a ticket for air pollution on the way home from the dealer due to the vast clouds of smoke that follow you. Several return trips to said dealer, accompanied by your rapidly dwindling cash reserves, cures the smoking. But now, the engine sounds like a food processor full of ball-bearings. After replacing every component in the car, including the radio speakers, the noise vanishes and is replaced by an odour reminiscent of a major fire in a goat-hair mattress factory. You still keep trying, God help you.
5) THE LAW OF UNAVAILABLE PARTS
“All parts of an Italian sports car shall be made of a material that is available in inverse proportion to its operating half-life.” Thus, the speedometer hold-down screws are made of grade 8 cold rolled steel, while the valves are of fabricated Unobtanium, made only at midnight by an old man with a pointy hat covered with moons and stars. Such parts will be backordered during the design phase of the car, and will remain so forever. Bribes, pleading and threats will be ignored.
6) THE LAW OF CRYPTIC INSTRUCTIONS
“Any official publications dealing with repair, maintenance or operations of an Italian sports car shall be written such that every fourth word is incomprehensible to the average owner. In the event that a random sentence is understandable, the information contained therein shall be wrong.” This is also known as flat-tyre English, where a sentence flows along nicely, then - Kaboom!
You 100% nailed it. Have worked on every Italian car, name it and it’s true what you expose.
Thanks man
You forgot rule 7!
All Italia sport cars are to be exported to customer countries as deck cargo on submarines therefor ensuring a continuous customer base!
Cars are also often designed poorly, even in the age of CAD, with some spots prone to holding water and eventually rust(no amount of epoxy primer can prevent the metal from rusting if it holds water). I've had a ton of 80s to 00 BMWs- E31, E32, E34, E36, E38 and E39. Most of them are relatively modern(I meantechnogical process) and generally won't rust on their own, but all of them have these "dumb spots" that will always eventually rust. Usually where metal profiles are drilled to fit some plastic skirts or trim pieces- if not flooded with wax, they are gone.
@@karolmalinowski9097 I agree with you 100% I have also had a number of BMW's for more than 20 years starting with e21 and e30 which rusted badly, thrunk was especially prone. As did e9 and e24 especially at the bottom of the firewall. the e34, e39, e38, e65, e91 and ending up with f20 and f22. The newer ones don't rust yet. and the e39 and e91 that I still own have been protected regularly with tuff-kote dinol. They don't have a spec of rust. BMW has become better and better over the years, and lots of the subchassis and wheel/suspension system being made of alu/mag alloy rust or rather corrode very little. But as you say, poor design where you have water pockets still make cars rust. especially when driven on salty roads, which we have at least 6 months out of the year where I live.
Great vid Jack... it's not often a youTuber not only listens to their subscribers [like me and Chris] but then carries out a lot of research to self correct and does a vid to set the record straight. Massive kudos to you sir !
Thank David, glad you enjoyed it!
Soviet steel had less carbon and nickel in its composition, and this can speed up the oxidation process. But the biggest problem for Alfa's south Italy factory of those times, was the storage of the steel sheets outside/outdoor before they were pressed, and the poor
anti-corrosive protection associated with the painting scheme, at the level of the primer layer (and the incorporation of zinc as a constituent), and other anti-corrosive compounds on the chassis, before painting. This problem was also common on Fiat 127, 128, not only on this Alfa-Romeo model, and also on some Lancias. Do not compare this, in general, with the German and Swedish standards, saying that they also suffered from the same problem, in the same way. That's not true, and it's already a subject known to everyone who knows the reality of the European automotive industry since the '60s.
The Russian steel was also hot rolled-unlike the common cold rolled stell. Hot rolled steel is less string and more probe to flexing. My experience with rusty cars is extensive-one of the best American makes (oddly enough) was AMC-they did a body primer dip before painting, my AMC had very little rust at 12 years old.
You are ignoring that the involvement of Russian steel was debunked. Further more, if the steel sheets were stored outside then Moroni would have picked up on it and that would have been the end of the rust issues. The real reason can be found in the car specifications: the 1st series Alfasud weighs only 730 kg whereas the Volkswagen Golf Mk 1 is 790 kg, but unlike the tiny Golf the Alfasud is in fact a proper size family car featuring an impressive boot space. How do you think they managed to loose weight? Sure they won some on the more modern engine design, but what really did it was thinner sheet metal and that's where car building techniques from that era bit back because you cannot paint the inside of hollow sections. Every car from that era (roughly '70-'90) I ever owned thus eventually suffered from the same issue: condense in hollow sections evolving to rust that at some point would break through to the outer shell. On cars from more conservative manufacturers it just took longer to show, but had MOT existed in those years the differences would not have stood out as much as they are presented today.
From what I have seen on my Italian cars of that era if you could not see the surface from the outside it was not painted. Not even primed. Plus they also use double skinned panels which become dirt and moisture traps especially around edges like hoods (bonnets) and wheel arches etc.
@@johnmcdermott5505 Exactly, the fitting of wheel arch liners solved a lot of the problems. No cavities for the road dirt and mud to build up and never dry. I'm old enough to remember when viewing a slight accident on the street, the amount of dirt that fell from the wheel arch area. Of course now bodies are dipped to prevent corrosion but I run an old Land Rover Defender which has the same issues with dirt build-up in the chassis box sections. Jet washing regularly is a must to keep things under check.
soft steel ? so tooling lasted longer and possibly the body lines were more crispy? than if using say SS 304 or 308 that's way harder as ford found out on Lincolns and mustangs but quick quite after less than 200 cars in as it ate the tooling
Jack, I've owned a few Alfas, and whilst I acknowledge that Suds did sometimes rust in the center of panels for no apparent reason, their rust was always worst in cavities that Alfa had filled with a porous spay foam. The foam acted like a sponge, and ensured that the panel that it was supposed to protect always remained wet, thereby promoting rust.
I was hoping that you were going to tell us the story behind the introduction of the foam.
dad had two and yes it was common.we had no Idea these were made from Russian steel to be honest.Look at any Sud Sprint from the first half of the eighties sold in Australia and compare it to any Fuego,Prelude,Cordia,Laser S later TX3(I am measuring class of similar vehicles)from about the same era 1980-1985 and the condition after three years and the french and japanese cars would be in better condition when it is time to trade up.we looked at a Laser in 85 out of interest to replace our second Alfa due to the Europeans not offering anything affordable by that stage.
The foam in the sills trick was introduced in 1976 (I think) and yes, it did makes things worse for a while, but Alfa fixed that and it did improve. The extreme rust cases that nearly bankrupted Alfa were the early 'Suds from 1972 to '76, before the foam injection was thought of.
The foam was in every pillar, seal and quarter panel. The Suds rusted out windows frames, sills, midpanel. The rims stayed nice😂
@@chrismartin9421 My 1978 Alfasud Ti literally dissolved between 1982 and 1983...not sure if it had the foam but either way it was a painful experience...mechanically and to to drive it was fabulous though...felt so sophisticated after my first car...a 1972 Triumph Spitfire...which to be fair was by comparison completely corrosion free...
My dad bought a 1978 Alfasud Ti when it was only 2 years old. Fantastic little car, but despite being treated with "Ziebart" from new, it rusted really badly while we had it. I remember helping him fill the holes and repaint bits before we sold it on!
Thank you for another very interesting video Jack. As a child, growing up in both the UK and Germany, I can confirm that the German cars of that time were indeed just as bad as anything else in the rust department. The two biggest culprits were BMW and Opel. Merc were a close second. My family had a Fiat dealership amongst its members. I can clearly remember my cousin showing my father rotten German coachwork in the body shop. Those were the days. Another large contributor were the many built in water traps to be found in areas of the body containing areas of multilayers of steel welded together eg. scuttle-wing-A pillar. All this in no way stops me adoring Lancia, Abarth (olde) and Fiat. Just love 'em and get on with them very well indeed. Bw Mike.
This explains why my dad bought a new car every 2-3 years when I grew up in the 70's and 80's in Germany. He bought Simcas/Talbots/Peugeots from the same family owned dealership every time, and undoubtedly got a good deal for being a loyal customer with the trade-ins and new cars. I assume French cars were no better in the rust department. Fast forward to today, and I'm driving a 24-year-old Honda with no rust issues whatsoever. Granted, I live in the American south, where snow is extremely rare. But still, times have changed for the better.
Thank you so, so much for having researched this and corrected the record, Jack. Jay Emm’s response when I pulled him up on this was underwhelming, to say the least. Thanks, too, to Chris; it seems that his book informed a lot of your work. I’ll be sharing this video to my Club Motori Italia mates and amongst the X1/9 and 128 communities.
I`ve owned over 200 cars, a good percentage of them were from Italy, but also Britain, Germany, France etc. I can tell you that all of them rusted at similar rates, the only manufacturers who were proactive when it came to rustproofing for longevity, was Mercedes, especially post 1975 & later Audi post 1982-ish. By the end of the 80`s, pretty much everyone else had caught up to greater or lesser degrees. Until that point, cars were routinely rotted to the point of failing MOT`s by 5 -7 years old, some even had holed outer panels at 2-3 years old! Your only real option was to have your shiny new car rustproofed immediately with Zeibart or similar (or filling your box sections up with used engine oil every year or 2).
Not true! I have owned a junkyard since 1985 and the Mercedes is the worst rusting cars of all makes. Some survive only bacause of the owners meticoulus care. In general though they are horrible and the most overrated car ever built. I bought 2000 cars once that had been sitting on the ground without wheels for 5-10 years and you couldn't lift an MB with a loader without it braking in half. So also the Citroen ID/DS and Japanese trucks. If I lifted a Vaz Lada they looked like new underneath.
@@mossig Mercedes did suddenly get very bad for rusting when the accountants took over from the engineers, circa 1995 (not just rust issues either). What I did find when I was in the motor trade, was that a lot of older Mercs that had been crashed (& all German cars) were repaired with cheap pattern panels in the 90`s (when "Euro Car Parts" took off in the UK), this led to a lot of them rusting out quickly, especially front wings, which were much thinner metal than the originals, & were made of poor quality steel.
@@MrPabsUk I don't know about the pre WW2 cars but from the Ponton, w110, w115, w123, w201, w124 they rust badly. A Lada cost 25% of the cheapest MB:s and consequently got washed and maintained a lot less, but rust less. My experience is that if you go buy an expensive car you tend not to talk it down until you are fed up with it and went to another brand. Yesterday I junked a 1998 w202 wagon and it had fotball size rust holes in many places. The rear suspension (hydraulic) was completely not salvageable due to heavy rust. MB:s rear axles are a nightmare to work with. I mean two days ago I junked a 1983 Escort and it was 99% rust free! Both of them was parked in my lot on wheels for about 6 years and I drave them both to their resting place years ago. I used to drive a 1974 W115 lang 220D. But one day it broke in half while driving it. I do have a almost rust free MB though. A 450slc 1980. But that is mostly because it was inside for many years and not used. But there is always an exception to the rule.
@@mossig I don't know about the early ones, but the 114/5, 123`s & 124`s I worked on were always better than their competitors, as you say, they tended to be owned by wealthy people who looked after them well, & tended to keep them in garages. I`ve only owned one Lada, I got it stupidly cheap, it was about 6 years old & I paid less than £100 for it. Nearly all the panels had rust. It wasn't "normal" rust though.. Like, at the top of the front wings, the entire length had small bubbles, which went all the way through the panel. I took a screwdriver banged it with the heel of my hand between each hole till the whole wing was cut through at the top.. It was like a perforated stamp! I had other cars with rusty front wings, but the rust would be concentrated in 2 or 3 places, either at the top corners &/or the bottom corners of the arches. The Lada metal also felt like lead, so if you hit the middle of a panel with a hammer, the damage would be very localised, whereas if you hit most cars panels with a hammer, the damage would extend 5 times further...
I did have a similarly aged (& stupidly cheap) Skoda 120 around the same time as the Lada, & that had no rust whatsoever.
I also had Escorts, including the Mk3 & 4, & they rusted everywhere! The worst place was the battery tray, which would then allow water into the car, rotting out the floors. This was partly because the scuttle & wings had no lip, so all the rain went directly into the engine bay, including onto the horizontal section under the battery, which would suffer acid damage from the battery itself. The last one I had, an 89 1.6 Ghia had suffered VERY badly because the owner used to park on a very steep driveway with the cars nose facing upwards, so the battery tray always had a pool of water on it, till it rusted through, then all that water would go into the car & make its way to the back. As a result the entire floorpan had rusted through..
That said, I also had a Porsche 924 that had rusted the battery tray (which sits in a similar place to the Escort), the difference was, the RHD 924`s had the fuse box directly under the battery tray inside the car, so when the battery tray rusted out, the water would then fill the fuse box, causing many, many issues. I`ve also had several 944`s, but they never did that.
A friend of mine had am Alfasud in the late 70's. It was a lovely car and really sporty compared to the offerings available from other manufacturers at that time. I remember a large rust spot breaking out in the middle of the roof, not where you expect rust to start, it appears the rust was built in from new.
Mine did exactly that right in the middle of the roof
lol so did my first sud and more in the middle of other panels.
Perhaps around the interior light area, that causes the formation of vapour, when the light is on, for a certain time and the temp outside is cooler (?)
In the mid 70’s, my older brother worked as a mechanic at a MG/Fiat/Lancia/Jaguar new car dealership in central Illinois. The Fiats needed rust repair immediately after delivery to the dealer, before they could be placed on show room floor. Apparently, the sea voyage allowed lots of sea water exposure.
All those makes crossed the Atlantic.
@@pd4165 But the non-Fiat makes withstood it better.
Very interesting mate. It is amazing how many of these type of myths are bandied around.
There is another Alfa myth going around that it is not possible to mount a Ferrari V8 into a 105. Hope someone proves that myth wrong!
@@thomasthacker4939 Good heavens. And its already a nu binary myth as it is.
In any industry or process I've been involved in, there are myths that untrained people begin to parrot to feel that have a knowledge of the concept. I watch videos of the wine industry (No wine is worth more than $30, they are just ripping you off" and the aviation industry (If it ain't Boeing, I ain't going), both of which I have been involved at a deep level and they both have comments making those ridiculous claims to false knowledge. And don't get me going on "Fix It Again Tony". I had an early 70s Fiat 124 Spider that was bullet proof and a fine road machine. When people know nothing about a subject but want to impress their friends they just repeat the cool sounding bad information they heard at the bar.
Maybe the urban legend took off because it was written on the side of a bus.
@@boyracer3477 You are absolutely correct.
The rust problem in Italian cars in the 1970s was related to poor quality steel sheet from the Taranto steel works supplied to the Alfasud works in southern Italy and other car plants as well as poor rust proofing, which could be remedied.
Hehe this steel plant is still kickin and once in a while polluting the Environment 😅
My father bought a Fiat 124 Sport Coupe (AC version) in 1969. Here in Canada where snow abounds and salt is used with great abandon, the poor beautiful car lasted about 3 years before it was a rusted through mess, even with dealer applied rustproofing, although mechanically it was perfect. In reality, most other brands of cars here suffered the same fate, but it usually took a few years longer. My mother, being a firm believer in customer service wrote multiple sternly worded letters to the Fiat Canada head office, which was conveniently located not 4 miles from our house, about the disappointment in the corrosive abilities of the car over several years. Finally tiring of the constant communiques from Mum, when a representative from the Fiat head office in Italy was visiting, he was sent to our house to inspect the car. He agreed, with my mothers beady eye glaring at him, that it was indeed not acceptable. A deal was then made that they would offer full trade in value for the car provided they purchase another brand new Fiat. They then purchased another 124 Coupe, a 1975 model (CC version), which ran beautifully for 10 years and over 100,000 miles with no real corrosion, 7 years with them, and 3 years as my first foray into car ownership. While I owned it, I decided to purchase a 1973 Alfa Spider, which while looking great, hid a huge amount of rot. A fresh coat of paint hid it beautifully.
I agree that while most all cars rusted in those years, Italian vehicles really took the trophy in spectacular fashion. I do think that the cause of it was a terrible workforce, with apathetic concerns of build quality, and all the other things mentioned about the workers.
My dad would disagree that Italian cars were no worse than others in the 70s. He had several brand new fiats that simply dissolved despite his best efforts with waxpyl. Rust would break out in the middle of a panel for no obvious reason. They were truly shocking and far worse than BL or ford of the same era.
Interesting video. 70's cars of all makes and models tended to rust thanks to mud traps, umpteen separate pressings being used due to how cars were designed and built back in the 70's, lack of arch liners and splash guards, car bodyshells being stored outside, workforce strikes (if going on strike was an Olympic sport British Leyland would win gold) and lack of proper anti-corrosion systems. I can still remember my dad having to underseal our R reg Escort MK2 a couple of years after buying it new because it was starting to rust.
Nobody denies that most cars of the period rusted, the point is, the Alfasud (particularly before 1977) was far worse. I worked for a major London Alfa dealer and we had a queue of cars in for repair that were still within their 12 month warranty.
salting the roads didn't help. All cars rotted away in Denmark thanks to road salt.
My 1974 Sud SE, rusted very badly, the brilliant dealer in York (Alwyn Kershaw) gave me the option of a swap for another Sud, in white, or he would repair my green one. I didn’t like white so the green one was welded back to life. It lasted for about an 18 months before the suspension turrets rusted through and leaked water into the cabin. I traded it for a Renault 5, this rusted the rear wings ! However my following four Alfas , two Suds, a Guilietta and GTV6 never rusted. I also had a 1974 Rolls Royce Shadow, which had rusted sills and rear arches. Maybe Alfas not so bad after all.
Ho
I’d heard stories of rusting 70s Rolls Royces - so much for ‘the best in the world’!
Good video, Jack.
I decided to research Russian-language sources so see if I could find info about exports of steel and other ferrous metal to Italy during that time but came up with nothing. Much more info about oil exports.
A bit of background. The USSR faced a problem with workers holding massive amounts of cash and little to buy. Until the late '50s workers were required to buy government bonds in value equal to 1/12th of their annual salary. Finance officials forecast that beginning in the mid '60s payments on mature bonds would exceed the amount the State received by the forced annual purchases. Someone had the bright idea to pitch to the workers they ought to patriotically donate their bonds to the State in gratitude. When this was proposed to workers it was immediately rejected. The Government decided to cease issuing these bonds and freeze their repayment and interest for 25 years. No longer forced to buy bonds, personal savings increased even more. An absence of borrowers meant this capital was gathering dust. Because the state had made no promise of providing the proletariat cars, it was thought this would be a good way to get capital moving in the economy, the state to earn a tidy profit, develop a new industrial sector, increase exports, and narrow the lifestyle difference between capitalist-state workers and those in the USSR.
A foreign marque was sought because the USSR didn't have drivetrains suitable for passenger vehicles as well as know-how in other automotive technologies. Ford Taunus 12M, Morris 1100, Peugeot 204, Skoda 1000MB, Renault 16, and Fiat 124 were purchased and shipped to the USSR for evaluation. The Renault became the favourite of the engineers. They were told the Government decided the contract would go to FIAT. The Italians offered better financing. The politics were better too - the USSR had identified Italy as the weak link in the Nato chain, the Italian Communist Party was the largest in Western Europe, and communist politicians had been appointed government ministers, making the Party influential.
During tests at the Dmitrovsky test site of the Central Scientific Research Automobile and Automotive Engines Institute, the 124 showed itself poorly. After the first 5000 kilometres driven, it became absolutely clear that it was impossible to operate the model on Soviet roads without modifications, for example it lacked towing eyes and the low ground clearance was too low - at 120 mm this made it difficult to travel country roads. Engineers claimed drivers wouldn't be able to park in the city without the risk of damaging the car on the kerb. In addition, the car frame was not robust enough and began to crack. Italian engineers made about 800 changes to the design. The VAZ 2101's engine was modified to an overhead camshaft. In addition, the rear disc brakes were replaced with drum brakes, and the thickness of the critical elements of the load-bearing body was increased. The most noticeable external difference is the clearance was raised by 30 mm.
On 20 July 20 1966, the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted a joint resolution 'On the construction of a plant for the production of passenger cars' as part of its Eighth Five-Year Plan. The decree provided for the construction from 1967 to 1969 a plant in Tolyatti, Russia (a company town named for Italian Communist Party leader Palmiro Togliatti) for the production of passenger cars in the amount of 600,000 units per year, as well as the organisation of the production of components for them. Over 1200 hectares of land were allotted for the construction of the car factory, related facilities, and infrastructure such as housing.
Really interesting on the selection process undertaken by the Soviets, thank you!
Great investigation work Jake. Back home in Portugal i know ,my dad had a Sud,some new cars were taken apart and rust treated and that's why there are still nice Suds around there. The last Alfa Romeo made before Fiat takeover is one of my favourites too, the 75 :)
Thanks Inacio, take care chap!
In Canada in the first half of the 1970s, it was a bit of a rust-fest. Datsuns were famous for visible rust, Toyotas for secret rust, the Brits for slow steady rust, and Fiats for complete rust. The Fiat 128s were so bad that there was a buy-back program. Luckily any car they bought back had turned to lace, and so Fiat Canada did not need to spend money on using crushers to dispose of them! That era pretty much spelled the end of mainstream Italian car sales in Canada.
Hi Bob, that's very interesting. I came to Canada in the mid eighties from the UK and had often wondered about the lack of Italian cars here. I had assumed that with the smaller population the market was too small. Perhaps that is the case for French manufactures?
@@iansmeath8674 the French had a solid niche market here in the 60s, especially in Quebec. However, their dealer network declined as the dealers defected to higher volume brands. Japanese competition pushed them out of the entry level market. Personally, I have a Citroën 2CV, and am part of the teeny tiny French car community that still exists in eastern Canada.
@@bobmcl2406 Thanks for the info on the Canadian car market Bob, very interesting. So you have a 2CV quite a rarity though I have seen a couple here. One had a brilliant license plate
"ESCARGOT" priceless!
240Zs if driven year round in the northern tier of the US rusted completely away in about three years.
Very interesting car production history, Jack. And it's right on the spot what I have heard. The late father of a close friend of mine was head of the Austrian Alfa Romeo importing company. He told me that because the paint shop in Pomigliano d'Arco was often out of service, due to strikes or other reasons, the raw Alfasud bodies were stored outside and often without any protection and were subject to weather. And note: Pomigliano d'Arco is close to Napoli and Napoli is on the Calabrian coast. So there is always a little bit of salt in the air's vapor.
Very interesting vid. You say that pretty much all cars of the era rusted, and I would agree, but….
Most cars rusted in places where you would guess that they would, areas exposed to water a lot, inner wings, cills etc. But Alfas, Lancias and Fiats would rust pretty much anywhere. My Alfasud had a hole right in the middle of a door panel, it started as a bubble under the paint, so it’s origins were before the paint was applied. But it was a great drive!
Very true. My mates dad had a Fiat Strada in the eighties. That had rust right in the middle of the roof
A schoolmate's father had one of the early Giuliettas in the late seventies. Wonderful car, fast and impressive for the time, but that also had rustholes in the middle of the panels (doors, wings) develop after only 2 - 3 years. I think it was connected with new technologies for spraypainting. The old paints (solubles) were very unhealthy for the workers, as well as very bad for the environment so new products (based on water?) were used. But on the other hand, French and German cars did not rust in that way at the time...
Great history Jack, thanks for this video. I owned an 83 Sud Ti in Sydney with minor corrosion, they no doubt improved rustproofing towards the end. Our Pomigliano built 156 still has no issues. Cheers.
Well documented Jack and it’s great to see myths like this one explained and with facts, rather than simply opinion and copied thoughts. I have owned Fiats and Alfas built in the ‘60s, 70’s, 80s and 2000s. Asides this our family over the years has owned, Australian, Japanese, English, German and Italian built cars across the decades, all of which have had rust issues at some point in time. The very simple observation I can make is that rust protection, eg on the undersides and in cavity sections, historically was very poor and thankfully has improved. If Soviet steel had been the issue why would rust still occur in cars built from
the 1990s onwards. So yes, it’s a myth just like numerous other ones exist. The use of salt on the roads in many parts of the world (though not here in Oz, NZ etc) also has a significant part to play in why so many cars rust.
im going to help dispel that myth about tanks as armour steel is actually high quality but probably would eat the tooling to make the body's so like quality low carbon local cheap steel was probably used and by the sounds of it probably wasn't even up to the lab report aka what we sold the factory isn't what you though you bought so maybe junky steel will impurity's ect. that wasn't supposed to be in the steel add on it looks like from the pictures it's thin gage metal so rust is more of a problem to begin with design wise of the body work even if SS was used
I was in the motor trade at the time, and we never actually thought that they were made of Russian steel. What we did know without doubt however was that all Italian cars rusted horrendously, not just the Alfasud but all Fiats, Alfas, Lancias and even Ferraris etc. Yes, all cars in those days rusted but Italian cars were by far the worst. I even knew of Fiat Stradas which had rust holes in them at 18 months old. We used to say that they were 'dehydrated bodyrot, just add water for instant rust!'. We used to believe that they were made for the sunny Ialian climate, as soon as they saw British rain they fell apart. They were pretty useless then and they're not much better now.
ain't that the truth.
I had a Strada that i really liked, but was lucky with that one as it had a manageable level on that car. But the rust thing of those days was all over the place & a case of what impurities exist in the next cauldron sort of thing. It did get me with the jumping out of reverse thing.
I’ve followed Roadster Life on RUclips for some time now and his video on the Sud put the Russian steel myth to bed for me . Great to see you’re honest enough to correct yourself Jack . Really well researched video 👍🏻
Thank Matt!
It was partly that which led me to investigate further. Like Jack, I have to admit I had long believed the Russian myth but it did seem to only apply in English books and magazines. As I had to learn some Italian anyway in my research I soon found other clues. There is much Italian government documentation available online if you can read it. And Matteo at Roadster Life was also a help.
I owned 5 Lancias, including 2 Betas and an HPE. I didn't keep any of them long enough to see any rust. However the last was a Gamma coupe which I believe was built in the Ferrari factory on the 400 production line. That car was pretty rust free after 18 years so that seems to validate the working practice theory.
Thanks for a very informative video.
The Gamma Coupé was built by Pininfarina, not by Ferrari.
@@8BRInteractive I know but I read it was built on the Ferrari 400 production line.
My mother in law's Fiat Doblo had amazing body, one of the best I've known, infinitely better than contemporary German cars. It's reliability was amazing also.
In around 1980, every Alfa Romeo GTV chassis were sent to the small town of Hässleholm in Southern Sweden by train. There, they were treated in the Tuff-Kote Dinol plant and subsequently returned the same way. Tuff-Kote Dinol was a pretty popular corrosion maintenance system in those days and you could could see the Dinol sticker on many cars. In the end, I believe the Italians built their own processing plant. In any case, the train traffic ceased.
You are quite right that most cars rusted badly in the 70s. Audi had a particularly bad reputation. My cousin in Hamburg had a Fiat Mirafiori 131 and an Audi 80 at roughly the same time, both rusted away at the same rate. I heard a rumour that the Russian steel/Fiat thing was that Fiat facilitated the use of Russian steel for the Yugoslav built Zastavas.
Brilliant video. Nothing like some facts which appear well researched, to start tongues wagging. I've enjoyed reading all the comments very much!
The Lancia Beta HPE was an absolute master class in kerb side design, it always looks 'just right' and as it should be. It is a shame they are practically extinct now due to the rot problem.
Hi Jack , I,m glad your studying has highlighted other issues that lead to the “Italian Rust Scandal “. Our UK motor industry was not the only country with poor management relations as often quoted by British TV media, and this vid highlights this particularly with the Italian cars. In the Lancia Beta case , it was discovered the shells of cars were often left outside either in primer or without whilst production was on strike , which as you say , was frequent. Similar pattern here in UK happened in Rovers plant with the SD1 production , the car had an excellent process for paint , provided we had continuity of production , well we all remember what happened there! Another factor, which has been overlooked was with the introduction of both the Alfasud and the Lancia Beta models coincided the with the Oil Crisis early mid 1970’s , so they sat in UK docks for ages , as cars were not selling awfully well , a similar thing happened to 1st Ferrari 308 GT4s , and you don’t hear many slagging them off for rust! ( But they did) . With both the Beta and the Sud aiming for a different market to their predecessors, also the with Uk joining the Common Market meant their pricing was more advantageous, having had the big Import tax removed, which existed since Clement Attlee put it on after WW11 , this made previous models in Jaguar E type territory . It can be argued for this reason that buyers of the new models may not have had so fastidious owners than were before. Either way, people seemed to forget premature rusty subframes on Minis and the ADO 16 models, we still bought them . Rusty front strut mounts on Escorts ,Cortina’s etc; we still bought them , and what about the metallic Silver Fox paint on 1600E and 1300E Fords which literally flaked off before your very eyes! It’s obviously a very fickle world in motoring folklore. Really liked this vid. P.s You ought to try a really well sorted Beta they are quite brilliant
My dad tells the tale of when he had a puncture on his 1956 Vauxhall Wyvern.
He put the jack in the offside rear jacking point and started Jacking the car up.
The jack went up but the car stayed on the ground lol.
The floor completely rotted out!
There's Top Gear clips from the 80s about the Metro where early cars were rust buckets in 3 years. Cr@p manufacturing is cr@p manufacturing
My dad bought a brand new Montego turbo diesel in the 80s and that had to have the sills repaired under warranty at less than six years old.
This is absurd. As the former finance director of the largest steel trader in the world I can tell you that Soviet, and now Russian, steel is of the highest quality, right up there with Germany and Japan. I remember chartering a vessel from the Black Sea to Australia which we loaded with steel to be used in the Bushmaster, for example.
In the 70’s my father worked in a large steel components supplier for the automotive industry in The Netherlands. At a certain moment Mercedes Benz did abruptly stop the production of their steel products. All produced steel part het to be scrapped. Later on other ca brands did the same. However the high standard Mercedes Benz quality control carried out by Mercedes Benz themselves was the first to spot the rise problem. What happened was that the whole car industry started to buy recycled steel what was a rather new phenomenon in the early seventies. The Russians offered it for a very good price (better then the rest of the steel market). How they were able to do so turned out later on. The Russians did not recycle the steel a temperature that high enough to have all impurities come floating op tot the surface. Therefore the new steel had a ha the corrosion already in it when it came straight out the Russian steel factories. This problem hit most car factories not only the Italian car factories.
I remember watching a UK TV show in the '90s about car rust, and exactly this was described. Mercedes were cited as being effected, surprised and traced the problem to poor steel manuf. Rust was described as existing throughout the metal. Funnily enough, Italian cars not mentioned.
After saying that, I remember a less-than-1 year old Alfa Sud with both wing indicators missing, as the rust holes where they should be were so big the lights no longer fit!
Spot on and much more like it on what is such a silly thread.
What a load of nonsense. Provide evidence in the form of scientific analysis of steel samples before you spout your garbage. I bet you never melted anything harder than a candle in your life. You have merely repeated the exact myth that this article debunks.
I can't decide if I now love the the brand more or not. Amazing it's still alive. Great post!
if you have ever taken the fenders off of an italian car, you'll immediately see why they rust - the only surfaces that were painted were the visible body panels. Inside the fenders is bare steel. Couple that with the majority of the cars being sold in the Northeastern US where everything rusts, it makes them all look bad.
I don't know about Alfa Romeo, but I have read in several books on Volkswagen cars that VW bought cheap steel from the Russians, though they don't mention anything about it being recycled. This combined with poor rustproofing techniques meant that early Rabbit/Golf, Scirocco, and Jetta cars were often rust buckets.
Great video!
Informative video on an interesting subject, thanks. We had a couple of Fiats in the family, a 1980 127 and a 1981 128, and both of them rusted quite badly. It's definitely true to say that pretty much all cars from the late '60s to early '80s had corrosion issues to some degree, but I think Italian and Japanese cars were at the 'serious rust' end of the spectrum. In other words, all cars rusted but some were noticeably worse than others. I agree that the Soviet steel story is probably a myth and the issues were down to poor management and manufacturing practices within the Italian motor industry at that time. A shame as the cars were so cool!
I had an Alfasud Sprint 1.5 and it wasn't rusty, great car, lots of happy memories.
Oh dear Jack, you spent a video correctly pronouncing the likes of Lancia Beta. That's only going to even more annoy the Porsche snobs that hate how you say that.
One minor correction, that Franklin Delano Roosevelt referred to here is the son of the former President (with the same first and middle name). His father, the President, died in 1945.
I thought Lancia was ‘Lan-cha’ rather than the ‘Lan-seer’ Jack uses?
@@emmajacobs5575 I believe it is the first way, but both crop up here. It's just the Porsche fans get wound up the most about it.
Thank you and yes you are right on Roosevelt!
I keep hearing about Porsche pronunciation being Incorrect.
Which is correct
Porsche or Por-sha...?
.
Apparently the Germans pronounce Volkswagen as
Folks - Vagen
I always get annoyed when people say FIATs rust. I have owned 4 FIATs: a 1975 128, a 1986 Regata, a 1995 Uno diesel and a 2003 Punto diesel, of these the only one that rusted was the 1975 128. By the time the 80's came along the problem had been solved by zinc coating the steel.
I spent the greater part of the 1970's welding rusty cars, and there was many Fiats among them, the fiats rusted in the same way all 1970's cars rusted, perforation from the inside out due to lack of internal primer in the hollow sections and almost total lack of any underbody sealant combined with multiple underbody mud/water traps. The Alfas were different, and different in a way that showed the steel was badly made, wherever it originated from! Bad storage and bad industrial relations may explain the reason for some Italian car problems. but on the Alfas I saw something I had never seen before or since, with one exception! We bought a low mileage Alfa Gulietta 2 door, what a lovely car, front engined, rear gbox and wearing twin webbers (Dellortos?) on its 1.8 twin cam engine, unfortunately both rear shock absobers were hanging loose in the turrets in the back wheel arches! when repairing it I noticed that the steel I was removing looked like it had been rolled with layers of slag between seperate sheets or layers of metal and it was clearly delaminating into four or more seperate thin sheets, the rust was coming from inside the steel! Wherever there was a poorly protected cut edge, the moisture seemed to be drawn into the "slag" layer by capilary action and the whole part would begin to swell and delaminate. It may not have come from Russia, and it may be coincidence but the only place I saw similar delamination of steel was in the Moskovich vans and pickups, imported by my part time employer in their thousands! At the time a Moskovitch van or pick up was £1300 new , signwritten if required and including towbar and electrics! Moskovitch didn't actually make a pick up, they were all bought as vans, and most were "converted" at a bodyshop somewhere in East Yorkshire Where the importers were based!
Phil
My 850 FIAT was a terrible rustbox, I had an Accident with it requiring me to replace the front panel, it was the totally useless painting that allowed condensation to eat it from inside the box sections and under the reinforcing of the other panels where they were spot welded and nothing to protect it. However my Ford Anglia 105 of ten years earlier had NO paint at all in the chassis box panel nor inside the door and body. The paint was also cellulose and that has sod all protection from water. Dip treatments with good paints, means that modern car do not suffer from this problem and now depend on sensors and electronics to cause them to be scrapped.
Very interesting and very informative Jack ...I like these history presentations from you ..
As a huge Alfa fan and owner I too believed the Russian steel story ...
Anyhow excellent ...well done
Strikes when the metal was in the harbours for months and the sea saltwater made the rust.Myth from Hellas.
I really enjoyed this perspective and it would be interesting to know which Fiat models were from which factory over the years. Before we were married I bought a 5 year old 1973 Fiat 126 to fix up for my girlfriend and the front end was full of holes and required many new panels. After I fixed that she progressed to a Fiat 127 in 1982 which was also 5 years old and the bottom 4 inches of the driver's door skin had been eaten away so a bit of progress in a way as the rest of it seemed ok!
We had both a 127 and a 128 in the family in the early-mid '80s when I was a youngster. They rusted quite badly despite being Ziebarted but not as bad as your experience. I remember the bottoms of the door skins, all the hinges in the cars and along the lip of the hatchback (127) and boot (128) being the worst. Surprised the doors did not fall off as the hinges were so weakened by rust. The undersides were OK so the extra rustproofing must have had some effect.
Fantastic video as always. My dad bought a Lancia Beta in the 70s. A truly gorgeous car but it was rusting within weeks of delivery. My Alfas (916 Spider, Giulietta QV and Brera) have all been free of rot. Things have definitely improved.
mercedes espacialy the sprinter van the w210 the es klass after the w140 are also rust buckets
And they were premium cars
Cheap Chinese steel
Fascinating video Jack.
Interesting to set the record straight.
It's clear most manufacturers in the 70s were having rust issues.
It wasn't until early 80s that galvanized steel started to become the norm.
I think there may be a way to settle this once and for all.
...
If small metal samples taken from Alfa's, Fiat's, Lancias made from 70s and have all these individually metallurgically tested.
This would identify the elements within the steel.
As mentioned in the comments, Russian steel lacked high quantities of Nickel and Chromium as these were expensive.
A test would clearly identify the type of steel used by each manufacturer.
I suspect you'll find they'll all match.
...
They did this metal analysis on metal fragments from the Titanic as there were rumours of poor quality steel used in construction. This was being (recently) considered as one of the reasons for the sinking.
They found the steel was excellent quality high carbon content.
Later research found rivets used on the bow of the ship were of a lesser quality than used elsewhere on the ship. Not necessarily a structural issue, more facilitated the break up when the Titanic started to sink.
...
Mate had a W reg Fiat Strada.1.3 in the early 90s.
It was a bit of a jalopy and of course rusty..he never locked it - no one stole it lol..
Engine was sweet thou.
I worked for Fiat/Lancia at the Brentford and Alperton UK headquarters in the 70's and 80's. Rusty Lancia Betas were bought back from customers on the quiet and disposed of in clandestine circumstances. There was a secure compound at Alperton full of them and the state of some Betas had to be seen to be believed...
I believe they were sent to a scrap metal dealer in Somerset and crushed behind closed doors.
@@roberttucker805 This steel debunk is so ridiculously researched, i could go with they betas were recycled back into russian tanks right now.
Thank you for laying that one to rest. Selling Lancias in the mid 80s I realise the fall out from the whole 70s corrosion fiasco. I also loved everything Italian and it really hurt that in the UK we laughed at Italian cars whereas nobody mentioned the suspension turrets corroding in Escorts or the Pinto engines that suffered oil starvation to the camshafts. The Chevettes that rotted behind the headlights and so on. In more recent times we've had a FIAT 128 Punto, 2 X Pandas, a 156 and a Giulietta Multiair. They've all been good cars.
156 a beautiful car
Interesting video. Thanks for sharing it.
I well remember going to the Motor Show at some point in the 1970s when everyone was laughing at Porsche for declaring their intention to galvanise their body shells. It was just accepted that cars would rust through in a few short years. I had a four year old Ford Cortina in 1980 and it had a hole in the front wing that you could put your fist through.
Are you kidding me? The document dated 1965 names a Franklin Roosevelt and you say he wasn't yet President?. Lol. That Roosevelt was never President. Franklin D. Roosevelt was President during WW2, a couple decades previous.
Rust in late 60's and early 70s cars was probably due more to poor design of box sectioning sheetmetal for chassis strength. Leaving areas with poor drainage of water and poor rustproofing. By late 70's most cars had much better rustproofing as well as additional dealer installed rustproof materials at extra cost.
MG's, Triumphs, Volvo, Chevy's, Fords,Chrysler, etc all rusted out just as bad, especially if they were in rust belt areas.
Thanks for pointing out the Roosevelt thing.. I had assumed it was the same person and didn’t make the connection on the dates being so far off!
It was his Son
@@paulie-Gualtieri. he was an interior decorator ...
Couldn't agree more, with your thoughts! Well done.
Didn't know about the Mafia, but it's obvious in South Italy.
Had a friend who had a new Fiat 1100, in the late '60, with a rusty front bumper (new), so he had to complain (fight) with his dealer and he was told that the bumpers were left out side in the rain, befor getting chromed!
I had a B prefix reg (1984) Alfa Sprint 1.5 ti Cloverleaf and a mate of mine had a 1982 Alfasud 1.5 ti Cloverleaf (W suffix reg) and we used to nickname our cars Alfa-Seltzer as they effervesced in the rain ;-)
Loved my Sprint. The sound of the twin Weber carbs on over-run...Music....
Interestingly, my father who was a mechanic in the 1970's-1980's had a slightly different version of the myth: He told me that the steel came from recovered shipwrecks and they somehow screwed the melting process, leaving sea salt in the steel, thus leading to the panels rotting from the inside. I can't wait to tell him the truth :-)
Where did they recover all those shipwrecks from?
It's expensive to do and there are millions of cars to recycle right on your doorstep.
Economically it would be insane (you only recover shipwrecks if they're an obvious danger to very high value shipping routes or you want uncontaminated steel if it wasn't exposed to fallout from nuclear explosions - or historical wrecks for museums).
Very interesting. I was fooled by that rumour as well. I love the way you pronounce all the Italian names so well and yet use the English pronunciation of Lancia.
It is so satisfying to hear someone speak English _and_ correctly pronounce Italian names.
This story reminds me of a - probably - other urban legend:
According to it, Volkswagen used Polish steel up to 1984 - which is why they did rust like crazy.
I think in 84 they did invest in rust protection - wax conservation, sealing welds etc..
I owned a 1991 mk2 Golf - which was known (except the very first ones) for really good rust protection.
Even today, you can see brown lines of wax under the rear hatch on a summer day.
Unfortunately, VW had the bright idea to save on that in 1993 - they hired Ignazio Lopez (who previously did cost-cutting at Opel/Vauxhall, the first Astra was a perfect lemon) making the Golfs of that year rust like crazy.
All 70s cars were pieces of crap that rusted while you watched. They'd have rusting wings and door sills well before they were 5 years old. They hadn't mastered the preparation and painting process and the necessity to shield stone damage from the wheels. There were mud traps everywhere which held damp and road salt. Of course so long as they all rotted this was just fine for the manufacturers.
Alfa cured their rust problem in about 1987 when they launched the 75/Milano which had better panels and better treatment. The Alfa 164 is one of the best rust protected production cars ever. They've slipped back a bit these days, but are no worse than anybody else now.
Aussie Holden Kingswood and Ford Falcons are rust magnets
All cars rotted in those days, my dad had to scrap a 68 singer vogue in 73 ! Completely rotten underneath, and my first boss had spent two years restoring a 68 Jag 420 it was rotten right through by 76 when he started work on it!
It's been known for years in tank community that Italian iron ore is oxide rich and prone to rust.
And actually soviet cars from early 70-ties rust less than early 80-ties. I'm lucky to own few Moskviches from 1969 to 1987 in original factory paint so got a lot of evidence on that.
Thank you! Very interesting to hear about the tank stuff!
07:56 Roosevelt (the president) died in 1945, it's quite hard to figure him waiting to become president in 1965
As a past Alfa Sud owner (5) the rust was no greater than other cars of the era.
The last one was a beauty, though. A white 1.5 Ti. Waxoil dripping out of it.
A really fast car but also pretty good mileage.
The first to second was always a bit hit or miss.
Cool vid.
My dad had a 1970's Alfa Sud. The biggest problem with it was keeping the engine cool in traffic jams. He had to add extra fans with switches on the dash board. I learned to drive on that car, it was lively and fun but i bought myself a Mk1 Escort as soon as I could.
Hi Jack, couple of points. I bought (actually my dad did) a Ford Crapi (sorry Capri) in 1970 in the states. Literally within 8 months the rear fender (ie wing) began to rust. In 2 years the car was very rusty. And in December 1984, I was in MIrafiore and other Torinese plants with company big wigs (I was just a small guy) and we toured the zinc coating bath which Fiat had put in place to solve the rust issues. I think their system was licensed from Porsche.
Thanks Dom, interesting to hear!
Fascinating, Jack. Really enjoyed that. And I love your Italian pronunciation. Martin
Flipping ace mate what a great contribution. Thanks chap (Si from Bath)
Very interesting video, having grown up in the 80s this rumor has been around. In reality the same problems with early Japanese cars (Datsun I'm looking at you) and a lot of British layland products as complete bear metal bodies were transported uncovered on a flat bed truck in the rain and snow to be painted in another factory nearby in the midlands. Great video Mr 27.
The boxer engine also had a problem with insuficient engine protection. Many engines broke in parking lots during winter, because owners drove into snow piles that melted from engine heat and then later the water froze in the timing belt and at start up the belt jumped on the sprockets and bent the valves. Also they used foam for insulation inside tight body spaces. This is still done in many makes but the material is now incased in plastic bags so that they don't collect water.
I bought a brand new 1981 Lancia Beta Coupe back in the the day. It was my pride and joy for 16 years, and i looked after it very very well. I always lived one street back from the Ocean in Australia, in what is a very salty environment, with car only under a carport.
I detailed the car myself monthly including waxing it about 4 times a year.
Throughout its whole life with me, I only ever had about 3 rust spots develop around the windscreen at different times, and each time they appeared i would have them properly cut out and re-done....this was all i ever had.
So considering, i think mine did as good as any decent car would of this era, so mine bucked the myth trend for sure.
My parents had a Ford Corsair from new and the top of the front wing perforated in 18 months. However Alfas and Lancias were spectacular in their ability to disintegrate before your eyes 😄
Just watched your fascinating vid Jack. Thank you for explaining the rust issue with Alfa’s so well. I had one in the 70’s.
As I understand it, the main issue with the Beta was a poor design for the back part of the subframe that housed the engine/gearbox. This was a huge water/mud trap, resulting in that particular area rusting and in some cases the engine mounting was so damaged that it failed. Lancia bought those cars back from customers, but that gave them terrible PR, and so even after the subframe was redesigned and the cars went back to being as rusty as most of the other cars of that era, the damage was done. Lancia being a fairly pricey marque probably didn't help their cause.
After the Beta, most Lancias were galvanised and rust became much less of a problem, however the damage was done. (I had a 1992 Dedra and now have a 1993 Y10 which is remarkably solid, shame about the interior plastics, though at least some of that can be blamed on a previous owner.)
Jack - I have a question about your pronunciation of Lancia - I've heard various pronunciations of Lancia, and the one you use seems to be the anglophone one - have I got this wrong?
Lanchia
As an auto parts and car dealer I can state categorically that all cheap production cars from the sixties to the late eighties were rust buckets…for whatever reason I don’t know why but even Hondas from the early days were rusters…
In one of Jeremy Clarkson’ shows he said that the Lancia Beta’s electrostaticly charged painting system had the polarity connected the wrong way round, so the paint had very poor adhesion.
It seems the Dutch steel plant Hoogovens Estel based in IJmuiden made steel for Alfa Romeo. On Alfa's request Estel added more rusty scrap to their steel to keep it cheap.
Another story is that due to the local salty sea breeze they unpainted bodies of the Alfa Sud started to rust inmidiatly.
Actually this happened to the FIAT 126 in Poland too. These bodies stayed outside waiting because the new line for the FIAT Cinquecento had to be build and starting up this production was key.
But, well, this procedure was common at British Leyland too. Lots of unfinished MINI's were victim of the harsh Britich weather!
I'm from Spain and have never heard such a thing about the steel LOL
I used to work at a Lancia dealership in the early 80's just before Lancia stopped trading in the UK. I remember seeing new cars arrive on the transporters with rust on them. I have seen pictures of 100's of Fiat x19 body shells sitting in primer out in the open with snow on them. That would not help the rust problem they had.
Very useful. I first came across the Soviet steel story in the early '70s and believed it ever since.
What a great video, Jack!
Interesting topic, great production quality and thorough research.
I hope this video does well on RUclips because you deserve it! Can't wait for more from You, especially on the Influenzo.
Kind regards,
Albert
Thank you Albert!! Glad you enjoyed it!
This was very interesting! I think you should do more of this on your channel, talking about the car industry and history, especially when you find new facts instead of repeating the stories we have all heard before. Thanks! :)
Glad you liked it and yes I would love to do more but it’s not easy to come across stories like this!
@@Number27 Lol it certainly isn't all that usual to attempt a neuro linguistic restatement concerning russian steel that becomes italian for no knowable reason whatsoever.
I bought an alfa 33 Trofeo new in the 90s. When I picked it up at the dealership, I noticed that a piece of bodywork around the headlight was starting to rust because the varnish had peeled off. Of course I brought it back and they painted it for me under the warranty. The body was guaranteed for five years against rust. Otherwise it was a beautiful car full of sensations and its boxer engine was a marvel.
I had the first and second Alfasuds registered in the UK, TAN41M and 42M. I bought both by accident as spares cars from different places and both had catastrophic MOT fails in 1977/8 so were scrap at 4-5 years old. Both were nailed together enough for an MOT with some very creative welding to take the number plates off 30 years ago and then thrown away. Back then there was no interest in rescuing stuff like this.
As a student my chums had Alfa's. A brown Sud that even as a 17yr old I could see was full of filler, and a Guilietta (dark blue, did its engine and got sold to the college's agricultural workshop worker for £100).
Anyway, a year later (1988) I bought a rusty W reg Sud 5-dr for £150. This eight year old / very low miles car was so rusty that the top of the front strut towers had ripped away, hinging up from the inner wings. It was the only car I've owned where the bonnet was a structural member: you had to jack the car up a bit to close it, and when you released it (with a hefty tug) the car would drop by a bit. I blobbed some plates at it, gave up and got my money back from someone who simply drove off in it: bonnet straining, no MOT. A year later I got an '83 (Y) Sud Ti Green Cloverleaf with 140,000 miles. Not a spot of rust anywhere and a wonderful car.
That red Alfa introduced me to car restoration though, and for the last 20 years I've done 45+ early 911 shells, plus others. Would now love a Sud / GTV for restoration for myself!
Great film and very interesting, thank you.
When I was with German Air Force in 1978, one of my pals owned an Alfasud about ~ 3 - 3 1/2 years old. He bought it when it was 2 years old. He was told it was refitted on behalf of Alfa-Romeo Germany by the dealer. It received new front fenders and was partly new painted (especially the roof). When I met my pal, his Alfasud was rusting all around. There was a BIG hole just above the exhaust / silencer. Rear fenders, doors (especially lower parts, but surprisingly the roof on top and the hood showed brown rust blotches under the paint. On the other hand the engine was brilliant, the gear was great, handling of the car superior. But everything made of sheet metal or tubes was just scrap. His car did not survive the 4-years TÜV inspection. It was scrapoed. BTW a inspector of Alfa-Romeo Germany told my friend: „ I have never seen such badly rusted new cars before the Alfasuds. They must have used badly rusted material producing them.“ Most probably he was straight on the point. The Alfasud could have been a cash cow for Alfa-Romeo, had it been built even to their own standard. It was a good car brought down by shoddy workmanship. How they built them was straight for the scrapmetal man.
I've owned 7 ALFAs, from the 69 1750 Berlina to the 82 Milano. A little rust problem on the 74 2000GTV (my favorite). Entirely worth it. No one would believe a car could have "soul", but ALFAs could to a Mechanical Engineer.
Golly - thanks for this - fascinating and the only film out there which has truthfully tackled this subject . I have read various bits about 70's Lancias suffering from 'mixed' batches of steel and of course as you say the Alfa tinworm stories but this has been a great bit of investigation by you and Chris, the Alfasud author. Nice !