Autocar 19th Jan 2011

[HFStuart]

In a series of Cars that amde or broke the company (or something like that) an article on the Beta.

Not the usual hatchet job and a fair bit of praise. Worth 10mins of your time when you're in Smiths.

Stuart

[MattNoVAT]

Stuart, 

I read it and to be honest I thought it was just recycled garbage, nothing new, same old words, just lazy journalist filling a page.

Shame because he states that "no-one really knows the truth about the Russian/Eastern Bloc steel" story - So maybe its time a journalist went and interviewed those that were in the know about what really happened.  After all it was 35 years ago, so water under the bridge and I doubt there would be any repercussions from the truth finally being told.

[rossocorsa]

I think the Russian steel is probably a fairy tale in any case all Fiats of the era would have been made from it not just Betas mind you thinking about it every Fiat from the early 70s rusted twice as fast as the Beta anyway!!

[HFStuart]

I'd agree that there wasn't anything new there but it was better than "the engines used to fall out" rubbish I was expecting.

Anything to raise the profile and all that !

[MattNoVAT]

People seem to forget that it wasn't just Italian cars that were affected.  Fords, Austins, British Leyland, pretty much anything japanese from that era all suffered.

I personally think it has more to do with how the individual marques handled the issue, those who press dept. kept things low key came off lightly, those who took a more open & honest stance paid a heavy price, that was dished out by the good old british media.

[rossocorsa]

to be fair first series beta belinas were pretty bad I remember seeing one that was like one big rust blister on wheels and that was back in the 70s when it wasn't very old, seen the same on other cars though.