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1980 Morris Ital 1.7 HL [ADO73]

1980 Morris Ital [ADO73] in Clarkson: Unleashed on Cars, Documentary, 1996 IMDB

Class: Cars, Sedan — Model origin: UK

1980 Morris Ital 1.7 HL [ADO73]

[*] Background vehicle

Comments about this vehicle

AuthorMessage

G-MANN UK

2006-11-17 23:39

One of the bad cars Clarkson looks at.

"Then there was the Morris Ital. An magnificently humongous car which had been styled by Giugiaro. Even geniuses, it seems, have "off-days". Apparentely it could overtake a Mercedes 200! Well, so can my lawnmower. The Morris Ital was cheap, but so is sawing your leg off."

To see what appears to be an original advert for the car, click here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwZvWQyYSDM

You'd think Mercedes would have sued them over this (maybe they did?)!

-- Last edit: 2006-11-18 02:35:38

stronghold EN

2006-11-18 01:39

[Image: unleashed199695ni1.1456.jpg] [Image: unleashed199696zw3.9989.jpg]
..don't know what happened to Giugiaro (..must have been a bad day.!) ..this is even uglier than the Marina it was based on.!

stronghold EN

2006-11-18 01:42

[Image: unleashed199693on6.1493.jpg]
..here it is driving through a sleepy Italian village (..with an angry mob ..chasing it out.!! :D )

-- Last edit: 2006-11-18 01:46:44

G-MANN UK

2006-11-18 01:59

This was the final car to wear a Morris badge, and the car the Austin Rover group followed it with was the Austin Montego, another ugly piece of crap that unbelievably was still production in the mid-90s despite being looked severly dated compared to things like the Ford Mondeo and the Renault Laguna.

Want to hear something really funny? Long after this car had been laid to rest in Britain, the design was sold to a Chinese firm and the car returned from the grave when production of the Huandu CAC6430 began in, wait for it, 1998!!

-- Last edit: 2006-11-18 02:23:13

stronghold EN

2006-11-18 02:59

I think there was a version in India for a little while.?

2491tj EN

2007-01-17 19:20

worst car we ever had...4 door saloon,beige,broke out in terminal rust and disintegrated!,ironically the best car we ever had was the estate version!!!it went on for ever...i think eventually the tooling was sold to Russia..someone was going to import them into the UK but because they would have to be sold as new cars,they would have to be extensively modified to pass the emissions test..the cost of modification outweighed the cost of import,so the idea was dropped..a similar thing happened with the old morris cowley/hindustan ambassador.

Sunbar UK

2007-01-17 19:39

stronghold wrote .
..don't know what happened to Giugiaro (..must have been a bad day.!) ..this is even uglier than the Marina it was based on.!



Its a common mistake (and not in any way corrected by Austin-Morris at the time, who gained from the publicity) but it was not styled by Giugiaro. Ital Design were involved but were only responsible for detail design on a contract basis, the minimal styling changes were all done in house by Austin-Morris. I guess Ital Design did not complain because they wanted more design business to follow.

rpcm PT

2007-01-17 19:48

Curiously, it was sold in Portugal only with a 1500 diesel engine and badged Marina 1.5D.

-- Last edit: 2007-01-17 19:49:08

Gag Halfrunt UK

2007-01-17 21:02

I googled Huandu CAC6430 and this thread was the third hit. :)

lastinpurple ES

2007-05-26 17:29

I think this car is beautiful, and the Marina too

cortina.chris EN

2011-11-27 14:40

I loved my ital, i had it for nearly 3 years,and it never let me down.

@rpcm... it also sold well in Malta with a Diesel engine .

-- Last edit: 2011-11-27 14:42:10

dsl SX

2013-01-10 16:09

RHD but Italian plate. Did they sell in Italy?

Neon IT

2013-01-17 10:34

I've checked on my old car magazines: the only ones I own of 1980 (november and december) there's no trace of Ital. In the whole 1982 neither so, or it was sold in 1981 only and I cannot check since I've not any magazine from that year or it was not sold at all :)

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