INTERESTING, never knew such a car exsisted...

Napolis and Bisonte, thanks for those great pics - could I have your permissions to use them for my local Fiat club magazine? The 166 looks just my size! LOL! To anyone thinking of buying the Dino, one of my clubmates here in Qld bought one about 12 months ago and between the FIAT parts people and Fcar specialists I don't think he's had any great difficulty getting parts or information (and the car's terrific!)

 

You can use my photo.

Best

 

I used to run one of these here in the UK... in fact the old girl has just turned up on ebay, sadly needing some work now (I didn't buy it back - don't want to shatter the hazy wonderful memories) you can see it here - http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/1967-FIAT-DINO-RED_W0QQitemZ270326943128QQcmdZViewItemQQptZAutomobiles_UK?hash=item270326943128&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A2%7C65%3A13%7C39%3A1%7C240%3A1318
When i bought this one many years ago, it was a cheap, flash car virtually nobody had heard of which made the most incredible noise - driving it hard actually made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up it sounded so amazing - absolutely fantastic. Mine was the purer 2L aluminium engined version which I always thought were much nicer than the 2.4s - more urgent and sporting, plus better styling IMO... i really enjoyed that car.
For 1967 they were incredibly advanced... 4 wheel disc brakes, vented on the front with 3 piston calipers, 5 speed gearbox, that wonderful 4 cam V6 aluminium motor which had electronic ignition from memory and revved to over 7.5k, it even had a limited slip differential - drove really very well. I had a trye delaminate at well over 100mph and was able to bring the car to a halt much faster and more controllably than i expected. They had a dubious reputation in Europe, particularly Italy as they were highly favoured by the Italian mafia - a very fast four seater with significant presence, they became the vehicle of choice for the discerning mafiosa - so much so that they became very difficult to sell 2nd hand in Italy and values plummeted - a lot were exported in the 70s and 80s and in the real rural areas of Italy there are tales of village folk shouting abuse at passing Dino coupes.... such was their association. I have always felt that they were significantly undervalued / underappreciated and it is good to see that my old one is still around and sold for a good bit more as a non-running project than it cost me as a running driving car all those years ago. Needless to say bits are difficult to find and expensive - really only available 2nd hand. I had to put a new diff in mine and rebuild the rear axle and remember it as a real struggle, eventually finding parts at a breaker of exotics. From memory there was something like 60 odd coupes in the UK at the time - i would imagine there are far less now as a good number have been robbed for their V6 and scrapped - a sad end for a highly competent machine.

 

Didn't this engine also find success also in the Lancia Stratos hillclimb/rallye cars?

 

Yes, the engine didn't live up to its potential until it was installed in the Lancia Stratos where it killed its competition. The Stratos had a different intake manifold and carbs than the Ferrari/Fiat Dino. There are threads and photos in the Dino section about the Lancia Stratos.

 

The Stratos also had the 4 valve heads.