Here’s a Fiat Palio, seen in Beijing on a hot summer day in 2018. The Forest Green hatchback was a little dirty but otherwise in fine shape, with the original wheel covers and fitted with rare white Beijing license plates.
The Fiat Palio in China
Fiat produced the Palio hatchback for the Chinese market at the Nanjing-Fiat joint venture. Production started in 2002 and ended in 2007, with a late update in 2006. The car in the photos is a pre-update example. Note the super cool mud flaps fore and aft.
The Chinese name of the Palio was 派力奥 (Pài Lìào). The Nanjing-Fiat joint venture also produced the Fiat Siena (Palio sedan), Palio Weekend (a wagon), and the Fiat Perla (an upgraded Siena).
The interior
The Fiat Palio’s interior had a modern design for its time, especially compared to locally-made competitors. The cabin looked all right for its age, albeit a little dusty. The faux-leather seats are original. That’s rare; most owners cover the seats with ugly covers.
The center console, with a bright-blue Fiat logo, a shipload of tiny buttons, a CD player, and a basic heating system.
The China-stamped logo in the window, with production/certification codes.
The rear bench is softly padded, and there’s more legroom than in many modern cars. Some taxi companies, especially in central China, used the Palio for taxi work.
White license plates
Beijing, Hangzhou, and Shenzhen only issued white license plates for passenger cars in 2002 and 2003 as part of an experiment where citizens could create their own alphabetical/numerical combinations.
The experiment ended after citizens got too creative, choosing combinations like “sex,” “CIA,” “FBI,” and the infamous “USA-911,” which appeared on a Beijing car shortly after the September 11 attacks.
Following the uproar, authorities canceled the experiment but allowed owners to keep the non-offensive plates. The Fiat Palio has 京A WWL-088. Eight is a lucky number in China. “京” is short for 北京, Běijīng.
Specifications
Fiat offered 1.3-liter and 1.5-liter engines. The car in the photos is the Fiat Palio 1.5 GX (CD) model. “(CD)” was part of the model name, referring to the CD player. Cheaper variants had a cassette deck. In Chinese, the model name looked like this: 派力奥1.5L GX (CD). Output of the 1.5-liter engine was 62 kW (85 hp) and 122 Nm. The gearbox was a 5-speed manual. Fiat also offered a 4-speed automatic. The top speed was 175 km/h, and 0-100 took a leisurely 11.9 seconds.
Price and legacy of the Fiat Palio
The Fiat Palio was one of the first affordable Western-branded hatchbacks in China. Initially, it was quite popular, but due to persistent problems with quality and distribution, it never really caught on. It was cheap, though. In 2005, the Fiat Palio 1.5 GX (CD) sold for only 63.800 yuan.
After sales continued to disappoint, Fiat abandoned the joint venture in 2007. In 2012, Fiat returned to China via the GAC-Fiat joint venture, later GAC-FCA. This business wasn’t very successful for Fiat either and was ultimately disbanded in 2022.