I love it when a left-for-dead car is brought back to life. I’m not talking the car whose transmission crapped out two months ago, either…I’m talking D-E-A-D car, the kind where nobody knows where the last license plate went to, the kind that is more archeological dig than it is a simple fix. You could say that my Imperial qualifies…after a seven-year slumber parked next to a horse barn, it pretty much was a revival, and it was amazing how well the car did in it’s two years alive. It’s why I’m excited to wake it back up after another four years down. What would it take for you to walk upon a serious derelict ride and proceed to start scraping away decades of detritus? For many of you, you’d need the monetary backing necessary to fund at least half of a full-blown restoration project. But for an enterprising few, all you would need would be a pair of gloves, a can of gas, some basic hand tools and you’d be elbows-deep in the engine bay muttering something to the effect of, “Work, you bitch!” That’s always a good day. And it’s a better day when you actually make progress that leads to a classic up and moving once more.

The story on this Fiat 850 Spider is one that sounds very familiar: after the car was involved in an accident sometime around the 1980s, the older owner of this vehicle had started a restoration on the little roadster, but passed on before it was completed. The car became part of the property, living in the barn for thirty-odd years more or less untouched, changing hands when the property got sold. Regardless of the circumstances that surrounded the Fiat’s slumber, now is the time when it gets dragged out of the barn and put to use. That means the Shop-Vac is going to be put to good use for sure, and it means moving an irritated possum out of a well-established home, but can this little sports car return to life and more importantly, can it drive? The beauty of this little car is it’s 817cc engine and it’s simplicity. The downside of this little car is…well, Fiat functionals, for better or worse, compounded by decades of neglect. Does the little Fiat wake up easily or is it a fight?