Let’s start with a few immutable universal laws: policemen get ever younger (no, really), politicians get madder, footballers get richer – and cars get bigger. The new Fiat Punto proudly proclaims itself ‘Grande’, the Alfa 156 expanded into the 159, and you can bet a sizeable wedge that the 147’s successor will have filled out to plug the gap. Which will leave room for a one-three-something-or-other underneath, and so on…

It’s refreshing, then, to go back little more than a decade and discover a car substantially smaller than the one it replaced. Mind you, when did anyone ever expect Maserati to do anything obvious and predictable, or to march in step with the rest of the world? Besides, a bigger replacement for the fat-cat Quattroporte III would have required an HGV licence.

So when Alessandro De Tomaso finally threw in the Trident-branded towel in 1993, selling his entire holding in Maserati to Fiat, the new proprietors very quickly set about planning a replacement for the Argentinean’s brawny flagship – something altogether more modern, more agile – perhaps, even, more Maserati. It was fast becoming another immutable law that three or four years should elapse between the demise of one QP and the arrival of the next. This time round, the gap had to some extent been filled by the various four-door Biturbos (though none had been accorded the ‘Quattroporte’ tag), and it was the final 430 version which provided the basis for the QPIV, which bowed in at the 1994 Turin Show.

Maserati gave Marcello Gandini a second bite of the QP cherry (he had been largely responsible for the Bertone-badged ‘II’, 20 years earlier) and he came up with a design far more lithe, sinewy and compact than any of its predecessors – especially the most recent of them. Taut and elegant from any angle, it was also (with a Cd of 0.31) the most aerodynamic – the bluff-nosed QPIII, in particular, being about as streamlined as Doncaster. The kicked-up rear wheelarch is to Gandini what the double-bubble roof is to Zagato – a stylistic calling-card which, for my money, looks better on his more extreme machines such as the Lancia Stratos Zero, or the Lamborghinis Countach, Bravo and Diablo. That idiosyncrasy aside, there’s no excess fat, no rococo adornment, and the result is the most elegant package ever to grace the Biturbo underpinnings. We have also gone, at a stroke, from the largest Quattroporte to the smallest.

And to the quickest, by far – up to that point. The Biturbos may never have earned the unqualified adoration or admiration of traditional Maseratists, but there was never any denying the manner of their going – which was bloody quick. All the twin-turbo V6s, in either 18 or 24-valve form, had power in profusion; and both of the versions offered initially in the new QP – even the Italian market-only 2.0-litre tax-break special – could trump the QPIII’s 4.9-litre V8 in that respect. And they had well over 300kg less to pull.

In fact, the well-boosted two-litre version trumped the alternative 2.8 as well (by 3bhp), but the bigger unit boasted an effortless driveability more in keeping with the QP ethos. And those who felt that this demanded no fewer than eight pots were well catered for by the 3.2-litre V8 – ‘Ottocilindri’ – introduced as an option two years after the car’s debut, in 1996. With 335bhp to play with the QPIV really could rock – sub-six seconds 0-60 and 170mph were well up with the best of the German autobahn-burners.

In 1997, Fiat handed control of Maserati over to fellow-subsidiary Ferrari, who took one look at its erstwhile rival’s antiquated factory, had a good laugh – and closed it down for major refurbishment. With production disrupted, the opportunity was taken to completely re-vamp the QP – although the major mechanical components were untouched – and re-introduce it, in 1998, alongside the new 3200GT. Now branded ‘Evoluzione’ it remained in production, with all three engine options, until 2001. Production figures (wait for it…) are hard to pin down, but around 2500 of all types isn’t far out.

When the last of them rolled off the line our test car was five years old. A 2.8-litre ‘Seicilindri’, with ZF on hand to change gear for you, it’s now 10, has 115,000 miles to its credit, and feels and looks to all intents and purposes like a new car – which is to Maserati’s (and the owner’s) credit. It’s a car that has worked for its living, but a bit of pottering around the tediously sprawling, unwarrantably expensive part of urban Surrey adjacent to the Auto Italia test track confirmed its fitness for purpose, the 102bhp-per-litre V6 quite unflustered by heavy traffic.
 

And with nothing beyond the most basic driving skills required, I was able to take in the finer points of the oh-so tasty interior. Cream leather, Alcantara on the dash, lovely elm woodwork – does anyone do it better? No one I can think of. The seats are as good as they look, legroom in the back is okay, but the whole interior is rather ‘cosier’ than the cavernous expanses of the QPIII. The same goes for the boot – you’d have to make do with one or two fewer pieces of pigskin Prada, I reckon. Only the steering wheel lets the interior down a bit. The studded wood rim is wonderful, but the big rectangular plastic boss-cum-airbag locker definitely isn’t. That clock is a treasure, though (amazingly, it didn’t survive the ‘Evo’ makeover), and the general ambience is one of impeccably tasteful, if slightly decadent, luxury.

The QP’s tolerance of traffic was far better than mine in fact, and I was glad to reach the track, and of the chance to stretch its legs. They stretch with disconcerting ease, too, the wild surge of acceleration something of a shock initially, after all the pootling about. The two IHIs go about their business with no detectable lag, and the svelte saloon turns almost feral. The V6 has a diamond-hard sound at full stretch, although it’s not especially characterful. There’s a little wind noise at high velocities, but overall it’s an extremely refined drive. And no QP ever went like this before – the V8 being significantly quicker still, of course.

There are no ‘steps’ in the power delivery, just a linear surge barely interrupted by the 4-speed auto’s ultra-smooth, unobtrusive changes. In Drive, the natural change-up point is around 5k, but taking over and changing manually brings about a transformation. Response to the lever is super-quick and, using all your allotted 6400rpm, second and third are long, meaty ratios which make the most of the motor’s wide power band. You can commit to corners, in particular, with a lot more confidence knowing the ’box won’t decide to help itself to another cog at an inconvenient moment.

I wouldn’t want the steering any lighter – in fact a little more feel would be welcome in the twisty stuff. But it’s very precise, and the car’s balance can be adjusted equally well by either hands or feet. The faster the cornering speed the greater the roll-angles, of course, but it’s got huge reserves of grip. The Biturbo’s felicitous combination of MacPherson front and trailing arms rear suspension takes the Quattroporte into a whole new era of chassis sophistication.

Traction control is happily absent, but there are four graduated settings for the superb dampers. On start up, it defaults to No 2, which is a fine compromise. In fact, at low speeds there’s little noticeable difference, but for high-speed cornering No 4 – the stiffest – is dramatically better. Roll disappears almost entirely, and you’re getting close to pure sportscar territory, the QP doing its best to morph into a go-kart. Better still, the excellent ride quality is virtually unaffected – on average surfaces at least.

This is all getting a bit sycophantic – let’s find something to criticise. Ah yes, there was some brake judder under heavy applications; but they did the business when required – you need anchors you can rely on at the end of the long, 120mph-plus straight, or things can get messy…

All in all, not half bad for a once-round-the-clock workhorse. So why did the QPIV not perform equally well in the showroom? Conventional wisdom has it that (in common with any number of Alfas, for instance) its ‘Italian flare’ appealed to ‘arty, media types’ and ‘individualists’ (all the usual buzzwords) who nursed a stubborn, cultural aversion to being seen near anything German; but sensible punters, of course, would always go shopping north of the Alps. And that’s about the only thing Maserati got wrong – not moving two or three hundred miles north and changing its name to MMW. Everything else was pretty much spot-on, and the ‘IV’ represents a quantum leap forward from previous QPs. The big breakthrough, though, would come with its successor – a car of sufficient quality in every area finally to challenge the Anglo-Saxon super-saloon hegemony.

Story by Simon Park / Photography by Michael Ward