ONE MILLION KILOMETRES TO THE FOUR CORNERS OF THE GLOBE

To the North, on the icy tracks of chilly Lapland where the temperature drops to 40 degrees below zero. To the South, under the torrid sun of South Africa where the Atlantic ocean meets the Indian ocean.

To the West, along the precipitous peaks of the Sierra Nevada in Spain. And lastly to the East, to the slopes of the majestic and eternal Mount Everest.

The Panda 4x4 showed its mettle as an indefatigable explorer in all these exciting and inaccessible places by unflinchingly covering thousands of kilometres as it was put through tough tests and forced into extraordinary feats.

The tiny off-roader was challenged at the four corners of the globe to assess its sturdiness, character and on-road behaviour in road situations and in weather conditions that were often at the limit of endurance. In total, the Panda 4x4 covered more than one million kilometres during its development stage when the four-wheel drive devices were put to the test and the findings were used to complete the results of the exhaustive testing already conducted on the two-wheel drive version.

The Everest trip and the harsh tests in Spain, South Africa and Sweden illustrate one distinctive attributes of the Fiat group: i.e. its willingness to take a chance on new technologies, test them to exhaustion and find the best solution by calling on a quintessentially Italian sense of originality and imagination. The same spirit is very evident in the Panda 4x4, a vehicle created to tackle any situation, extreme or less extreme, with dynamism and freedom.

Before testing the vehicle in these extreme situations, the new four-wheel drive supermini underwent tough testing over alpine routes, roads leading to the top of Mount Etna, on the Fiat test tracks (in Balocco and Mandria) and in the Wind and Climate tunnels in Orbassano (Turin). Fiat has conducted the initial development stages of its cars at this site since 1976: in those early days by applying experimental equipment and procedures and nowadays using the most advanced mathematical modelling and numerical simulation techniques.

Subjected to the harshest climatic and aerodynamic tests

The Orbassano Wind and Climate tunnels (Turin) form a sophisticated test centre where the aims of reducing weight and consumption and achieving aerodynamic excellence are pursued while seeking to maintain stylistically pleasing shapes and optimise acoustic and thermal and fluid dynamic comfort.

For example, the Wind Tunnel was used to optimise the profile of the Panda 4x4 while all the materials and components used on the pint-sized Fiat were subjected to the harshest climatic conditions in the adjacent Cold Climate tunnel that operates at temperatures of over 40 degrees below zero to assess their strength and operation. The same tests were carried out in a second Climate Tunnel known as a Hot Tunnel: here the temperatures range from 10 to 50 degrees above zero.

A frozen lake near the North Pole

In Lapland, less than 100 kilometres from the Arctic Circle, we find the town of Arjeplog that is a tiny dot on the map of Northern Sweden. Despite its size, this is a place of strategic importance for the Fiat Group. This location, surrounded by forests and lakes, is home to a Fiat Auto centre where engineers, technicians and testers put all our models, naturally including the Panda 4x4, through their paces.

The truly imposing structure extends over an area of 800 hectares occupied by numerous immense lakes that ice over during the winter months. Four tracks occupy some 200 hectares of the water surface on one lake: these include a ring measuring 200 metres in diameter, another ring measuring 450 metres in diameter, a 2.8 kilometre track - and an 800 metre long, 70 metre wide dynamic platform that is used to test handling, comfort, transmission and traction systems, electronic brake controls, stability and suspension systems. Another dozen road tracks are also arranged around the Test Centre: some with sections of differential grip organised in a checkerboard configuration (polished ice and hot asphalt), others coated with cat's backs and cobbles, others with precipitous ramps and switchback sections. Technicians can also make us of a 3 km circle and a 10 kilometre forest route.

Even at winter temperatures that drop to minus 40°, the Panda 4x4 displayed all the performance of a true off-roader and overcame snowy slopes with a gradient of more than 40% with ease. This even aroused the amazement of Swedish experts who praised the enterprise in the local press. The car was able to demonstrate the same outstanding performance on roads with very low grip due to its four wheel drive system that shifts the drive torque to the rear wheels so that the vehicle is always able to get out of trouble with extreme safety.

South Africa: from the Kruger park to the Kalahari desert.

And then on to the borders of Africa, where whiter-than-white beaches alternate with exuberant national parks interspersed with deserts, forests and canyons. These landscapes of extraordinary beauty provided the backdrop to the tests conducted on the Panda 4x4. The four wheel drive supermini started its journey in Pretoria and drove through Durban, Kimberley and Upington to reach Cape Town. A truly extreme trip over unfinished roads sometimes took the form of barely visible tracks: here the vehicle underwent testing of all its mechanical and body parts with the suspension and four wheel drive systems subject to particular stress. Not to mention the presence of dust and sand, temperatures fluctuating between 35 and 45 degrees and all this at altitudes ranging from sea level to more than 1500 metres.

In detail, the Panda 4x4 vehicles left Pretoria at the entrance to the Kruger Park, one of the country's greatest attractions. Located in the north-eastern region on the border with Mozambique, the Park was opened to the public in 1927 and is the most extensive of the 18 National Parks with an area of some 20,000 square kilometres. It houses an extraordinary variety of animals including the essential big five: rhinoceros, lion, buffalo, leopard and elephant.

The trip continued down to the coast to the town of Durban with its soaring humidity levels before taking the long and beautiful road to Kimberley, an area famous for its diamond mines. The Panda 4x4 cars continued unerringly to Upington and 120 kilometres later they reached the Augrabies National Park where the waterfalls of the same name are located: a spectacular 60 metre drop to an underlying landscape with its characteristic vegetation of quiver trees, aloe, euphorbia and camelthorn.

Then the Panda 4x4 cars, driven by the Fiat Auto Test Team, headed straight towards the Kalahari desert, a truly inhospitable area that extends through the states of Botswana, South Africa and Namibia for 700,000 square kilometres at an average altitude of 1000 metres and includes the Okawango, Limpopo and Orange river basins. Here, at temperatures of over 45°, Fiat's off-road minis thundered over sandy tracks where suspension and four wheel drive systems were tested to the limit. After coming through this long and difficult test with flying colours, the test expedition ended in Cape Town.

In Spain, on Sergio Leone's film sets

After tests in Southern Italy, the Panda 4x4 cars continued their test sessions in Spain, Andalusia to be more precise. The cars left from Mojacar on the coast and covered more than 10,000 kilometres in two weeks. Places on the itinerary included the evocative area between Almeria and Tabernas, a spot that many consider to be the Spanish Arizona: a desert filled with rock formations and dust, whipped by an incessant warm wind where the vegetation is increasingly sparse and the ground increasingly arid. The film director Sergio Leone chose this area and its landscapes as the backdrop for some of his western films including the well known 'A Fistful of Dollars'. Nowadays, tourists can visit the Western Villages (Texas Hollywood, Mini Hollywood and Western Leone) and relive the epic of the first settlements in the American West.

Along the canyons that surround the Tabernas desert, the Panda 4x4 cars continued their test run towards the Sierra Nevada to test, in particular, the braking system, suspension and four wheel drive system on the steep descents, continuous switchback sections and unsurfaced roads. The car returned outstanding results and inevitably responded in a safe and reliable manner. The already difficult route was also made even tougher by the variety of weather conditions: humid near the coast and dry in the desert area.

The Panda 4x4 cars on the roof of the world

Two Panda 4x4 cars also starred in an adventurous test drive that began in Kathmandu (Nepal) and ended at the Everest advance base camp at an altitude of more than 5000 metres. This undertaking was all the more extraordinary when one considers that the only preparations for the trip were a few adaptations to the engine control unit settings on both vehicles was to adjust to the local petrol.

The two Panda 4x4s started out from the legendary Nepalese capital and covered 110 kilometres of unsurfaced road to Kodari on the border between Tibet and Nepal. The caravan of cars covered a very different route on the next day when it headed out towards Nyalam in the land of the Dalai Lama and then continued towards Tingri. Here, amidst mountain tracks and unspoilt places, both Panda 4x4s drove through the Tangula pass at over 5000 metres: a gruelling 180 kilometre long trip where both cars showed all their resolve and sure-footedness.

On the next day, the team reached Xegar where the Panda 4x4 cars forded a river before setting out the following morning for Rongbuck and its famous monastery, a solemn place of peace and prayer suspended in time and space. Here the expedition was warmly greeted by the local population but did not linger and braved cold temperatures and strong winds to continue the test along long rocky roads as the clouds wreathed the peak of Everest in the distance. The Everest advance base camp lies only a few kilometres from the monastery but the expedition had to reach it along an extremely difficult track. This marked the first occasion that the 5200 metre high camp has been reached by a small off-road vehicle.

No more extreme undertaking could have been embarked upon to test the strength and free spirit of the four wheel drive supermini, which responded ably and reliably to prove itself a faithful, tireless, travelling companion. The Panda 4x4's extraordinary enterprise was also joined by the many-time flying champion Angelo D'Arrigo who successfully completed his 'Over Everest 2004' challenge on 24 May: a flight over the highest Himalayan peak in a delta plane: the flight lasted 4 hours and 30 minutes at an altitude of 9000 metres and reached speeds of 200 km/h.