Should Fiat have built this Hummer-style 4x4?

This is the Fiat Oltre concept, a military-style number introduced at the 2005 Bologna motor show – the Emilia-Romagna region’s premier automotive exhibition. Fiat itself described the styling as ‘exuberant’, which even so seems to have dulled a little in translation. Oltre means ‘beyond’ in Italian, which could mean anything, really – beyond roads, beyond the reach of international law…

The Oltre does have a distinct Panda-meets-Hummer vibe, that’s true. Or does it look like the Lamborghini LM002? The concept is actually based on a military vehicle, the Iveco LMV (Light Multirole Vehicle). See? Iveco doesn’t just do supermarket delivery vans. The Italian army has about 2,000 of them, some of which have seen action in Afghanistan. Delivering pizzas, perhaps. 

There are very few creature comforts inside the Oltre – if Fiat had even vague plans to capture part of the hip-hop market it would need a lot of pimping inside here. The dashboard is particularly angular and unforgiving, although the tasteful blue and white colour scheme does lend the car a soothing air. The Alpine stereo on top of the dashboard does look somewhat like an afterthought, but to be honest we’d be quite excited at getting all those buttons to press if we were driving the Oltre. 

There’s nothing glamourous underneath here – the engine is a 3.0-litre, 4cyl, Iveco F1C diesel engine that was nabbed from one of the firm’s vans, pumping out 185bhp and 336lb ft of torque and paired with a six-speed auto gearbox. This gets the Oltre concept to a heady 81mph top speed, at which point it has probably built up enough momentum to smash through a country – mainly because of its four-tonne weight. There’s permanent four-wheel drive and three locking differentials to ensure that the Oltre is a truly practical ‘go anywhere’ vehicle.

The Fiat Oltre is a compact 4.87m long, 2.05m tall, 2.2m wide and the wheelbase is 3.23m. Perfect for the city. Or invading one, at least. Ground clearance is a breezy 50cm, while the car has a wading depth of 85cm, which increases to 1.5m if you fit a selection of pipes. That four-tonne weight would increase to seven if you exploited the full payload ability of that flat rear deck. The Oltre concept can carry just over three tonnes, which is equivalent to four Kia Picantos, or 1.1 Rolls-Royce Cullinans. 

The existence of the Oltre in itself is fairly crazy, and borderline offensive even for the headily excessive days of 2005. Crikey, we’ve had two global depressions since then, maybe someone drove an Oltre into the side of the economy. The sport seats and Alpine infotainment system are perhaps a step too far for military applications, but overall Fiat was keen to emphasise the practicality of the concept – the door handles were recessed into the doors so as not to affect the car’s off-roading abilities. There are sleek retractable sun blinds in the cabin, so you don’t get distracted when insurgents are firing RPGs at you. Practical. 

Even in the most prosperous of times, demand for a mostly useless four-tonne truck could charitably be described as light. Slap a Fiat badge on there and it evaporates to essentially non-existent. Military contracts might have been a vague aim, but then why base your concept car on an established model that’s already been quite successful for some time? Of course, the main reason that the Oltre didn’t go into production was the prohibitive cost – with such a small target market the numbers really needed to stack up better. 

Let’s face it – no. But allow us to fantasise here for a moment… Fiat has been allied with Jeep for a few years now, enough for engineers from both Italy and the US to get to know each other and make friends. Surely the flexible Wrangler platform would lend itself well to a wartime adaptation of the Panda? They’ll need to sneak it in quick, before the PSA merger happens and the bean counters from Paris take over everything.

The Oltre concept now sits in a big warehouse at Fiat's Mirafiori factory with lots of the company's other crazy creations. Check out our gallery of pics from the collection.