 It was called the "ML 929" to honor the mother of Alfio Russo, Maria Luisa, who was born in 1929.The more powerful "TS 1.6" appeared in April 1981 and uses the engine (and badging) from the Volkswagen Passat TS, it has .Both models have a four-speed manual transmission, but as is the case for their donor cars the TS 1.6 has a longitudinally mounted engine while the ML 929's engine is mounted transversally.