Re: Are Alfa-chameleons Okay?

[Scott Fisher <sfisher71@domain.elided>]

--- "Douglas R. and Julia R. Harris" <dharris@domain.elided>
wrote:
>     Years ago, I saw a red Spider . . . "in person"
> . . . how can you beat a red Spider? 

Every Alfista should own a red Alfa at least once, if
only to get it out of your system. :-)

There's a lot to be said for having *exactly* the car
you have always visualized, whether it's the color or
the year or the trim package, or whatever it is that
catalyzes your epoxy.  When I bought the '67 GT Junior
I used to own, it was a once-attractive burgundy
metallic color, from which most of the clearcoat had
peeled above the beltline.  I tried polishing it... I
tried color-sanding it... and eventually I just
stripped the paint off down to the steel.

I have a standing offer to all my friends and
acquaintances: if you ever decide you want to strip a
car down to bare metal, give me a call and I'll talk
you out of it.  Like the time I popped an entire
habanero chile in my mouth, chewed it up, and
swallowed it, stripping a car to bare metal is
something that it is better to talk about than to live
through.

But while I had my "De Lorean-Alfa," as I used to
describe it, I spent several months agonizing over
what color to paint it.  The original aqua/pale
turquoise didn't appeal to me at ALL; the previous
owner had described it as "Nazi mental-institution
blue," which accurately described the feeling that the
color inspired.  The burgundy had once been quite
pretty, I'm sure, but a metallic color was not what I
wanted on this car.  I gave serious thought to dark,
dark cobalt blue, to eggplant purple, and for a LONG
time to a deep non-metallic burgundy like the Scuderia
Ferrari cars of the Thirties.

And in the end... I went with AR501 "Alfa Red,"
because that was the image I had in my mind all along
of what I wanted this car to look like.

In the final analysis, do what makes you happy -- it's
your car.  At least till you trade it even-up for a
1961 356B T5 coupe or something.  And NOBODY would be
that silly. :-)

>     I'm wondering how true believers feel about
> changing the body color of an Alfa.  

I can't begin to imagine.  On one of the other car
lists I frequent, there was a bitter dispute several
months ago about how difficult it was to do a CORRECT
restoration, when the factory often didn't pay
attention to what they were SUPPOSED to put on the
cars and instead used whatever they had on the
shelves.

The mind, she boggles.

However, I will make one suggestion -- with the caveat
that I don't know you, your Spider, or the Alfa market
where you live, and I realize that any or all of those
criteria might influence your choice of how to proceed
far more than this observation does.

And the suggestion is:

If I wanted a red Spider, I'd go buy a red Spider. 
Fercrissakes, it isn't like there are only three of
them in the country.

Buying a Spider that's already red is going to be a
hell of a lot simpler, probably a lot cheaper, and --
unless your Spider is exactly the configuration, year,
trim, etc. that you always wanted -- it offers you the
opportunity to sample a different set of
characteristics.  Want to try a car with Bosch
injection, or Webers?  Want to try out those nifty
Recaro-esque seats from the later cars, or the light
and simple ones from the early Seventies?  Now's your
chance.

Of course, one mitigating factor in this is whether
you've got a Good Alfa or a Bad Alfa.  Harry Pellow,
356 engine guru known as "the Maestro," is fond of
saying that a Good 356 will break down in your
driveway, while a Bad 356 will break down in the worst
part of town, at two in the morning, during a
rainstorm.  Alfas, in my experience with the marque,
work the same way.

So if you've got a Bad Alfa, now's your chance to
upgrade.  But if you've got a Good Alfa, be warned:
don't ask us, ask the Spider what SHE thinks.  You do
NOT want to make your Alfa unhappy.  Life with an Alfa
that is pissed off at you is genuinely miserable. 
Trust me on that.

Best,

--Scott Fisher
  Tualatin, Oregon
  one Good Alfa, three Good cars designed by guys
named Ferdinand
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