Re: Fiat (Alfa) and GM

[Ryan Fellini <rfellini@domain.elided>]

<<Too late! its already happened. To me the final nail in the coffin was
Fiat's decision on using the revered GTA name for a warmed-up,
gadget-infested 156. Ok, so everyone including the people on this digest
are intrigued at present but think what would be more appropriate as the
bearer of the GTA name - the 156 GTA  or the Brera? I have absolutely no
doubt that if a new GTA is to be a world-beating hot number as the Giulia
Sprint GTA and the 1300 GTA Jr were, then the only car that Alfa has
produced worthy of the name is the Brera ... "decent horsepower in modern
terms, great chassis platform, a drivetrain that will take all the power
you can throw at it, and best of all, no some overweight warmed-up commuter
car aimed at the sort of people who drive BMW and Mercedes.>>

Les, of course you've driven this overweight commuter car, 156 GTA,
yes? si? ya? :-)

Yeah, neither have I, but so far most people have pretty much summed
it up as, "decent horsepower in modern terms, great chassis platform,
a drivetrain that will take all the power you can throw at it"

To quote Autozine's Mark Wan,

"Strangely, automotive theories seem do not apply to Alfa Romeo 156
GTA. Putting 250 horsepower over the front wheels, having more weight
at the nose than the existing 156 2.5 V6, theories tell us it must have
serious handling problems. No, the engineers at Alfa Romeo worked
out a miracle here: this is the front-wheel-drive version of BMW M3 ! in
some areas, especially driver involvement and emotional character, it
even surpasses the more expensive Munich rival."

Hmm, I wouldn't mind to try one somehow...
Have a good rest of the week.
take care,

Ryan
ps. what gadgets were infested into the 156 GTA by the way?  like those
oscillating air-conditioning vents in Mazda's??
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