Re: South African Alfa Production

[TQG4PLY@domain.elided]

Regarding George Caracatsanis and others:
 Subject: Re:Non-Italian Alfas
 George wrote:-

>> On the thread of Alfas being built out of Italy, here's what I found in
 Quattroruote's annual edition 'Dizionario delle Auto 1970', published in
 July 1969:
 'Construction and assembly abroad
  Malaysia: City Motors. Assembly of Giulia 1300TI, 1750
  Portugal: Officine Mocar. Assembly of 1750, 1300 GT Junior
  Spain: Fadisa. Assembly of the F12 van
  Brasil: FNM. Construction of Berlina 2000
  Malta: Officine Muscats: Assembly of Giulia Super, 
  Paraguay: Officine Japsa. Assembly of Giulia 1300 TI, Giulia Super, 1750,
 1300 GT Junior.
  S.Africa: Alfa Romeo S.Africa, East London: Assembly of Giulia 1300 TI,
 1300 GT Junior, Giulia Super, 1750, 1750 GTV.'
 
 I am curious, where the Maltese Supers were destined to. Commonwealth
 countries ?
 
 Cheers
 GC
 Athens
  >>

As a former South African and member of the Alfa Romeo Club of South Africa,
I can vouch that there WAS an Alfa factory in Brits. From the late 50's or 
early
60's, until early to mid 70's,  various Alfa's were assembled SKD - 
Giuliettas, 
Guilias, GTV's, etc.

Then in early  to mid 70's (I don't remember the actual date) Alfa Romeo 
built a
factory in Brits to manufacture Alfas.  Alfa was a sponsor of the Alfa Romeo
Club of SA and each year opened the doors of the factory to club members
for a tour of the factory. That, as you can imagine, was the highlite of the 
Club 
year !  Alfa also had a sales and service center in Wynberg, a suburb of 
Johannesburg, where we would have technical sessions, new model introductions 
and various other meetings.  Brits built Alfetta's, Sud's, GTV 6's (including 
the locally developed 3 liter) and a turbocharged Alfetta which they 
introduced after I left SA. 
I believe the turbo was also locally developed, but am not sure. In the 70's 
Alfettas and Giulietta's were  made for Great Britain . SA is right hand 
drive so it made sense
to make a limited run at Brits. I remember production runs totaling over 8000 
cars
per year at Brits, which closed around '83 due to political pressure.

I know there are members of the SA Alfa club on the digest, such as Phil 
Erasmus
(erasmusp@domain.elided),  mvcoller@domain.elided  (Malcom van Coller) who could 
better answer these questions.   Pat O'Brien ( patrick1@domain.elided ) is 
currently the SA club archivist (historian) and world renowned Alfa Romeo 
expert/author, and would   probably be the best person to provide information 
about Alfa Romeo's in South 
Africa. 

I suggest anyone interested contact Pat directly, as he is a walking 
encyclopedia
of Alfa !  Anyone interested in  Alfa's incredible winning stats in SA should 
contact
Malcom van Coller, as he (and other club members) still race and rally Alfas,
especially older Alfas, in classic or historics. According to Malcom, Alfas 
are
and have been for many years, the car to beat !

Regards,

Howard Jacobs
Cleveland, OH
1984 Maratona GTV 6 (11,000 miles !)

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End of alfa-digest V7 #664
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