Inboard brakes

[JHertzman@domain.elided]

In AD7-1434 Joe Elliott writes " if the Alfasud was introduced in 1972/3, 
then would that make this lowly 1.1L front-driver the first Alfa to be 
equipped with inboard brakes??  Jeepers."

Good try, but no, it wouldn't. The Giulia TZ, admittedly small production but 
still production, had them when it went on sale in 1963, after an 
Alfa-standard long development time from 1959. The Sportiva, designed for 
series production and customer sales, but dropped to concentrate on the 
Giulietta, had them in 1954. The tipo 160 GP prototype of 1952, also dropped 
because of Giulietta pressures, had four-wheel inboard brakes in 1952. The 6C 
3000 CM, built in very limited numbers but still enough to get into road use 
in private hands, also had inboards (but two only) in 1952. 

I believe that is as far back as it went. All of the IRS Alfas, from the 6C 
2300 B of 1935, could easily have had them, but brake cooling in the 
airstream was more important than unsprung weight. Inboard brakes had been 
common on FWD cars in the twenties, but for linkage reasons rather than 
unsprung weight; it wasn't until hydraulic brakes were adopted that outboard 
brakes on FWD cars became really practical.

A possible trivia point is that all of the chain-drive cars of the Gordon 
Bennett era, both competition and stradale, had what were in effect DeDion 
rear axles, transaxles, and inboard brakes, some of them water-cooled (as, in 
fact, were the tires on some cars.) The resulting low unsprung weight 
contributed to their remarkably decent performances on often-poor roads. 
However, from the beginning Alfa, a relative latecomer, used the newfangled 
live axle and outboard brakes.

Trivia question: anyone know of another car, besides the Alfa 160 and 
Mercedes, that used four-wheel inboards? Or, for that matter, another car 
than Mercedes which used inboard brakes on non-driven wheels? There must be 
some, but at the moment I can't think of any.

John H. 
Raleigh, N.C.

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