166 rear wheels touching inner liners

[Martin Jacques <martin.jacques@domain.elided>]

> Fellow lovers of all things Alfa,
> 
> This may be a bit of a long shot, but I am wondering if anyone has seen
> anything similar to what I am experiencing with my 166 3 litre. The car is
> totally standard, and has the optional Alfa 17 inch wheels fitted with
> 225/45 Goodyear Eagle F1 tyres.
> 
> When the car is pretty heavily loaded, or when I have my race bike trailer
> attached, the outside shoulder of each rear tyre touches the inner wheel
> arch liner when the suspension compresses. This happens frequently enough
> to wear the outside shoulder of the tyres noticeably faster than the rest
> of the rubber. This meeting of tyre and liner happens way before any bump
> stop on the suspension though. I have read the payload and trailer nose
> weight specs, and I am nowhere near exceeding these, so it almost seems
> like bad design to me. I have had the alignment checked, and all seems
> well.
> 
> I have spoken with my dealer, and also to Alfa customer services (for what
> good they are), and neither has heard of any similar problem with the 166.
> So I am faced with a couple of possible conclusions:
> 1) The suspension has deteriorated over 48,000 miles to such an extent
> that the suspension compresses far more than it is designed to.
> 2) The Alfa 17 inch alloy wheels, fitted to the car when it was bought
> new, are the wrong offset.
> 3) The rear wheel arch design leaves a little to be desired.
> 
> Would anybody care to comment on this at all, perhaps with any similar
> experiences? Failing that, does anybody know if it would be possible to
> fit harder rear springs, or maybe even some form of aftermarket
> self-levelling device? I have enquired of various people like Koni, Spax
> etc, and they only seem to offer lowering springs.
> 
> Thank you in advance,
> 
> Martin.
> 99 166 3L 6 speed (UK)
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