Re: Alfa fwd

["John Hertzman" <johnhertzman@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

John Burrows wrote "Also don't forget about the Tipo 103 that Alfa was working
on in 1960, prolly as a response to the Mini.  I don't think Hruska was at
Alfa at that time so it would have been a Satta project, so Alfa management
was studying fwd long before FIAT became involved."

No major argument, but Fusi (who does list the 103 as a Satta project, and
does not mention a Hruska connection) says the work was started in 1959, which
was the year Hruska left Alfa Romeo where he had been Technical Director from
1954, and General Assistant Director from 1956, so he was hardly out of the
loop.

Alfa also had launched in June 1959 the AR-1090, an Alfa-badged modification
of the Renault Dauphine which they built in fairly substantial numbers
(70,502, compared to 14,000 Giulietta Spiders and Spider Veloces and 27,000
Giulietta Sprints and Sprint Veloces) and was presumably already at that time
familiar with the Renault R-4 which Alfa also built in smaller numbers (about
42,000) and without an Alfa badge starting at a slightly later date, 1962-'64.
While the 103 did have a transverse engine like the Mini (albeit a twin-cam
alloy unit) and unlike the longitudinal R-4, its design was arguably part of a
developed industry-wide consensus that for small economy cars engines and
drivelines would be unitary at one end or the other - VW, Renault, Saab, DKW,
Fiat, Panhard, Biscuter, Isetta. While one may point to occasional exceptions
like Citroen and, perhaps, Tatra, (and the Isotta Monterossa) there were few
in that era who saw the unitary engine/driveline as a comparably ideal
approach for appreciably larger and more powerful cars. Despite Alfa's
Alfasuds and 33s, this seems to me to be the nub of the question whether Alfa
(Alfa 'Nord', the Milan company) would have made an across-the-board choice of
FWD without Fiat's controling ownership. But that is academic debate over
ancient history.

Enjoy yours,

John H.
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