[alfa] Alfetta instrument placement

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While I did mention the extreme Kamm tail on the Alfetta GT and likened
it to the TZ1 (a bit of an exaggeration), I failed to continue my
'exhaustive' research regarding tachometer placement. Joe Elliott
somewhat brought the two elements together with his comments, "While not
mass-produced, could you call the SZ, TZ, and 33 Stradale "road cars?"
I'm pretty sure some of those postwar limited-production race cars had a
tach in front of the driver and a more centrally-located speedo."

John Hertzman acknowledged Joe's solid point in #814 by stating, "Joe
Elliott very properly swats me down for overstating my argument on the
Alfetta coupe tach location."

While I don't believe it was quite a 'swatting down', Young Master
Elliott is certainly correct. After getting up off my duff, walking five
feet, then opening Marcello Minerbi's book 'Alfa Romeo-Zagato SZ TZ' it
opened to page 95. Yup, there's the big old TZ1 tachometer (which reads
to 10.5k) dead center in front of the driver, with (the smaller water?)
temp gauge to the immediate left, a gauge which reads from 1 to 10 on
the right (?), then much lower to the left of the steering wheel is the
(I assume oil temp) gauge, to the right is a (pretty sure) fuel gauge,
then further to the right is a large speedometer obviously reading in
kilometers (2o thru 260). There is both a drawing of the instrument
layout as well as a large photo of the TZ1 dash. In the photo there is
another instrument to the right of the speedo (clock?).

On page 34 there is a small drawing and photo of a SZ dash. They
identify all the switches and controls but fail to point out what the
medium sized three instruments are grouped in front of the driver. I
believe the tach is on the left, the speedo on the right, and what
appears to be a Giulietta tripod instrument (fuel, oil temp, water temp)
gauge in the center. Most curious. Obviously they learned from their
'mistake' when they made the TZ1. (Tiny happy face).

Unfortunately I don't have much on the 33 Stradale. While hardly
counting as a 'coupe' the drawing of what I'll call the 'long-tail' 33/2
Sports Prototype on page 648 of Fusi appears as if it has a single gauge
in front of the driver. There are several photos of 33/2 'running
chassis's' but unfortunately without instruments. I did check a very
dark photocopy of the wonderful Winston Goodfellow (photos by Dave
Mericle) article on the 'Stradale' in the June / July '98 issue of
Sports Car International. Doesn't appear to show any photos of the dash.

To interrupt 'instrument placement' for a minute, Fusi's book shows
three drawings on variations on 33/2 body styles - the 'periscopica'
(1967), the 'Mugello' - Luglio (1967) - both of these having open
cockpits. The third drawing shows a very Stradaleish looking coupe and
is listed as "Profilo 33/2 litri Daytona, coda corta - Febbraio 1968.
Goodfellow does say that Stradale means road. He also lists the chassis
numbers of the 18 33/2's and the whereabouts (or lack thereof for
numbers 5 & 6) of the various cars. Six are referred to as Stradale.
Might this have been a name that came along at a later date?

While looking for the photo / article of the 33 Stradale in the book
Fantastic Alfa Romeo by Luciano Greggio (again no cockpit photos) I ran
across the Alfetta - the 159 version. While hardly a coupe, it
interestingly has two (possibly three) smaller instruments grouped to
the immediate left of the steering wheel's shaft, a small one upper
center, and a huge pie-plate sized instrument to the immediate right -
I'd guess tachometer.

I had toyed with the idea of pointing out my '50 (English) Riley saloon
came with all instruments in the center. Since it is left hand drive
(actually steering) the speedometer should have been on the center far
left and the clock on the far right, with the smaller instruments in the
center. They were reversed. This was one of the first changes I made.
FWIW a tachometer was available. Believe it then had a small clock on
the face. Unfortunately one needed to drill a hole (very dead center) in
the rear of one of the cams (has twin cams located high in the Very long
block). Obviously the driver then had the choice of glancing to the near
right to see the tach or the far right to see it. This instrument
arrangement was not unusual in the 50's since the edict was 'export or
die' for UK manufacturers. The instruments were one item they didn't
haven't to deal with when switching steering wheels (among other items
like pedals) to the other side.

Steve Thompson pointed out that he saw a Morgan with tachometer dead
ahead of the driver with 'lesser' (my term) instruments to the right.
Since you can't get much more English than a Morgan, it won't be
necessary for me to talk about my Riley. Do believe the center speedo in
the Mini falls under 'fun', and just perhaps, the Germans patting the
English on the head and saying, "How quaint you people are - let's just
hope your quaintness still sells."

Biba
Irwindale, CA USA
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