[alfa] Re: confidence levels

["Ben Ament" <bament@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Greg -
I am happy to hear that you are finally going to get another Milano - you
will be pleasantly surprised at the reliability.

My sons both drive Hondas. MY choosing, not theirs, though they like their
cars. The 1991 CRX gets between 38 and 42 MPG on the highway (36 to 38 in
town) and is even sorta fun to drive. The 1988 Accord is boring even with
the 5 speed - it gets 32 to 34 Highway and around 25 in town. My Milano is
fabulous to drive and gets about 25 in town and breaks into the low thirties
on the highway. Not as good as either Honda, but it has more power and much
better chassis dynamics.

But your question had to do with reliability, not mpg or fun or any of the
other reasons we by Alfas instead of Hondas. We don't buy Alfas because they
are reliable, do we? Well, I do. My Milano sees regular duty on a weekly
round trip of 240 miles. My GTV6 before that saw daily duty on a commute of
120 round trip. I have purchased several Alfas (2 Bertone GTVs, 3 or 4
Spiders, a Berlina, an Alfetta Sport Sedan, and a very tired GTV6) and
driven them all home from several states and sometimes thousands of miles
away. Even the sellers often think that I am nuts, but with a little
planning and forethought it can be done.

The CRX threw a rod through the side of the block at 65 miles per hour. I
was driving - neither of my sons had even set foot in the car at the time  -
I had recently serviced the car and it only had about 85,000 miles on the
clock.

I chose the Milano for a recent trip to Omaha to visit a declining uncle.
Round trip total: 885. Do I trust Alfas to get me there? As much or more
than either of our Hondas.

In fact, I am looking for another Milano to replace the Accord.

Ben Ament
St. Cloud, MN


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