On 1/11/12 11:30 PM,George Graves wrote:
The car's worth as an automobile is not the point nor is it in
question. It may be excellent, certainly the Fiat 500 is an impressive
car with great engineering (that multi-air engine technology is
apparently a real advance in engine management). The point is that a
new Alfa is simply not an Alfa. It may be a great Fiat, but there is
no Alfa DNA in it
Okay, George and everyone else: an automobile is a MACHINE. Talking
about "bloodlines" and "DNA" and all that is what we aficionados do, but
it is at its base romantic crap that can too often obscure much more
important problems. BMC didn't go belly-up just because their MGs,
Wolseleys, Rileys and Morrises were all really Austins, but because they
were building too many brands that were all the same, and though many
were good enough they progressively became less so. It was a series of
bone-headed decisions, driven by massive egos and vicious politics, that
set BMC up for the final disaster that was British Leyland. The cars
were simply the machines they made and sold to finance their stupidity,
though some were very good cars indeed. I do however remember the horror
expressed by many MG stalwarts when the TD appeared, with wishbones and
coils instead of honest axles and cart springs, and then when their
beloved Morris XPAG engine (which was itself derided by purists at first
for being pushrod OHV instead of SOHC) was supplanted by the Austin
B-block mill their wails rent the skies or at least the air in several
pubs. Never mind that the TD had better road manners (including an
actual sense of direction) and rode well enough to preserve one's
fillings. But MG's descent into irrelevancy had nothing at all to do
with what these guys were whining about; it happened precisely because
management was counting too much on Heritage and Legacy and too little
on proper engineering. You can sell that stuff only until people start
noticing that the big MG looks like a rubber duck and has become
noticeably slower than the little MG
Alfa Romeo has had many deaths, in case we're forgetting. Alfisti
mourned when the Italian government took control, and when factory
output turned largely to mass-produced sedans; I'm guessing there were
snobs who were sure that Henry Ford would never tip his hat to a
Giulietta. The sale to Fiat that we've had reason to hate in past years
has I think been vindicated: what if Ford had been allowed to buy the
company? We've seen how well that worked out for Jaguar, Aston Martin,
Rover and Volvo, haven't we?
Anyway, if you're looking for the preservation of so-called automotive
DNA anywhere, you'll come up with damned few examples. Porsche, Morgan,
Ferrari, and who else? Rolls-Royce has a fairly recognizable version of
their old radiator, and they're still ungodly expensive, but remember
when they used to be pretty? Range Rovers and Land Rovers are still
about as capable off-road as anything you can buy from a showroom, but
rugged simplicity got kicked off the tailgate a long time ago. Some car
lines have resurrected themselves by shedding "DNA": Buick and Cadillac
come to mind here. Instead of letting the marketing guys pretend the
cars are radically new (remember "Not your father's Oldsmobile"?)
they've actually reached back to their beginnings, when their cars were
considered advanced and rather dashing for their times, to re-invigorate
the new generation. Marchionne is doing exactly the same thing with
Chrysler, or rather he's overseeing it, as Chrysler was born very much
as an engineering-forward company; if anyone wonders how Fiat can be a
better fit than D-B was expected to be, it's because Fiat is giving
Chrysler the benefits of their latest technology instead of flogging off
last generation's stuff as the Germans did. I also believe that
Marchionne has a respect for Chrysler's engineers that D-B clearly lacked.
Where does this leave Alfa? It's a car company that continues to make
some interesting cars. There's quite a bit of engineering talent there,
and although the whole enterprise is a lot more open to
cross-pollination than it was in the dear, dead days of their youth and
ours, I expect those cars to be worthy ones. I don't expect them to
look, drive, smell, sound or handle exactly like any other Alfas I've
had, but they didn't totally resemble each other, either. Their only
common characteristics were that their looks appealed to me, they were
and are nice to drive, their performance was always better than their
numbers would suggest, and they carried that badge. I expect no less of
any new one.
Will Owen
Alfa Milano '87
Alfa (Fiat??) 164S '91
Subaru Forester '01
--
to be removed from alfa, see http://www.digest.net/bin/digest-subs.cgi
or email "unsubscribe alfa" to [email protected]
