Archive for category Alfa Romeo
Novitec Tunes the Alfa Romeo 8C
Posted by in Alfa Romeo on July 25, 2011
The German-based car tuning specialists at Novitec have a long history of tuning Italian cars. The company is divided into a number of branches based on the type of cars they modify. There’s Novitec Tridente for Maserati cars, Novitec Rosso for Ferrari, and for the other Italian automakers such as Fiat and Alfa Romeo, there’s Novitec.
One of the most celebrated designs to come from an Italian automaker in the past decade has been the Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione. The car was built to honor the eight-cylinder racing cars at the height of Alfa’s motorsport success. The 8C proved to be immensely popular, and from this popularity, spawned a convertible variant. Just in time for the warm summer months, Novitec has introduced a tuning program for the Alfa Romeo 8C Spyder.
Since the topless sports car is roughly based on the Maserati GT and uses a similar engine, Novitec called in their Maserati division to tune the engine. The 4.7-liter V-8 engine was fitted with a supercharger driven by the engine’s crankshaft via cogged-tooth belt. The supercharger was designed to provide an even power band, even at low speeds. Maximum boost pressure is set at 0.37 BAR (5.37 PSI). In addition to the supercharger itself, Novitec Tridente has also added a water-to-air intercooler with dedicated radiator and larger fuel injectors. The entire engine upgrade is completed with advanced car tuning, in which Novitec has recalibrated the injection and ignition mapping for the optimum power output.
Since the Alfa Romeo uses a Maserati-based 4.7-liter V-8, it also boasts one of the most attractive exhaust notes in the industry. To make it even better, Novitec has installed a stainless steel sport exhaust with a flap system that varies the volume of the note depending on the engine speed and throttle input.
The result of the engine tuning is an astonishing 600 horsepower (441 kW) at 7,300 RPM and 433.63 lb-ft. (588 Nm) of torque at 5,400 RPM; an increase of 150 horsepower (110 kW) over stock. This added power helps improve the acceleration time for the Alfa Romeo 8C by cutting the 0-62 mph time down to 3.9 seconds. Top speed is also increased from the stock 180 mph (290 k/h) to 189.52 mph (305 km/h), making it the fastest Alfa Romeo model. Read the rest of this entry »
Guilieta Alfa Romeo Classic Sport Car Coupes
Posted by in Alfa Romeo on July 25, 2011
For those stylish sports car enthusiasts that are in the know most of Alfa Romeo postwar success can be traced to their stylish Bertone and Zagato coupes. Powered by fast, zippy twin-cam high performance engines they were highly fast as well as attractive.
The last of the Giulia GTV coupes left the production line in 1976, marking the end of a pretty direct line after 20 years, true testimony to the high quality of the original design.
The first Giulietta coupe had been introduced in very limited numbers during 1954 and the range really made its debut at the 1955 Turin Auto Show. Giulettas were small cars designed chiefly to be popular and affordable but also to be versatile enough to be built as practical, indeed dowdy saloons, elegant coupes and even efficient race winners.
At the heart of the Giulietta was a twin engine cam engine essentially that was still in production way into the 1980′s. It marked a return to pre-war Alfa practice in some way, being built in alloy with wet cylinder liners (although with shimmed rather than threaded tappets). It’s slightly under square dimensions of 74 mm x 75 mm resulted in a displacement of a mere 1290 cc from which no less than 80 bhp was extracted at 6300 rpm. Much of that power was due to the top end design of the engine, which featured two overhead camshafts chain driven and operating two valves per cylinder inclined at 80 degrees, in hemispherical combustion chambers. That amount of power of power naturally gave the coupe impressive performance for a mid 50′s 1300 and it could reach 103 mph (166 kph) in top, a genuinely impressive speed for its day.
Almost as good as the engine was the suspension, a strong thoroughly engineered and relatively simple design of double wishbone and coil springs in the front and a live rear axle. The axle sounds very much in keeping with the 50′s except that great pains had been taken to locate the axle securely to eliminate tramp and hop. Two stout pressed steel lowering trailing arms were complemented by a triangular upper bracket connected at one point to the differential carrier and at two points to the body in front of the axle. Again the springs were coils and the clampers telescopic. One unintentional oversight in the workup, which was quickly rectified, was an oddity – a column mounted gear change. You can bet that it did not take too long, and too many models out the factory door for this oversight to the ultimate motorists and drivers of this sports car was revised and thankfully corrected. Read the rest of this entry »