THE ALFA ROMEO 164 – A CELEBRATION
By Andrew Roberts |
18th January, 2021
By any standards, the 164 is a very special motor-car. It was the last of the “Tipo 4/Type 4” family, predated by the Fiat Croma, Lancia Thema and the Saab 9000. It was also the last Alfa Romeo developed before the Fiat takeover of 1986 and one of its generation’s finest sports saloons.
The Tipo 4 project dated back to 1978, when Alfa, Fiat, Lancia and Saab agreed their next generation of large cars would share a common platform. The 164 debuted at the 1987 Frankfurt Motor Show, and its Pininfarina styling instantly differentiated it from the Thema/Croma/9000. Some aficionados queried the front-wheel-drive engine layout – a “first” for a large Alfa. However, the motoring writer William Kimberley described the “Busso” 3-Litre V6, with its single cam per bank, as ‘an architectural delight’.
To state that the 164 faced an array of challenges is akin to saying that Emmerdale is not renowned for its acting. Alfa sold 15,000 on the home market within six months, and the new model accounted for 18% of sales. Yet, if it was to enjoy commercial success in export markets, the average “executive buyer” needed to be convinced a 164 possessed the build quality of an Audi 100 and the sporting nature of a BMW 5-Series. It also needed to convey the prestige of a Jaguar XJ6 and to be as comfortably reliable as a Volvo 760.
The UK market versions made their bow on 14th October 1988, with the 3.0 V6 at £17,925 and the Lusso at £20,250. Alfa Romeo GB planned to sell 300 units in that year, but even that was a challenging task because none of their larger saloons enjoyed great popularity in this country. The 2600 was not exactly a common sight during the 1960s and nor was the Six twenty years later. Alfa enthusiasts might argue that during the 1970s the 105-series 2000 Berlina was not an unknown quantity, but that was a smaller machine that rivalled the Rover P6 and the Triumph 2.5 Pi Mk. II.
In short, the 164 needed to appeal to the motorist in the Rover Sterling income-bracket and to raise the marquee’s profile in the UK. In 1988 Autocar & Motor thought the Lusso was ‘brilliant but flawed’ and ‘If the 164 cannot put Alfa back where it belongs nothing will’. Car preferred the Alfa Romeo over the BMW 525i SE and the Rover 827 Vitesse, not least because ‘nobody else out there is going to have more fun in a £20,000 saloon’. Motor Sport headlined its 1989 test with ‘The comeback!’. It concluded ‘Hardly any other car offers more fun per pound whether it be in its handling and performance, styling or overall engineering’.
And the 164 was of vital importance to Alfa GB. As Kimberley observed, ‘not only has it boosted sales, its image has rubbed off on both the 33 and 75 giving them a boost in their sales as well’. Production ended in 1997, and we shall be covering the Quadrifoglio Verde and the Quadrifoglio 4 versions later this year. For now, here is as young Quentin Wilson describing it as Alfa’s ‘finest sports saloon’ on Top Gear. He could well be right...
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