1960's Alfa Romeo - now showing the real thing.

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I was walking around town today and I spotted a parking lot of older European cars, so I head over to take a closer look. At first glance, it seems pretty interesting. They had 2 Rovers, one long wagon, one chunky sedan. A Lancia Beta of some sort, a clean Saab 900 Turbo 16V, some Jaguar XJ I think, a Triumph TR6, but the most important was this small, beat-up Alfa in the corner. I took a good long look at it, this car was figgn' stunning! From the outside, all of the damage really only looked cosmetic, the body was in bad shape (cracked and rusted everywhere) and the interior didn't look so great either.

It was small, had a headlight on each side, and looked a lot like the 1966/7 1300 Junior GT. It could be something different though, I don't think I remember the chrome bumper. I know the Junior is a pretty cracking car in Europe, is this one worth asking about? What would I expect the guy to say? Thanks for the help (unfortunately the digicam no longer works, so I can't go out and take a picture).
 
What year was it? - i have a fair knowledge of 60's Euro cars.

Was it 'rounded' like the GT/Junior or squarer?
 
Going by this list: http://www.ppf-rs.com/rs_roman/giulia/alfa/lineup.html, I'd say it's almost identical to the Giulia Sprint. I have no idea which version it is though. Is there any way to find out? I looked at the tail, and there isn't any logo or anything like that. My bus drove by the lot again today, but some bloke was standing in my way so I could not see anything. I'll get another look tomorow.

How about that Lancia Beta? Are they at all desirable? I'm just trying to find out if all I'm seeing is just a lot of junk or some actual potential.
 
If I'm not mistaken, (and I could be) Alfa's are unibody cars, and the Italians were not that great at rust proofing in the mid 60's.
Check in the trunk, and the Suspension pick-up points in particular.
 
Well, you came across a good lot of interesting pieces. The Triumph TR-6, of course, is well-known as the "manly man" Triumph thanks to its rorty big six and brawny Karmann retouched Michelotti styling.

The Lancia Beta Montecarlo is a neat little sidebar in the sports car world. Think of a prettier more powerful Fiat X1/9. It was sold here in the states as the Lancia Scorpion (since Chevy already had Monte Carlo in the states) and has found a niche as a fun car for SCCA club racing.

The Beta's real calling card, though, was that it was Lancia's entrant into the silhouette wars of the late 70's (Group 5, IMSA Camel GT) and in a revised form, it became the rallying Group B legend - the O37.

lancia1.jpg


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Thanks for all of the info. If I can find out more about the lot (I think it may be a Euro parts dealer) then I will for sure look into the Alfa with more attention. The Beta was not the first one pictured. TR6s are really nice, but they're fairly common. The Alfa really raised a brow when I first saw it. I'd love to have a little project car if I can pick something up for cheap.

I live in Montreal, Canada.
 
If the Alfa's in good condition it would certainly be a fun and unusual car to own in Canada. But like Gil said, 60's Italian cars have a huge appitite for rust. A clean one would be a little gem, a poor one would either fall apart around you or drain your savings account.
 
Quote: ''small, beat-up Alfa in the corner. I took a good long look at it, this car was figgn' stunning! From the outside, all of the damage really only looked cosmetic, the body was in bad shape (cracked and rusted everywhere) and the interior didn't look so great either.''

It may be a bit late (since this alfa was a 70s/80s car), but there was a car called an AlfaSud, which was like their compact sports model. Only problem was, the body rotted away before you could drive it from the dealers....I hope this helps.Look it up and see if it's the car you saw.
 
herrwazza
Quote: ''small, beat-up Alfa in the corner. I took a good long look at it, this car was figgn' stunning! From the outside, all of the damage really only looked cosmetic, the body was in bad shape (cracked and rusted everywhere) and the interior didn't look so great either.''

It may be a bit late (since this alfa was a 70s/80s car), but there was a car called an AlfaSud, which was like their compact sports model. Only problem was, the body rotted away before you could drive it from the dealers....I hope this helps.Look it up and see if it's the car you saw.
Click to expand...

Nope, I'm now 100% sure it's a late 60s Giulia Sprint (or one of the various editions). I'll have to wait 'til the camera gets fixed to actually get proper footage of this car, it's certainly something worth investigating. I keep telling myself it would be fun, but the rust is bad, so I guess I'll have to wait for a decent e30 to come along, and spend my money on something along those lines.

67alfa1.jpg
 
hey, that alfa there.Il buy it, rust or no rust.a very nice car.yep its a giula sprint.Changing body panels is no big problem, but making sure it hasnt affected the rest of the car i.e. axles/transmission etc might be expensive to fix. If it's your car and you don't want it, add me on msn warren.thatcher@btinternet.com and we'll talk prices.....
 
Like I said, I have no info on the car, except it's location. I'll stop by tomorow and try to find some answers (hopefully with a camera). It's not mine, I don't know who's it is or any details. All I know is where it is sitting. If I find any decent info, I'll let you know.
 
That's just an example of what the car looks like.

I drove by it today, but didn't get out. I had to get home as soon as possible to use the bathroom. It doesn't have the chrome bumper, like the GTA (I can't find any other version without the chrome), but it doesn't have the clover logo of the GTA, but it is possible that it fell off (although the same could be said about the bumper). The paint colour is, well, rust. There are rust spots on the rust coloured paint (double-negative perhaps?). I'll get photos as soon as my camera gets fixed/I buy a new one (hopefully this week). I'm suddenly really really interested at the possibility of it being a GTA.
 
I think all the GTA's were red or white, and i doubt an alloy bodied GTA would be rusting!

- The regular Giulia GT is still a great car, and every bit as good as a GTA on the road.
 
Alright, so I went down today with the camera to see what I can get from the lot. I talked to a local worker, and he said the cars belonged to a neighbouring garage. I went around front, and it seemed pretty locked up, but there was an older Audi sedan parked infront next to a Defender with GB stickers on both.

Here are the pictures I could get. I totally forgot to get any sort of interior shots, but it's not too bad on this inside, not as bad as the exterior of the car.

Here you can see the Lancia Beta


It looks like there used to be a retrofitted bumped on the front, possibly to comply with local laws?


This is the worst of the damage, near the nose


The rest of the damage was mostly along the bottom panels, like here


It's an old license plate, but it's definitely not from the 60s, and also that added on bumper


A bit of the interio, there's a blanket over the seats, and you can see my daily driver, the ol' Scort (she's a rally superstar).


I am so dumb, I totally forgot about getting any interior shots, didn't think of looking for any evidence of manufactured date, nothing like that... I didn't even bother knocking on the garry door. Anyone think I should offer him 500$ to get rid of it for him?

In other interesting Alfa news, a friend of mine is in New Jersey doing some construction work for a rich fellow. He mentioned that they're barns that he's rstoring, so I asked for what. The whole time we were joking around about how this guy's got a ton of money, so my friend says "you know, for his 30 Alfa Romeos." I didn't take him seriously, I just presumed that he meant the employer's got some money, so he'll fill it with rich stuff, some tractors, maybe some cars for storage, etc.

Nope! Turns out he actually owns several dozen Alfas, and races them regularly. I went one weekend to see how the work was coming along, and I casually asked where the cars were. My friend says they're mostly in Europe right now, but they'll slowly be brought over once there is room in the barns. In fact, if I had come a week later, I'd be able to take a look at the first batch of 12 or 15 cars.

But, there were a couple in the normal garage-house, where my friend was staying while doing the work. He offered to show them to me, so in I went to check out the cars. The first garage had 3 GTA racecars, two in full race-guise, one closer to street wear (like pictured) but still looked like it had been tracked. The next garage had one car, a sedan, but full out racer, beautiful interior (track beauty)... I didn't get any pictures, but if I go down again, I'll have some serious metal to photograph.
 
Hmmm, thats interesting.

If you know how to do some bodywork, and you are willing to invest some money, that would be an absolutely awesome car to restore. Too bad the parts will probably cost an arm and a leg, but if you could get it restored and sell it, you could probably stand to make a good profit.

Do you happen to know if it moves under it's own power?
 
I know nothing other than it's location and model.

It's an undisclosed location near my house (;)) and it is an Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint with a flat back tire and some fairly huge body problems. Next week I'll hit up the owners front door for some info.
 
It looks like a late 60's, probably early 70's, Alfa 105-series, the wheels and door handles give it's age away. It looks in pretty poor condition to be honest, i would have thought that a set of new panels would cost you as much as a complete 'sound' version. The sills are the bits that you should walk away from if in bad condition - these don't look good.
 
The car is a 1968-1970 Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint GT Junior 1300, which is a step-nose 105-bodied car. In 1968, all models other than the Junior GT and the GTA converted to the slant-nose styling, but it took two more years of life for the Junior to apadt to the quad-headlighted slant-nose, joining the GTV, GTC etc, although the GTA remained a step-nose for its entire career. This one is a 1968-1970 car because of the second generation's interior. The GT/Giulia series found it's replacement in 1974 (the Alfetta I believe) and finally ended production in 1976. Almost a thousand GTAs were produced in the cycle, even a handful of supercharged models, even if AR only claims to have made only 500.

This GT Junior has a set of fairly popular and sought-after aftermarket Momo Vegas wheels, used on many Alfas of that generation.

I went today for a more-thorough investigation of a possible restoration mission or parting the thing out, and it turns out that it is not worth touching. The bottom half of the car is completely rotten, the underbody is mush, there's actually moss attached to parts of the car, someone tried to repair parts of the car, so significant patches of bondo are cracking through. This thing isn't worth touching with a 10-foot pole.
 

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