Alfa Romeo 166 3.0 V6 Goes for a Drive 

very good comment!!!

You are SO lucky to have been offered a new 166 as a company car! I bet very, very few people (outside of Italy) got it as an option.

You damn bugger got that spot on. A friend of mine had an alfa 164 3.0 v6, black, then got himself a 166 3.0 v6, burgundy, at the time my ride was a Ford Mondeo so when we went to the pub I always came up with excuses to get him pick me up just to hear those engines ravv up. Then came the moment the Mondeo gave up so I went out looking for an Alfa, no matter which one as long as it had a 3.0 v6. I drove home on a BMW. I felt like an idiot then, I still feel like an idiot now. And now, when I read your comment, I laughed out loud, very loud, just like an idiot.

The perception of a brand by the consumer is something of an enigmatic thing. Edit: And they spend millions on advertising to sway you toward buying their toothpaste...Whole generations of buyers, geographically worldwide for a world brand, tend to build and hold the same view of a product, so messing up can break a brand or tarnish it for years. Alfa had a few problems. First they were Italian. The big markets the US, UK, France and Germany had a dim view of Italian engineered things in the late 60s and 70s. This was simple bigotry. Hard to fight that. Then there were the union disputes and so on which affected the whole of Italian car production in the 70s. The whole industry stopped and steel was bought in from the USSR. The biggest market in the world was the US and as we know they hate ''commies'' and cars built with communist steel was one thing, but cars rusting before they were even delivered was another. Lancia died here. Horror stories of engines dropping through rusted subframes in the showrooms. Italian motors were seen as unreliable with shoddy workmanship, rusty rubbish. Sure they looked nice, and sure they could make a good engine, why they could even make cars that handled well. Just they fell apart after a week. This perception took Alfa thirty years to shrug off. It took a new generation without the memory. It took a good car. The 166 was not it. The 156 was. BMW hold a very different place in the mind of the consumer. Desirable, Performance, Engineering, Quality etc. All good things. These too are hard to shrug off and displace in the consciousness, fortunately for BMW.

BMWs of the time (E38, E39, E46 etc.) Were far, far from "unreliable utter pile of rubbish". You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about there. The fact there are plenty of them still around 20+ years later should say something about that. The newer ones however.... Time will tell. Sure these Alfas looked nice, went well and were luxurious but they were also thirsty, depreciated horribly, expensive to tax, and were tarnished by the reputation for serious reliability / quality failings of their cars from 15-20 years earlier. Having a good product alone is not enough sadly, people tend to want some kind of assurance that what they are buying will last well and be easy to live with and thats why most people just weren't brave enough to spend £30k on an Alfa. That, and the fact that the real world running costs were significantly higher than equivalent BMW or Audi models.

@@soundseeker63 ...and compared to a BMW it's front wheel drive which shrinks its appeal for enthusiasts both in period and later on. And that was peak BMW we're talking about here. They were on top of the world back then. It's an unfair comparison.

@@Petrospect I still have an E39 and have driven a 166 as well (many moons ago). The criticism of FWD is only really valid if you drive around on the ragged edge everywhere or like to floor it from a standing start...and if you are still in that mindset then neither of those cars is for you! In most normal situations on the road the 166 was more than adequate around the bends, though I did find the clutch rather heavy. It was the combination of thirst and maintenence worries that put me off personally (I could not afford and would not have considered one new in any case). And for most potential new buyers it was the fact that after 3 years it would be worth half what 5-Series or A6 would be worth come trade in... Same reason why the big French cars never sold well. You had to REALLY want to be different because financially they just didn't make any sense at all.

£250 upgrade... Steal of the century, it's more like 3 or 4 times that price to get an Independent to fit a Quaife diff. I've heard the LSD can make the car perform amazing things, my own Busso is open diff.

I bought her in January, the last owner wasnt good to her but i am getting her back to her best slowly! She is already back on the road with new hub carrier bushes and new headlights as well as a fresh MOT. Hoping to upload a few videos of her as she gets better 👍

Brilliant 👌

I love Alfas but you will Never beat the sound of a V8 😯

@@stuarthall2180 think it beats it easy

@@doddsalfa Not in a million years my friend. Alfas, fiat a Peugeot teaming up with General motors, you couldn't make it up. Rolling piles of crap 😯

@@stuarthall2180 you need to check out the story of the Busso engine before you start to confuse it with General Motors

@@stuarthall2180 You clearly have NO idea what you are talking about. ZERO. What Peugeot teaming up with GM car are you talking about????

Approaching 3 meters from the the wrong direction ...panadol for Matt.

Maybe he was confused with something else 😂

He must have thought 3feet in a meter...

3 liters long!!!!

What about "So very Citroen"?

@@rimmersbryggeri I'll await the next Citroen review for that reference! Hopefully Matt gets around to the C6 one of these days.

@@goyadressunofficial Yeah that's kind of the equivalent of the 166.

American...what does submit mean?

I have a 1999 Super (that is a 3.0 V6 6 speed manual). Yes, you are correct. It is a very good review, just a few little details he got wrong. The front grille (Scuderia) has an aftermarket backing...probably why the shield is loose. The 166 boot is much much bigger than the 156 saloon boot...not sure how he got that wrong. Manual gearboxes were 5 speed in early 2.5 v6 and 2.0 twin spark, otherwise all six speed (3.0 Super and later 2.0 cars) and the car being reviewed is a cf3 car, which has exactly the same set up as the facelift sportronic (3.0 auto). As you say the early cars 1998-2000 were all cf2 and the engine ecu was inside the cabin above the passenger footwell. The problem with the heater matrix leaking particularly affects the sportronics as coolant destroys the gearbox ecu.

3meters u sure😂

Well, if he's a mechanic, his customers should be concerned....3 meters long, talking about smaller twin spark engines, which have never been in 166 (only the 2.0 appeared there), mentioning the 3.2, as influenced by the GM (it's bloody Busso as well not like the one in the 159 and the 3.2 is really not less reliable than the 3.0) and many other inaccuracies...The car is great though

Spot on. As a dedicated Alfisti with 8 Alfas ‘under the belt’, I recently got a Citroen GSA Pallas. Really as advanced for the period and battling the Alfasud for sales. Happy with it but not sure if it warrants a rebuild. Anyway, the GSA has good road holding but nowhere near a ‘Sud’. In fact, the Sud is the best handling fwd car I’ve driven with amazing feel through the wheel; no car comes close these days!

I think the problem it's too Italian like Citroen is too French or Saab too Swedish they're never going to be massive sellers they're more bohemian left-field choices.

@@marcelhandsome6042 it takes a lot of “introspection” for a manufacturer to understand what their DNA is. Unfortunately Alfa seems to be more indecisive than Citroen, now that you mention it, as it is still struggling to find its own position in the market. They want to go after BMW but the latter is quite streamlined and certainly not as “special” and different. (I own a 3 series by the way, and a comparable Giulia felt a bit more special when I drove it)

@@luigicornelio7510 I'm Italian by the way and an Alfa fan but that's what I identify to be the problem with Alfa Romeo but nobody is saying it but it's too Italian like Lancia was. Maserati sells much better because it's less quirky less eccentric reaches a wider audience. If I was on the Stellantis (Fiat /Peugeot merger) committee I would modernize the Alfa logo call it just "Alfa" drop "Romeo" and also axe the traditional frontal shield and develop a new design language for the front grill.

@@luigicornelio7510 It's strange isn't it. Alfa is the best driving car, most interesting looking, has loads of character, gets attention....yes so it's not the most reliable but isn't bad. No one buys it. Lexus is the polar opposite of Alfa, brilliant engineering, super reliable, dull to drive, look anonymous, no character. No one buys it. BMW, Mercedes, Audi. Look okay, drive good, build good, breaks down a lot, needs parts replacing constantly. Public love them.

having owned a 3.2, I disagree. The car is very heavy in the nose and it doesn't know what to do with all the torque on the front wheels. An automatic suits the executive saloon character much better. Now, if the 3.2 had a factory LSD and pedals that allowed heel-toe then that would be a different story.

@@271productionAutomatic engines usually last longer than their manual counterparts.

As an owner of Nissan's vq35hr i wager that it and most nissan v6 engine are better in every measurable way lol It makes an extra 73hp and loads more torque with only 300cc more capacity, revs higher, more fuel efficient and is infinitely more reliable. Nissans VQ series has also won multiple awards over the years for being one of the best in the industry. To call Alfa's v6 engines masterpieces when many manufacturers do it so much better... i can't agree, its average at best, a glorified Fiat punto engine with polished intake pipes to lure in people who like shiny things.

@@addz17 OMG what the hell are you talking about. Do some research. Read, learn, know. You are talking about a long line of very fine, very high-quality V6 engines named after the engineer who designed it, Mr. Busso. It's ok to troll around You Tube whilst sitting on your toilet waiting to wipe your butt, but at least keep your mouth shut, you clearly do not belong in the conversation, and have zero clue what we are talking about.

@@danieleregoli812 uh ohh Mr ravioli's triggered lol there are better v6 engine than alfa ones ffs

Hi Greg, where abouts in Australia do you live. I'm in Brisbane. I have a 2003, 3.0 Auto with 83.000ks. Its silver with red interior. I absolutely love it.

@@conga63 I'm in Gympie. My car has gearbox troubles at the moment. BTW I have a 2007 3.0 l v6 facelift car that has parts the same as your car. I bought it mainly for the gearbox

Drove just this car last week - a friend’s and is magnificent

2.5L V6 came with manual gearbox too. But really rare indeed.

It's galvanised 🙄

correct. It is called ICS

😂

I actually like the headlights, what I never liked on this car are the rear lights.