Early GTV6

[GG105]

Happy new year everyone.

This is for the GTV6 tragics, of which I'm one. Around 1989 I bought a split dash GTV6 in red with beige interior and sold it after our daughter was born in 1992. At that time the ARA dealer cards for each car were available and I was able to ascertain that mine was an '82 build and first registered to ARA, I think it was on the road test fleet. It had a sunroof.

Early this year I bought the '85 GTV6 pictured below. Ive been working bringing it up to scratch, currently the dash and sunvisors are out for reskinning.

Well, I've just bought another one, a split dash, red with grey velour, a very original car with 125k. This one is interesting, it is a February '82 build and does not have a sunroof. This is only the second GTV6 I've seen without one, the other was a private import. I was told that 50 split dash cars, presumably all 82 builds (?) were imported in one batch and sold in the first half of '83. All were red and had either beige or grey trim (?). Thereafter all the cars sold were the single piece dash cars.

Unfortunately, I have no early history for the car. Can anyone confirm or otherwise the above? and do the ARA cards survive?



John

[Cool Jesus]

Love the Alfetta body, hence my interest, looks to be in real good shape by the photo.
The split dash is new for me, do you have a pic? I believe the you have a better chance at finding hens teeth above ARA cards, however if you send a quick email the Alfa historica, Marco will get back to you very quickly with some relevant details. There's a sticky thread on gaining this info here

http://www.alfaclubvic.org.au/forum/index.php?topic=10324.0

Marco will give you the cars original specs along with dates and who purchased it (no doubt it will be ARA)

Oh yeah, welcome aboard too 

[timgtv6]

Hi John,
probably not much help but I have a gtv6 thats plate says 03/83 with no sunroof, grey interior, red paint and a split dash. I dont know much about the history except it was first sold here in 84.

Tim

[GG105]

Happy new year everyone!

Thanks Tim, that's interesting. If it's correct that only 50 or so split dashes were imported, I suspect they were all '82 builds and all red, mine is Feb '82. That makes two more two more delete sunroof cars than I knew existed before yesterday! My car is chassis 2026, making it the 26th '82 production RHD GTV6. What is yours?

John

[colcol]

I heard that when Alfa Romeo Australia closed down in 1992, all the records were thrown out, as no one wants to keep them, its like when a company goes broke, all the records are shredded, as no one is interested anymore, the spare parts were all auctioned off, leaving all pre 1992 Alfa Romeo owners up the creek without a paddle, Colin.

[David Mills]

I bought one new from Frank Porter at Alfa city in September 1982.  I recall the story at the time was a small number came into the country for homologation for Bathurst.  I went down to the customs yard  with Frank and had a quick "test drive"   around the boundary roads and agreed to buy the car.  Aus compliance hadn't been completed at that stage but thats another story. I sold that car after 3 or 4 years but my younger son who  was about 4yo at the time of purchase must have absorbed the magic as he bought another '82 about 6 or 7 years ago and still has it.  Both or there cars are red with grey velour and no sun roof.

The pic shows my sons GTV6 in my shed a couple of years ago

[timgtv6]

wow David that is a nice shed!!
GG mine is 03 2043

[aggie57]

Hi Tim

Great to see such a nice looking early GTV6. There were quite a few brought in sans sunroof.  As you say it wasn't the norm but if you wanted no roof you could get one all the way through the time they were sold in Australia. I myself had a 1986 registered one from 1999 to 2004.

By memory the split dash cars were sold right into 1983, although I guess they could have been some of the earlier imports. It sounds like you know your GTV6's well so probably know that this was linked to Alfa initially building all RHD cars with the split dash.  Alfa GB kicked up such a stink, including creating their own local workaround, that in the end Alfa relented and started building them with straight dashes like the LHD cars. Otherwise it's quite probable that our cars would have had the split dash throughout production.

[GG105]

Thanks David and Alister. More information I wasn't aware of. Alister, is it correct then that '82 build LHD cars were single dash? I've always understood that the single piece dash came with the interior upgrade and applied to all Alfetta coupes.

When I bought my first split dash in '89 I hadn't seen another one and had not seen one since until the one I just purchased. So we can assume all the 82 build cars were red? Has anyone seen one that wasn't? Some came with sunroofs, some not and the trim was a mix of grey and beige.

I suspect that they were all produced in one batch with consecutive chassis numbers. Tim, I suspect your car is a March '82 build, the chassis number marks it in the same batch as mine. David, the chassis number of your son's car would be useful in verifying this. Has anyone heard any different to the number of 50 imports? My first car had no intrusion bars in the doors either and from memory no compliance plate. I pick up mine tomorrow and will post some photos.

I also understand the split dash cars also had smaller torsion bars, 19mm as opposed to the later cars 21 or 22mm?

Cheers
John

[aggie57]

All LHD cars with plastic bumpers, including 1.6 and 2 litre ones as sold in Europe, had straight dashes.

In Australia there was a mix of colours for these early cars. Red, grey, and a few black. Perhaps your previous car was a UK spec one?  A few of these apparently came here.

[kartone]

I purchase a new GTV 6 in the second-half of 1982 from car dealership Alec Mildren in Edgecliff NSW (see photos).
The car was red in colour with a black velour interior, had a split dash and did not have a sunroof.
I was told by the IMPORTER that 5 cars had been imported in one batch: one for the press, one for homologation purposes and three for racing. Within weeks of my purchase I met the owner of a second car from the batch, red with tan leather interior and sunroof, she lived two bays over and we became good friends.
Both cars were registered as 2 litres by the dealer as the 2.5 had not yet been homologated by the govt..

[kartone]

one more

[kartone]

last

[Ian Morris]

I have a dealer bulletin on the early GTV6. It says that 37 split dash cars were imported into Australia from June 1982 until mid 1983.
Some of those cars (probably yours John) were built in December 1981.
These early cars had the same 23mm torsion bars but differed from later cars in having campagnolo wheels and different gearbox ratios.
1981 gearbox ratios were: 1st 3.5, 2nd 1.956, 3rd 1.345, 4th 1.026 and 5th 0.78.
Later cars had 1st 3.5, 2nd 1.956, 3rd 1.258, 4th 0.946 and 5th 0.78 (much maligned ratios). That makes 3rd and 4th closer to 2nd and a much better gearbox. It was a similar box to the 2.0 of 1981 that had 3.3, 1.956, 1.345, 1.026 and .083. Why they changed it is beyond reason.
But like many things on the GTV6 the gearbox was stronger than the 2.0 gearbox (wider stronger gears.)
The LHD cars always had the one piece dash from new. But all RHD markets had the split dash until 1983.
I have seen a charcoal (black) split dash car.

[timgtv6]

Great info guys. I had no idea so few that made it here had the split dash. Probably why it is so hard to find the circular hazard light button in good condition