Drive review used 156

[colcol]

Hello 156 would be owners, in last Saturday's AGE, the subject for buying a used car was the Alfa 156,V-6, T.S. and Jts, i am sure its on line somewhere, but here is a few pointers, " It is said that without the fanaticsm of its followers, Alfa Romeo would have ceased to be a viable brand years ago" good point, "Alfa Romeo has never been in the business of making bland cars", take that Toyota!, Likes 1- Ride and handling rarely come together as well as they did with the 156, Supple and sure footed, 2- Interior is a nice departure from the norm, looks different without being twee, 3- Twin spark is smooth and revvy, 4- V6 offers more urge and similar smoothness, Alfa V-6's have always been good, 5- Looks good from any angle. Dislikes 1- Build quality not to the standard of some-particulary Japanese alternatives, 2- Other European cars in the same class offer better residual value, 3- Niggling small electrical problems, 4- Many previous owners thought they were buying a Ferrari and drove accordingly, 5- Hard driven examples, of the vehicle will be showing their age. Need to know 1- Electrical problems plague the interior, make sure all electric window switches work and the central locking obeys commands, 2- A handfull of early 2 litre engines had a machining fault, that starved the engine of oil, resulting in trashed engine, should have been detected and fixed by now, though, 3- Noisy clutch thrust bearing is a bad sign, its a gearbox out, repair job to fix, 4- Drive over bumps and listen for rattles, a 156 with no rattles has probably been babied since new, even well cared for cars can be a bit loose in the interior trim department, 5- Make sure any Selespeed cars have all their gears present and accounted for, third gear can sometimes stop working, buts its usually a sensor fault rather than the gear box itself., please read the full article, Colin.

[bix]

Thanks colcol. I discovered the article on Sunday night and read with much interest. The quote "European cars in the same class offer better residual value" annoyed the crap out of me. Surely that is an advantage; ie. why would I want to pay $20k on a similarly aged/similar k's Audi when I could buy a 156 at less than half that. I agree about the comment on the interior - one of the best interiors around in a car and I believe the quality of the leather puts anything from Germany to shame.

[Brad M]

The quote "European cars in the same class offer better residual value" annoyed the crap out of me. Surely that is an advantage; ie. why would I want to pay $20k on a similarly aged/similar k's Audi when I could buy a 156 at less than half that.

I think the point is you'd be spewing if you bought an Alfa new, instead of an Audi new.

I think you are thinking ... Better value to by that 2nd hand Alfa, as opposed to the Audi.

But, the journalist/reviewer is saying, if the cars keep losing valuing at that rate, you'll get more back when you sell the Audi. I conclude with; I still would rather have the Alfa.

[Neil Choi]

Here it is.

http://theage.drive.com.au/used-car-reviews/alfa-romeo-156-200106-20110318-1bzry.html

[Paul Gulliver]

Where were you 10 mins ago Neil, I have just been going though the rubbish bin to find Saturday Drive (found it ) . At least it was in the recycle bin. Not in with the prawn heads.

[aggie57]

Where were you 10 mins ago Neil, I have just been going though the rubbish bin to find Saturday Drive (found it ) . At least it was in the recycle bin. Not in with the prawn heads.

Lucky Paul - bin day tomorrow morning in your street!  

I read the article online too. Looks a pretty reasonable summary. My Dad's 2000 vintage 156 is still going strong. Selespeed too and thats been fine.

[pep105]

David Morely has reviewed the 156 in Drive twice before

in 2005
http://theage.drive.com.au/used-car-reviews/alfa-romeo-156-19992002-20050817-14s7e.html

and in 2007
http://theage.drive.com.au/used-car-reviews/alfa-romeo-156-20070706-14soz.html

Not a bad review however theres no mention of the all too important timing belt changes and other issues such as variators and sway bar bushes as potential things to look for. At least in the earlier 2005 review he mentions timing belts.

Don't know what Morely means when he claims 'the 156 was a little down on power compared to the
opposition' on its launch in 1999 it was more powerful than most other four banger euros (A4, 318i - which wouldn't pull the jocks off a
porn star) & more powerful and better performing than the IS200 which was a 2 litre six.

Even later on when the others had newer generation models and the 156 got the JTS engine it was still up there, sure not a rocket launcher but hardly back of the pack either.

[pep105]

Paul - Fine dining at your place prawn heads hey !

I've had to go through the recycle bin at Dads place to find Drive as well, when Dad gets Friday's Herald Scum opps I mean Sun
the first thing he does is throw the Cars Guide in the bin, pretty much sums it up then.........it's even too harsh to wipe your bum with  

[Davidm1600]

Yep  I too agree with the general thrust of the comments made both here and as per the article.  Must have missed it too, but unlike Gullys diet of prawn heads, mine went out with the used kitty litter.  Definitely a good use for the guide on most occasions.

Pep mate you have me cracking up as I have my breakkie reading this thread.

My take, now having owned my 156 for a little over 3 years is that they do offer excellent value 2nd or even possibly better still 3rd or 4th hand.  My car is now probably only worth 1/2 of what I paid for it, and that already was over 1/2 of what it cost new. 

I certainly have done my best to look after mine and have been rewarded with few problems.  Sure there are a few creaks and rattles but nothing too annoying or worse than many other cars.  Yes the carpet is poor say in comparison to the missus's beemer, but on the other hand the leather is superb.  I haven't had any dramas with the electrics so far and the windows are all fine. 

I do have squeaky front swaybar bushes and a clunk in the front end (lower control arm).  But these things are all fixable and will be.  Ditto it is time for new shocks and these will be done shortly.  Then of course the belts.  But hey any car with a belt driven twin cam needs to do these regularly.  Apart from the cost, there is no big deal about this.  As a Fiat Twin cam owner for over 30 years, that I need to do this also on the 156 doesn't phase me.

The real problem for the 156 like all euro cars, and probably the better Japanese ones is that once they are older than 10 years is that the cost of maintenance is potentially the real killer.  For they were expensive when new, but as they become cheap to buy, the cost of servicing doesn't equally fall.  However, owners often become reluctant to pay given that the residual value of the car is low.  That is when problems with the older cars become increasingly more apparent.  The key is to keep the maintenance up on them as problems arise.

[aggie57]

Actually now I read the comments on window switches we did have one break on the 156.  And of course I was driving it when it happened so it was my job to fix the damned thing.  Easy to do and got one from the wreckers easy enough.  But a really weak design when you open it up and see how it's made.  Apparently the later ones were stronger.

[alfagtv58]

Morley also did a couple of nice pieces on Alfa's during the centenary celebrations (grab a copy of Motor Mag from early last year).  He is reasonably nice about Alfa's given his leaning towards anything with an air cooled engine!!

[John Hanslow]

All up the 156 got Alfa Romeo thru a difficult time even though buyers were hit by selespeed and belt issues.

But now a 156 or 166 ( and other in the series) are incredible value on the market now and a lot do have appropriate service records.

[colcol]

And the most important thing with these cars is change the cam and balance shaft belts every 3 years or 50,000ks, NOT 4 years or 60,000ks, that was before they had the early cam belt issues and use the correct oil 10-60 fully synthetic racing oil, on the JTS, the brand being your favourite, and keep the oil level up to the top, check it once a week, the difference between full and low is 1 litre, if its down low and your oil light comes on, you have most likely damaged your engine, and has anybody heard about the incorrect machining of the engine causing oil starvation?, thats a new one on me, as the twin spark engine on the 156 had been used on its predecessor the 155, that wasn't sold in Australia, please tell us if you know the details on the incorrect machining, Colin.

[bix]

Talking about the 166, is anyone salivated over this one like I am at the moment?
http://www.carsales.com.au/all-cars/dealer/details.aspx?Cr=1&R=9722904&keywords=&trecs=22&__sid=12EEF2C8172C&__Ns=pCar_YearMade_Int32|1||pCar_RankSort_Int32|1||pCar_PriceSort_Decimal|0&__Qpb=true&tsrc=allcarhome&__Nne=15&seot=1&__N=1216%201246%201247%201252%201282%204294967249%204294967160&silo=1011

[John Hanslow]

The 156 (and 166) will be reviewed at the 156 Workshop.

I suppose for warranty purposes, there is merrit buying a car from a dealer however with my 3rd hand cars of lesser value, I consider it essentail to get an independant prepurchase inspection and the car checked on the Afla factoy analyser. 

I use the well known Alfa Specialist workshops to do this as they know the cars and any common faults, the quick fixes etc.   Something a dealer ever will never know.