Alfa Romeo 159 Lusso
Discussion
I've always loved them but, for one reason or another, I've never owned a real drivers car. The closest I came was a 1996 Fiat Cinquecento Sporting, but that had a habit of falling to bits. So, a procession of Renaults, Hondas and Mitsubishis followed.
That all changed today. I picked up my Alfa Romeo 159 Lusso Sport Wagon 2.4 jdtm, and I am utterly in love. The looks (of course), the feel, the soul.
I'm sure it's going to cost me a fortune and the headaches will be consistent. But, right now as I stare out of the front room window at it, I couldn't care less. I'm besotted.
That all changed today. I picked up my Alfa Romeo 159 Lusso Sport Wagon 2.4 jdtm, and I am utterly in love. The looks (of course), the feel, the soul.
I'm sure it's going to cost me a fortune and the headaches will be consistent. But, right now as I stare out of the front room window at it, I couldn't care less. I'm besotted.
Nice car, the lattice spoke wheels are quite rare. A lot of it's 'issues', if it had any, will hopefully have been sorted by now. DPF removal and EGR bypass works wonders with these although nowadays such mods are a bit frowned upon! I ran a 1.9 JTDm up to 185k miles, apart from a clutch and the usual belt services and numerous front suspension bushes it was reliable. It wore the miles very well, especially the interior and they are still one of the best looking estate cars on the road.
Great car...though I am a bit biased ! I am on my second Alfa 156: First was an X reg 1.8 TS Lusso with black leather etc and although I bought it off a pal and it had 144K miles on it, and it was my first taste of Alfa ownership, it was probably my favourite ever car. That TS engine coupled with a Cybox stainless steel cat back exhaust was amazing !
Regretted selling it ( for all of £600!) as it was very well sorted but I had already bought my 156 JTD 150 Veloce which is my main car. The 159 is the natural successor to the 156 ( missing out the GT by the way !) as it has the same beautiful styling and road presence.
Like your car....but as has been said, those wheels will take a lot of TLC.
My current 156 ( Remapped to about 190 BHP and a complete Stainless Cybox system, currently has its 'summer wheels' on ; a nicely refurbished set of 156/147 Selespeed 16" alloys, which are so easy to clean ! In November they will be replace with the winter set of original 16 Teledials which incidentally were from my 156 TS.
A 156 does look 'right' on a nice set of Teledials, although other manufacturers are now copying the design.
Regretted selling it ( for all of £600!) as it was very well sorted but I had already bought my 156 JTD 150 Veloce which is my main car. The 159 is the natural successor to the 156 ( missing out the GT by the way !) as it has the same beautiful styling and road presence.
Like your car....but as has been said, those wheels will take a lot of TLC.
My current 156 ( Remapped to about 190 BHP and a complete Stainless Cybox system, currently has its 'summer wheels' on ; a nicely refurbished set of 156/147 Selespeed 16" alloys, which are so easy to clean ! In November they will be replace with the winter set of original 16 Teledials which incidentally were from my 156 TS.
A 156 does look 'right' on a nice set of Teledials, although other manufacturers are now copying the design.
In my experience the Alfa reliability issues are massively overstated. What they are intolerant of is skimped maintenance. Keep them serviced and make sure niggling jobs don't snowball into big ones, and they are perfectly dependable.
And they are so pretty, and feel very special to drive. And wear miles very well. At 120k the 156 felt as fit and taut as any German equivalent I've been in. All the electrics worked perfectly too.
And they are so pretty, and feel very special to drive. And wear miles very well. At 120k the 156 felt as fit and taut as any German equivalent I've been in. All the electrics worked perfectly too.
Edited by Limpet on Monday 31st August 10:31
As has been said before, Alfas are wonderful cars but they do need to be properly looked after by specialists IMO.
My first Alfa 1.8 TS had an aux tensioner fault leading to the cambelt shredding... which I entrusted to a local non Alfa garage...to cut a long and expensive story short...they did the work ( involved getting all 16 valves replaced as the aux belt broke/got caught in the only small accessible part of the timing cover etc etc !!) So it was all put back together by them and all was fine. About 2 years later, having by then found an excellent local Alfa independent specialist, I had a rocker cover oil leak, so the indy changed that ( in about 1/10th of the time it would have taken me !), and he noticed that the timing belt had some wear marks which indicated that it had not been fitted correctly !!
Needless to say I got him to do the cambelt/water pump/tensioner properly. We also found other things that had not been done correctly and which of course were rectified.
I mention all this just to emphasise that Alfas need specialists !
It did not put me off Alfas, in fact I knew that I had a very good car and did a lot of hard miles in it ( it had 114K on when I bought it anyway !) And then bought a second one !
The other thing I would add is that as the rear suspension is adjustable ( on a 156) ( ie tracking can be altered ) it is well worth getting a laser 4 wheel alignment done; I had both my Alfas done as soon as I bought them, and they were both well out. This does make a huge difference to the handling.
In fact when I changed the 2000 reg 1.8TS for the 2005 JTDM as seen in my photo, I thought the understeer was due to the heavier diesel engine. After getting the 4 wheel alignment done, it handled just as well as the lighter TS engined car....so it is well worth getting done.
Although I am not sure if that applies to your lovely 159....!!
PS Also join up to the Alfa forums ( alfaowner.com is good ) and of course our own PH Alfa/Fiat/Lancia forum !
Not sure about the 159s but there are no affordable Workshop Manuals/Haynes etc for the 1565s. So the forums ( or is it fora?) are essential IMO
My first Alfa 1.8 TS had an aux tensioner fault leading to the cambelt shredding... which I entrusted to a local non Alfa garage...to cut a long and expensive story short...they did the work ( involved getting all 16 valves replaced as the aux belt broke/got caught in the only small accessible part of the timing cover etc etc !!) So it was all put back together by them and all was fine. About 2 years later, having by then found an excellent local Alfa independent specialist, I had a rocker cover oil leak, so the indy changed that ( in about 1/10th of the time it would have taken me !), and he noticed that the timing belt had some wear marks which indicated that it had not been fitted correctly !!
Needless to say I got him to do the cambelt/water pump/tensioner properly. We also found other things that had not been done correctly and which of course were rectified.
I mention all this just to emphasise that Alfas need specialists !
It did not put me off Alfas, in fact I knew that I had a very good car and did a lot of hard miles in it ( it had 114K on when I bought it anyway !) And then bought a second one !
The other thing I would add is that as the rear suspension is adjustable ( on a 156) ( ie tracking can be altered ) it is well worth getting a laser 4 wheel alignment done; I had both my Alfas done as soon as I bought them, and they were both well out. This does make a huge difference to the handling.
In fact when I changed the 2000 reg 1.8TS for the 2005 JTDM as seen in my photo, I thought the understeer was due to the heavier diesel engine. After getting the 4 wheel alignment done, it handled just as well as the lighter TS engined car....so it is well worth getting done.
Although I am not sure if that applies to your lovely 159....!!
PS Also join up to the Alfa forums ( alfaowner.com is good ) and of course our own PH Alfa/Fiat/Lancia forum !
Not sure about the 159s but there are no affordable Workshop Manuals/Haynes etc for the 1565s. So the forums ( or is it fora?) are essential IMO
Thanks everyone. So, just returned from a weekend in Cornwall with the wife and kids in the Alfa. Here's the list of issues that reared their head:
- Intermittent power loss (struggling up to 2500rpm) with engine management light coming on, goes off after 30 miles or so
- Drivers side wing mirror will not fold in fully using electric folding motor
- Slow puncture on drivers side front wheel
- Occasional lumpy tickover when warm
- Random immobilisation on one occasion when trying to start
- Heavily corroded wheels all round
- Rear passenger side window grinds rather than stopping when being fully closed
- Gearknob loose
- iPhone dock needs updating to Lightning connector
No one said it would be easy!
Done around 800 miles all told and averaged at 37.5mpg.
Still utterly besotted.
- Intermittent power loss (struggling up to 2500rpm) with engine management light coming on, goes off after 30 miles or so
- Drivers side wing mirror will not fold in fully using electric folding motor
- Slow puncture on drivers side front wheel
- Occasional lumpy tickover when warm
- Random immobilisation on one occasion when trying to start
- Heavily corroded wheels all round
- Rear passenger side window grinds rather than stopping when being fully closed
- Gearknob loose
- iPhone dock needs updating to Lightning connector
No one said it would be easy!
Done around 800 miles all told and averaged at 37.5mpg.
Still utterly besotted.
danjnixon said:
Thanks everyone. So, just returned from a weekend in Cornwall with the wife and kids in the Alfa. Here's the list of issues that reared their head:
- Intermittent power loss (struggling up to 2500rpm) with engine management light coming on, goes off after 30 miles or so
- Drivers side wing mirror will not fold in fully using electric folding motor
- Slow puncture on drivers side front wheel
- Occasional lumpy tickover when warm
- Random immobilisation on one occasion when trying to start
- Heavily corroded wheels all round
- Rear passenger side window grinds rather than stopping when being fully closed
- Gearknob loose
- iPhone dock needs updating to Lightning connector
No one said it would be easy!
Done around 800 miles all told and averaged at 37.5mpg.
Still utterly besotted.
You got a good one then - Intermittent power loss (struggling up to 2500rpm) with engine management light coming on, goes off after 30 miles or so
- Drivers side wing mirror will not fold in fully using electric folding motor
- Slow puncture on drivers side front wheel
- Occasional lumpy tickover when warm
- Random immobilisation on one occasion when trying to start
- Heavily corroded wheels all round
- Rear passenger side window grinds rather than stopping when being fully closed
- Gearknob loose
- iPhone dock needs updating to Lightning connector
No one said it would be easy!
Done around 800 miles all told and averaged at 37.5mpg.
Still utterly besotted.
Lovely looking cars quite rare too, not many about when you start to look for them.
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