New toy - Alfa Romeo Montreal

Thought I'd post a couple of pics of my new toy, a '72 Alfa Romeo Montreal. 2.6L of 4 cam, dry sumped, mechanically fuel injected goodness . . .

Definitely not a sports car, but more of a GT car. Came with the factory leather seats, A/C and power windows. So pretty "optioned out" as far as Montreals go. It's a driver though. Looks better in pics than it does up close and personal. More of a 10 footer, that has the bones to either remain a driver, or restore at some point - probably with my 11 yr old son as a "helper".

Not a lot of torque down low, but get it up to 5000 rpm or higher and the car is quite quick. The brakes suck though and this is one of the first areas that I'm going to tackle. Once safety and mechanical issues are addressed, I'll start getting into the cosmetics. Should be fun. Haven't had a project car in years so really looking forward to digging in over the next year or two.
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You're probably right. This one wasn't either. It was repainted from orange to red at some point in its life. The paint looks pretty old so I'm guessing it was done at least 25 yrs, if not more, ago.

If I decide to restore the car, I'll consider bringing it back to its original color . . . or maybe go for orange metallic, which looks really good on these cars.

 

Yeah, it was on my target list for ~20 years after having seen one in a car show once upon a time. Bought mine from a really nice guy in upstate NY. He was pretty honest about the car. It needs work, but not overwhelmingly so. Bodywork is solid, and the engine runs like a champ. So most work will be suspension/brakes and interior and eventually a bare metal respray. Fortunately, compared to Ferrari parts, Alfa Montreal parts are relatively inexpensive (not that they're cheap mind you) - though good luck finding some of the parts.

I considered importing a very nice condition car from Europe (I had my eye on a metallic green car in Spain that looked great from the high res pics that I saw), but Montreals command a premium across the pond. Problem with US cars is that there's so few of them from which to choose and it takes some work to pry them from the grip of their owners. It took me 9 months to find one, and I had to network to do so. I also wanted a car that required some work as my younger son is getting into sports cars and seems enthusiastic about working on the Alfa with me - or at least enthusiastic until the grunt work really starts!

 

Yup, that was my friend's car (I was at the Ridgewood C&C with my 348 Challenge). He helped me network to find my car. The owner never even had the car listed. Just spread the word through the Montreal grapevine that he was looking to sell, my friend caught wind and that's all she wrote . . .

 

Yeah, it's a quirky car no doubt. And it's a 42 yr old quirky car with Italian electronics no less, which I'm sure will have me pulling what little is left of my hair out before all is over

 

That's a cool thought, but unfortunately it's a stretch. The Montreal's engine was a detuned derivation of Alfa's Tipo 33 engine, which had 2 plugs per cylinder and Lucas injection vs a single plug per cylinder and SPICA injection in the Montreal (plus lower compression, greater displacement etc etc). So it's accurate to say that the engine was derived from an Alfa racing engine, but that's as far as it goes.