Markus from Germany owns this tuned Sprint 16V. It once was a Sprint Grand Prix with the 1.5 litre 105 bhp-engine with two twin-choke downdraft carburators.
Markus bought it in 1995 - it was his fifth Alfa Romeo with Boxer-engine. At the beginning he only exchanged the serial alloy wheels (14") against 13" Ronal A1 wheels with 195/45 R 13 tires and lowered the suspension. In Germany one has to have a permission for wheels and tires which were not available on the car when it was sold. This caused a lot of work for Markus. To get the permission from the TÜV he had to modify the transmission ratio of the speedometre.

After a few months with the sportive suspension and wheels, Markus planned to built an engine that could cope with the suspension. He installed a 1.7 litre 16V with Bosch fuel injection which came out of an Alfa 33 and also installed a tuned three-way catalyst of a 33 16V. The old gearbox with its long transmission ratio stayed untouched. Markus also installed the front brakes of the 33 16V (larger vented and outboardly mounted dics). The inboardly mounted dics remained in the car and are still used for the parking brake.

It now became quite narrow under the bonnet. And the Sprint's heart got quite hot. So Markus fixed and additional air-intake on the bonnet.
Now when everything was ready for a fast ride on the roads in the surrunding of his home, Markus wanted to test the performance of his car. Unfortunately a radar tapp got in his way and measured the Sprint with much higer speed than allowed. So Markus lost his driver's liscense for a month in April 2000...

Because we're in Germany you also have to get a permission if you install a more powerful engine. Markus tried to get that permission from the TÜV but had a lot of trouble. After a long time he finally found a friendly TÜV-engineer who allowed all the changes and registered them in the car's papers. Now he could legally drive the car on the road. Before he went to the TÜV he wanted to know how much power the engine developped.

According to the rolling road tester, the 16V has 150 bhp. 160 kph are reached quickly - Markus says. If you rev the engine up to 7400 U/min, the Sprint runs 225 kph (shown on the speedometre). This should be real 215 kph. (Alfa Romeos most powerful Sprint, the 1.7 QV with 114 bhp makes real 202 kph.)

After all the mechanical parts had been modified, Markus started to work on the optical appearance of his little white rocket. In spring 2002 he mounted a Corse front wing he still had at home. He adapted it to the original wheelarch extensions, painted it white and removed the original front bumper. Then he replaced the series III grille against the one of an old Alfasud Sprint Veloce with blackened chrome parts. The next work was done at the rear of the Sprint. It got the old series II rear lights and bumper so that the front and the rear of the car had the same look.

In all the years in which Markus has been owning his Sprint, he never broke down with it on the road. If your are once infected with the Alfa-Virus, you will never get rid of it. Esspecially when you have got the most dangerous version of the virus - the Boxer-Virus. If you want to email to Markus, please mail to ma.fleck@freenet.de.

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Last Update: May, 27th 2004     Created: October, 28th 2002

© Layout by and text Tim Rauen. Photos by Markus.