166 Advice

Went to look at a 1999 166 at a main Alfa dealer on Friday. It was odyssey blue with cream leather and had full Alfa service history, including cambelts done. 110000kms on the clock.

The interior, however, was a bit shabby. The leather seemed grubby despite the car having been detailed, the ICS knobs were worn, there were severe scratches (from a ring or something I assume) on the leading edge of the glovebox/armrest and some cream paint appeared to be flaking off the centre console around the handbrake lever and revealing flecks of black underneath.

I know its an 8 year old car, but they are still things that turn me off the vehicle. Can they be easily fixed and if so, at what sort of cost (Australian dollars please).

a good leather clean should sort out the seats and the worn knobs seem to be a common problem but i think you can get them from the dealers. The chipped beige trim is also common....i guess a wee bit of touch up paint would sort that out?

Yeah I would hope so. Should I choose to buy the car I'd demand for it to be fixed by a detailer before accepting to take it.

probably a good shout - especially as i'm sure 166's go for top dollar in Aus!

Check out a leather cleaner called Urad. Available in the UK but not sure about elsewhere. Really cleaned up my leather a treat. Gets the grime out of any creases and it's amazing how much better it looks afterwards.

the arm rest wear is common, caused by the driver using the armrest while wearing a metal watch, the leather/plastic will always come off worst

Interior condition is not so important, just make sure the engine is in a good condition.

Why drag up this old thread?

Welome alfapenta166 - You doing a search around?

Originally Posted by alfapenta166

Interior condition is not so important, just make sure the engine is in a good condition.

Well that was the first 166 I looked at and I still haven't bought one yet - maybe I'm being picky but I do have a perfectly good car to use until the perfect 166 comes up, so I think I can afford to be. I want my car when I buy it to be perfect.

I'm not considering anything before the 2002 model year upgrades now (in Australia, memory in the seats and a GSM phone were added as standard features) though so that car dropped from my consideration. It was on sale for months and months actually so I guess I wasn't the only one who didn't go for it...good 166s at good prices here get snapped up very quickly and the not so good or expensive ones tend to hang around for ages.

Keep looking, as you say don't rush. What is the 166 prices like in Australia?

I sold a fiat coupe to a guy emegrating to Australia last year - The coupes were so rare and expensive there that he bought mine and shipped it over!

Originally Posted by Dougie166

Keep looking, as you say don't rush. What is the 166 prices like in Australia?

I sold a fiat coupe to a guy emegrating to Australia last year - The coupes were so rare and expensive there that he bought mine and shipped it over!

166 prices here are unpredictable, mainly due to their rarity. The earliest (1999) cars with higher kilometers can be had for about $15,000 AUD (6,700 GBP). From what I've seen good 2002 cars (what I'm after) start around $25,000 AUD (11,100 GBP). Facelifts still fetch mid-40,000s (around 20,000 GBP) and the last TIs can still fetch $60,000 (26,800 GBP). However, you often see cars that are cheap which last one day on the market before being snapped up, and sometimes there are overpriced ones which are on the market for up to 6 months, and these usually end up being gradually discounted to a better price.

There are a few Fiat Coupes here...they look magnificent...I think the service manager at my closest Alfa dealership has two. There's a very nice one for sale at the moment, year 2000 and only 13,000 kilometers, for $45,000 AUD (20,100 GBP).

Fiat had a long absence from our market...they only returned last year, and right now only sell the Punto, although Bravo (which will be called Ritmo here) and 500 are due to arrive next year. We also missed out on Alfas from 1992-1998...so very very few 145, 146 or 155s here.

Just checking out your 166 market - http://www.drive.com.au/new-cars-for...fa%20Romeo

I sold my coupe (6 years old, 15k miles) for £8500 so he did the right thing.

Maybe I should ship my 166 over! We are being offered new 166 3.0 Sportronics for £16k currently!

Yes he did do the right thing!

Our market is frustratingly small, and all of our cars are 3.0 V6 Sportronics, which is in my opinion the biggest downside to the 166 here (manual would be nice).

If you do ship yours over, there's a buyer waiting at the other end

Hi Guys,

I have been owning this lovely 166 for 2 weeks and my first problem appeared today. Here you can see a pic about the engine control system failure:
http://rolandartstudio.com/AlfaRomeo/target25.html

could you give me any advices what is it and how serious it?

Thanx for your help,
Roland
http://rolandartstudio.com/AlfaRomeo

what are your symptoms? If nothing out of the ordinary is wrong it's probably a MAF...buy a cheap code scanner and it will tell you the fault codes - search for GS200 on ebay....

could be anything, as said a code reader will do the job, or take it to somewhere like motor-mech at the back of the Bull Ring, he does a diagnostic for £16

http://www.motor-mech.co.uk/index.html

no connection

HTH

thanx guys for the great advices.

i don't feel any symtomps. i hope this is not a serious problem. the cas has been serviced couple days ago.