The Alfa Romeo 4C is coming to America and there's good reason to be excited. In fact, there are at least 14 good reasons.
Alfa Romeo just sent out a big official press release on the mid-engined Italian sports car that will surely be a hit in the US. Okay, so the last time Fiat group tried to sell a mid-engined sports car in the US it was the wimpy Fiat X1/9, but this one is gonna be better. I hope.
Here are the 14 coolest facts I gleaned from Alfa Romeo about the 4C.
- It weighs 895kg/1973 lbs dry and 2,100 lbs wet. A Lotus Elise weighs 901kg/1,987lbs wet, though owners report a little less.
- The carbon fiber monocoque weighs just 65kg/143lbs, which I could totally bench back in high school. Since it's composite, it can't rust, but this is an Italian car, so it will probably find a way. Oh, and just for your information, the Elise's aluminum frame is 60kg/132lbs.
- Unlike the Elise, the 4C has surprising creature comforts like, say, an interior.
- The 4C's power to weight ratio is four times as good as a Smart ForTwo. That's 1hp/8.8 lbs for the Alfa vs 1hp vs 34.4 lbs for the chubby little German.
- Alfa Romeo estimates a 0-60 time of 4.5 seconds (probably thanks to the dual-dry-clutch transmission). That's a tenth of a second faster than a PDK Cayman S, which has 88 extra horsepower, but also an extra 876 pounds.
- The 4C is built in the Maserati factory, so you could kinda claim it's a Maserati with an Alfa badge if you're a super poseur.
- It's 13 feet and one inch long, which is only about four or five inches shorter than an early '90s Honda Civic hatchback.
- Alfa claims the 4C would make Alfa Romeo the only car company able to make 1,000 carbon fiber monocoques a year. This might be true if the pieces weren't manufactured by partner company Adler Plastic.
- The front brake discs are partially made of aluminum, shaving 2kg of unsprung weight.
- The body is't actually made of carbon fiber, but mostly of Sheet Moulding Compound, a kind of fiberglass that's lighter than aluminum. Alfa claims the body is 20% lighter in SMC than if it were made in steel.
- The bumpers and fenders are made of injected polyurethane, which is probably different than the polyurethane they make sex dolls out of. Probably.
- All of the glass in the 4C is thinner than normal, and is about 15% lighter than regular glass. The windshield is only 4mm thick.
- The engine is a 1.75 liter turbocharged all-aluminum four cylinder with 237 horsepower. It has direct injection and continuously variable valve timing. I'm not sure if that means it used Fiat's partially-hydraulic camshaft actuator MultiAir technology.
- It crackles on the overrun. It sounds tasty.
Alfa Romeo's full press release is right here, but there's no need to check it out, since I just told you all the best info anyway. No pricing is official, but Alfa estimated a European launch of around 40,000 Euros. That's $53,000 in today's US dollars, but I wouldn't be surprised to see the list price creep closer to the Cayman S' $63 grand.
Photo Credits: Alfa Romeo