Club Italia

The right ( and wrong) way to build a super saloon.
Both the renault safrane biturbo and the Alfa 164 Q4 call themselves pukka super saloons. Only one is right.

THE ALFA 164 Q4 IS A gem. It's the best 164 yet — not just by a small margin (which you'd expect of a range-topping £30,000 version) but by a country mile, and a generous one at that.

The fact that it won't be coming to this country as a mainstream right-hand-drive model is a calamity, although you can sympathise with Alfa Romeo GB's motives. Simply put, it knows that no matter how good the 164 Q4 might be on the road, it wouldn't be worth the development time and money to build right-hand-drive versions, purely because the sales could never recoup the cost.

But all is not lost for fans of big, fast Alfas. If the Q4 is received with enthusiasm by the press and sufficient interest is expressed by the public, Alfa promises to consider making the car available as a special import in left-hand drive form only, just as Lancia did with the original Integrale.

Well, Alfa GB, here's your answer: import this car and get customers behind its new airbag-equipped wheel, even if it is on the wrong side.

The strange thing is that it's the new Viscomatic four-wheel drive system — Alfa's term, not mine — which must assume the Kimberley-Anne-sized share of the credit for the Q4's talent.

More often than not, four-wheel drive actually detracts from rather than benefits a road car's handling feel — the Porsche Carrera 4 and Peugeot 405 Mi 16x4 are two prime examples — but in the Alfa's case, dialling in all-wheel drive has dialled out all the intrusive understeer and torque steer of the front-wheel-drive model and at the same time added a new word to the 164's vocabulary: oversteer.

Well, almost. Punt the Q4 hardish at a tight second-gear corner and to all intents and purposes it feels like a grippier version of the front-wheel-drive car; understeer builds up progressively but quickly and inevitably you end up lifting off to quell the drift. But that's selling the car short. Commit yourself, keep the throttle down and, as if by magic, the electronically controlled Viscomatic system, which can vary the amount of torque going to each axle from zero to 100 per cent front or rear, starts shuttling torque to the back wheels — the ones that need it—and, hey presto, you're power sliding out of a tight corner in a 164. Viscomatic is just as noticeable and effective through long sweepers or even at a steady speed on the motorway, where straight-line stability gains a new-found sense of vault-tight, four-square unflappability. The result? Never before has the 164 felt so composed, so polished as a driver's car.

The trouble is, this hitherto unknown sense of poise and maturity brings into focus a fresh hankering for a touch more power. Although the smooth and trusty three-litre V6 has a new Bosch Motronic M3.7 management system and a redesigned exhaust — which make it smoother and trustier than ever — it doesn't actually generate any more power or torque than that of the front-drive 230bhp Cloverleaf, yet the car weighs a kilo or three more due to the Viscomatic hardware. So in terms of performance it looks like a retrograde step.

But it isn't. Alfa, in its wisdom, has endowed the Q4 with an ultra-close-ratio, Paxman-slick Getrag six-speed gearbox — in which even sixth is good for just 22mph per lOOOrpm —and the result is through-the-gears acceleration that might not tear your scalp off but will leave it tingling with a meaningful sense of rapidly moving metal all the same.

Part of the appeal and the impression of speed is, of course, down to the guttural, bad boy snarl and growl from the 24-valve V6 when you nail the accelerator; it sounds fab-ulous at 3000rpm, plain gorgeous at six. But on the other hand, the Q4 will, according to the usually conservative factory, still get to 62mph from a standstill in 7.5sec and do 150mph on the flat, so it's clearly no slouch.

There are, of course, one or two compromises to shoulder with the Q4, it being an Alfa and all. Because of the short gearing, it isn't as quiet at a steady 80-85mph as its longer-geared, cheaper 164 brethren. The boot has shrunk a fraction, too, as has the spare wheel, which is now of the space saver variety — a result of the need to accommodate all the four-wheel drive gubbins.

But at least the fuel tank hasn't suffered; in fact, its capacity has increased by five litres, although the range remains much the same because the Q4's extra weight takes a nibble out of the overall fuel economy.

But none of this matters in the end because the 164 Q4 is without question the least flawed, most talented car Alfa has come up with in the last five, perhaps 10 years. The shame is that we won't get it over here, but the good news — indeed, the great news — is that if this is the sort of commitment Alfa has loaded up ready to inject into its new cars (the 166,133,144, Coupe and Spider, all of which will appear in the next two years) then Italy's best mass producer isn't just back in business, it's right back where it belongs — at the top.
THERE IS A TRAIN THAT will take you from Calais to Paris at more than 180mph. It corners like it's on rails because, well, because it is on rails and it doesn't need to handle because... because it's a train.

Renault has one of those. It's called a Safrane Biturbo. It does nearly 160mph, corners like it's on rails and is real comfortable. But it's about as interesting to drive as the 8.45 to Woking.
I know, I know. Renault is the same outfit that makes the Clio, as in RSi and Williams. And the not-too-shabby-at-all 21 Turbo of yore. And a most interesting thing called the A610, which actually donates its engine for Biturboing.

So what happened, you're asking. Well, the answer isn't simple. I mean, look at the numbers on the paper and you are bound to work up a bit of enthusiasm. The Biturbo has a 268bhp three-litre V6, a trick four-wheel drive chassis with viscous coupling, no fewer than two turbochargers and a giant intercooler hiding under its Lotus Carlton-esque front spoiler. And it's got 'adaptive damping', exactly like the setup in the RXE V6 model, which actually lowers the car by 15mm at speeds of more than 75mph. Computer-controlled suspension, more power than an Escort Cosworth, engine mods by Hartge, final assembly by Irmscher; with all that technology, surely we're talking about the ride of a lifetime? After all, technology was a good thing for the Williams-Renault Formula 1 car.

Not quite. The only significant changes to the standard V6 Safrane chassis are stiffer dampers, bigger 320mm brake discs up front and 17in alloy wheels.

A Renault fellow looks me in the eye and says: "This car is not meant to be a sports car." Sounds like trouble.

So I drive the thing. First off, I want to know where they hid the horsepower. In the glove-box? I mean, 268bhp, for God's sake, and the Biturbo has a train-like power delivery — big and dull. Where's the wonderful, instant response you get with, say, an Alfa Romeo? As in Q4.

Here's a clue. The small print in the back of the brochure says this thing weighs as near as dammit to 1700kg— almost as much as a Mercedes SE500. So that's where the horsepower went.

So I go through some quick-ish corners. About as adjustable as the 8.45 to...

Check the brochure again: "The Biturbo remains imper-turbably glued to the road at all times by guaranteeing optimum grip under acceleration, braking and cornering." Great. Fine. But I don't want to be permanently, irrevocably glued to the road. Honestly. I want feel, tactility, adjustability. Not glue. Really, really fast down the autobahn and I finally get it. The Biturbo is secure, quiet and smooth riding at 140mph. A massive 2691b ft of torque that comes in at 2500rpm makes the brute really, really flexible. The Renault guy is right. This is a big mother of a touring car that'll get to 62mph from rest in 7.2sec. So how come it doesn't come with an automatic gearbox? Renault says it couldn't find the right one for the job.

So there it is. A heavy-duty Safrane that goes like stink for heavy-duty MDs going places not serviced by 160mph trains. That's it exactly, I reckon.

Mr Executive will be pretty well looked after, too; air conditioning, CD player, electric steering wheel adjustment and an airbag are standard. Even the rear seats are electrically adjustable.

Renault says there is no way it would sell enough Biturbos to justify right-hand drive production for sale in the UK. If you must have one, you can always nip across the Channel and buy one in France. Which brings me to the punch line of this little tale.
If you specify the top-spec leather-clad 'Baccara' model, Monsieur Le Renault will ask you to part with £50,000. Really? You mean that for the same money I'd pay for a 911 Carrera or a BMW M5 or a Jaguar XJ12 I could have a Safrane Biturbo?
Maybe I can have my cake and eat it, too. A Euro-rail pass and the Porsche should do the trick.