Way back in 1987, Fiat has taken control over Alfa Romeo and has put out the model 155 and a few more. In the middle years of the 90's Alfa has found itself in a very big financial crysis, the sales have plummeted and the costs were too great. The company needed a model that will bring back the former glory in sales, thus the successor to the all mighty 155 has been born. Behold the Alfa Romeo 156!
The higher ups of the company decided to gamble with this revolutionary model, and it vas unveiled in the Frankfurt Auto Show in 1997.
As far as the design goes, it was top of the line and they decided to ditch a little of the boxy look they used in earlier models. The inspiration for the 156 were the Giulia, Giulietta and the Alfa 1900.
The new model was a bit rounder and a had a sportier look, it was a limousine with coupe lines. It was exactly that that made her stand out to the public. Doors handles on the back doors were hidden in the window lines. which looked nice, but the cost were little problems with parking. All that aside, the real looker were the wheels, whose look car companies copy to this day.
As for the interior, it had quite good build quality, that holds on in models alive to this day. The gauge cluster was inspired by the 60's, and if you were the driver, you would only see the speedometer and tachometer. Keeping its sporty characteristics, the cockpit was a little more drivers focused, leaving it a little boring for the codriver.
The Alfa 156 wasn't a big car, it was only 4.43 meters long and with a wheelbase of 2.6 meters. The boot was 378 liters, which in my opinion is enough, but for those who find it small, a crosswagon variant of the 156 exists. It came in a few trims which changed during 8 years of this cars production, but the standard options for the car were ABS, adjustable steering wheel, powered windows, foglights, electric seats, etc....
It also had 2 restylings in 2002 and 2003, where they updated the front lights, and added some options to certain trims, also some engines had a little bump in power.
Now let's switch to the engines, for the base model you had the 1.6 TwinSpark petrol engine, which on paper was good enough to carry this cars 1265 kilograms, but that may not have been the case exactly. Apart from the 1.6, you had the 1.8 and 2 liter petrols. Also, two V6 variants existed, with the 2.5 Busso V6 with 192 horsepower, and in 2002. the 3.2 liter GTA Busso engine which made 250 horsepower.
Even so, the diesel engine were the ones that brought glory to the 156. This was the world's first car with a common rail diesel engine. That was the case with the now well known Fiat 1.9 JTD engine, which was integrated in many other Fiat brand cars. Apart from the 1.9, a 2.4 JTD engine was an option as well.
The power was emitted thru a FWD platform with a 5 speed or 6 speed manual transmission, there was an automatic option but it was rather bad. The 156 crosswagon came with AWD.
This model saved Alfa Romeo from going bankrupt. Now then, these were all some good things about the car, we are going to dig into some problems it had.
The top 3 problems of this car were the suspension, electronics, and the automatic Selespeed transmission. Due to lack of fabric setting the front suspension had problems, and the tires were wearing out faster than anticipated, but that problem was resolved in 2001.
The electronics were a big and unsolvable problem to this day. Fake errors, non existing errors and bad fuel levels showing, etc... Also the automatic AC was an issue.
As far as the automatic transmission goes, just skip it, it was very unreliable and had leaks. The engines also had little problems, but they were all resolved by 2001.
But that was on the petrol variants, the 1.9 JTD is even by today's standards absolutely realiable. Although, i would recommend the 2.4 JTD due to it having a cylinder more and being unburdened.
All in all, if you are looking for a used 156, it's an all around okay car. For the looks, some people find it beautiful, some find it ugly, the parts are dirt cheap (where i live at least), and insuring it won't cost a fortune, the diesel engines don't have major problems, and can do heavy duty mileages (500.000+ km) with proper maintnance. It may also be a good first car due to it not being too big, and learning to park on it will be a little bit of a challenge due to it having a little bigger turning circle.
I heavily recommend it, and am also looking into getting one myself, with the experience i have had with certain 156's, i can only say good things about them!
