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Designed resolutely, deliberately for the competition or
the customers in love with sporting drive on the level of fanaticism,
without any preoccupation of comfort and an installation for small middle-class
man, Alpine A110 1600S holds, in this spirit, more than of the promises.
True small bomb, its handling, its punch get an approval at the wheel
which really comes out of the paths more the enchanteurs and give, with
each kilometer, a heart and a direction on which reign frequently rapture.
(L'Automobile, 1970)
We had spoken much and one still speak much about it, the discussion
always returns to it in the large club of the initiates, it is the pet.
One thinks of it while laughing at satisfaction, and of close, one flatters
it, one it côtoie avecr respect. Some even fear it because it is a small
monster.
Reproaches, one can make some to him. Not in the field of beam-frame
in any case, nor on that of suspension with 4 wheel independent, and still
less on that of engine, always derivative of R16 TS, of which the cylinder
A be protée with 1605cc, and which, feed by two Weber double-body of 45,
develop 125cv DIN with 6000 trs/mn, that a box with 5 report synchronize
exploit suitably. No, the bad side, it be necessary the seek in a design
of body which date, but fact always of effect, and which cause a cockpit
narrow, with visibility limit, saver nothing in the kind concert of culbuterie,
of transmission, of aspiration of carburettor, the all bathe in the emanation
of gasoline., by-here by spiced there of an exhaust fumes pinch...
But what import that when, sitted with cockpit de pilotage, or rather
install the head in bottom, the foot in top, you take in hand the small
wheel, and that after a glance with management report de bord clear and
complete, you yourself launch on the road. Of course, one realizes quickly
that it is not a private car large-: there is little place behind
the two seats for the luggage: the autostability is missing on the motorway,
by cross-wind. Not, which il is necessary for him, it is the small
road, the relief route if you want, who requires a little navigation.
There, it is the Effectiveness with a large E. You drive a ultra-sensitive
race car, where the security is breathed, even at high speed. You feel
it at the end of your arms and your feet. You do not drive a car: you
move with a machine which is the prolongation of you even. You put the
nose where to you wish it: the aft wheels will make the remainder with
the more extreme precision.
A pleasure of every moment, a car-toy which does not have an equivalent
in term of car. And if you find it small size, of too small size even,
think all the same that with 210 km/h of point, you will belong to a relatively
closed caste, that of more 200km/h.
(Sport Auto - october 1972)
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