Auto News – Daily Last Auto News

Last Auto account – Alfa Junior sets architect on MINI It’s small, but the Alfa Romeo Junior has a big albatross – it will spearhead a beachcomber of new models if it hits showrooms next year

The three-door Alfa auto will allotment its underpinnings with Fiat’s Grande Punto. And engineers are currently testing a ancestor adapted with a 197bhp petrol engine and limited-slip differential, which could anatomy the base of a hot GTA variant. The newcomer, accepted internally as the Racer, looks set to animate the brand’s Junior tag from the Sixties and Seventies. However, Alfa administration re­main ambivalent on whether to alter the absolute numeric allotment arrangement beyond the blow of the line-up.

Power for the all-new archetypal is accepted to arise from a turbocharged 1.4-litre engine. There will be a best of three outputs: 118bhp, 148bhp or 197bhp. In addition, the close is developing a beginning 1.6-litre Multijet diesel, with ability options alignment from 100bhp to 150bhp.

Entry-level versions are accepted to alpha from about £13,000 if the archetypal hits UK showrooms. And Alfa will adviser sales to see if it’s account introducing aftereffect variants such as a adventurous coupé, a cabriolet or an estate-style version.

The baby auto is the alpha of a above artefact abhorrent for the Italian manufacturer, which afresh axed 60 per cent of its UK franchised banker arrangement in a bid to addition abatement account standards.
Replacements for the 147 and 166 are both set to admission in 2009, while a soft-roader has been accustomed the go-ahead, too. This all-new car will be based on the 147′s successor, and is angled to arise in 2010.