The Alfa Romeo V10 continuation: the stillborn SE048 Sport e Prototipo

If you have been following this Blog for a while, you may have noticed that the guy writing has quite a love affair Alfa Romeo. Despite I would not call myself an Alfista just because the Alfetta GTV6 2.5 of my dreams is sitting in someone else's garage right now, and I still had not the chance to rev its beautiful Busso V6 properly, I cannot resist the temptation to talk about them I love to write about the marvels that came out the factory in Arese every time I have the occasion, better if the car we are talking about is something unique and not known by many. Why talk about Alfa Romeo? Because it is a great story and deserves to be told.

If you take a look at the story of Alfa Romeo, you always come around great models that were stillborn and never got the chance to be enjoyed by enthusiast: take the Alfa-Abarth 1000GT or the 162 Grand Prix or the 750 Competizione and also the 147 WRC. Last time we talked about the awesome 164 V10 ProCar and we discussed the great features of its 10 cylinder F1 engine. This story is actually a continuation of the great Procar, and back in its time the car you see pictured here represented an evolution of the 1985 V1035 project and was meant to be raced in the Group C Championship.

As a matter of fact, the role of the ProCar after the demonstration laps at Monza in 1988 was that of a test bed for the new Group C racing car for endurance competition. It was a decision based on the strategy that FIAT Ceo Antonio Ghidella had planned to promote the Alfa Romeo as a brand. In fact, his attention was beginning to be drawn from the successful Lancia Rally team in favor of new projects with the Biscione. Racing is expensive, and there was the need to promote Alfa new Fiat-based products, like the 155: this idea led to an investment made for competing in Group C and further on, in the DTM and ITC championship, with great success (and anger from BMW and Audi as well). To favor this project, the Squadra Corse Lancia was killed in 1991, still at the peak of its competitiveness.

The interest showed by Alfa Romeo in such a car was determined by the fact that the rules of Group C of 1990 had changed and demanded the use of 3.5 liter engines. Hence the interest of Alfa Romeo in using 1988 V1035 units  for a new sports prototype car to build a good reputation for the newer models. This strategy was also used with the 155 GTA of the DTM: a good advocate for the change of the humble successor of the legendary 75, the 155, which was built on a the same chassis of the less sporty Fiat Tipo 2.

Developed on the 164, the d'Agostino 10 cylinder was retuned to deliver its power further down the rev range, in order to increase the durability of the engine and make it suitable for endurance.

The Abarth headquarters in Corso Marche in Turin proved to be the ideal ground for the development of the new car: essentially, the facility was destined for this project, as Lancia cars were slowly finishing their competition life, and Abarth engineers, like Sergio Limone were also employed alongside Alfa technicians  to build the car. 

 The ground effect chassis was designed by ex Osella man Giuseppe Perrotta and it was all carbon fiber, the gearbox was an Abarth design and the aerodynamic was perfected in Fiat's own wind tunnel.  Also, engineer Sergio Limone, the man who designed the Delta S4 also took part in the project. It was a state of the art, purebred Alfa Romeo hybrid, developed in Turin by a mixed team of Abarth and Alfa Corse. Despite the good development made by the engineering team, The whole project began in 1988 but died in 1990, due to the lack of funds and to the general progressive loss of interest in Group C racing. In fact, the teams that showed real interest in the series were Alfa Romeo and Peugeot, so by 1993, it was all over.

As we said above, the legendary V1035 engine developed  for the SE048 was the ideal choice to be the power unit of the car. But, here we come to the controversial part. It's true that the V10 of Pino d'Agostino was the initial choice for the propulsion of the SE048, but it was later dropped in favour an Abarth tuned Ferrari V12, mainly due to reliability issues with the timing belt. But it is unclear whether the V10 was developing problems or it was dropped to internal reasons, as Eng.d'Agostino pointed out. But this fact is just a small shadow of a project that could have launched Alfa Romeo into a new wave of success, as it did in the DTM and WTCC racing. 

Sadly, the lost interest in Group C racing (only Peugeot and Alfa Romeo were really committed to it) and the decision to invest more in more durable championships made the SE048 project end by September 1990, leaving it not fully developed.

It's another Alfa Romeo that joins the club of the models who never made into the Company live history. Despite this, they remain true to Alfa Romeo and are in Arese for us to enjoy.