This Alfa Romeo 164 Q4 Is A Rare All-Wheel-Drive Beauty

"DailyTurismo" (thedailyturismo) 03/16/2016 at 13:03 • Filed to: Blog, Daily Turismo, Alfa Romeo, 164, Q4, AWD

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The Alfa Romeo 164 was the last of the Type 4 Project cars developed jointly with FIAT, Lancia and SAAB. It was North America’s first experience with a FWD Alfa, as the Alfasud was never sold here. Another Alfa never sold here was the all wheel drive version of the 164, the 164 Quadifoglio 4 or Q4 for short.

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The 164 was the last car to be developed by Alfa Romeo as an independent ward of the State company prior to being given away to FIAT by the Italian government, so it shares less with its FIAT Croma and Lancia Thema Type 4 siblings than you might think. Powering the 164 Q4 was the ultimate evolution of the Giuseppe Busso designed V-6, the 3 liter with 24 valves, producing 230 hp. As with the 12 valve V-6, religiously replacing the timing belt and inspecting the tensioner every 30,000 miles is critical as the engine is an interference design. Some say this is even more critical in the DOHC 24 valve motor. American market 164's came with various yellow warning stickers on the black front cross-brace above the radiator (“Careful, the coolant you are about to enjoy is hot!”). I would do a little research on whether European Q4's came with similar stickers as there are none on this car.

The interior looks good with its space age dash and Recaro seats. The Recaros were optional on the non-Q4, 164Q and some American magazine testers complained about them being tight (vs. admitting their BMI was high). Another thing to look out for with a 164 is the infamous stepper motors and gears that control the automatic climate control. The plastic gears eventually strip, and its a big job to dis-assemble the dash to replace them. Also, the 24 valve cars has an LCD display that looses segments over time.

The AWD system on the Q4 was co-developed with Steyr-Puch. The system consisted of a viscous coupling unit, central epicyclic differential and Torsen differential in the rear. It was connected to the ABS and Motronic engine management computers, which managed the torque split front to rear and side to side. The Q4 was never sold in the U.S., so this car being a 1995 is just a couple of years short of the 25 year exemption (those lucky Canadians and their 15 year rule). The central question is: peel the “4" off the rear badge and sneak it in as a 164Q or rent a garage in Canada for the next 4 years?

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Gianni is Daily Turismo’s pacific Northwest correspondent and resident Alfista.

Originally written by Gianni and published as !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! on !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! .

JawzX2, Boost Addict. 1.6t, 2.7tt, 4.2t > DailyTurismo 03/16/2016 at 13:31

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This is seems to be a common misconception (it was mentioned in print publications and even road-tested in California by a second-tier automotive publication specializing in Alfas (but not the official Alfa Owner’s publication...) who’s name escapes me), the Q4 was indeed federalized and sold in the States, Canada and Mexico, however information on actual sales is almost non-existent, the best sources I can find indicate that perhaps 50 were imported to North/Central America in total, with perhaps 25 being sold in the USA , 20 in Canada, and 5 in Mexico. What has happened is that most of these were RE-EXPORTED to europe where the 164 is generally (as it should be) well respected and liked, and the values for sales of the rare (rare everywhere, mind you, as total production numbers are reported at 1,206.) were higher where the cars were liked and supported by parts and mechanics. The US registry website seems to have died sometime between 2006-2010, as at that time there may in fact have been no Q4s in the US, and if memory serves there were never more than 15 or 16 members (one from Mexico and a couple from Canada) on the registry at it’s peak.

Also: Nice Price.

MultiplaOrgasms > DailyTurismo 03/16/2016 at 13:39

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Could’ve had a Peugeot.

DailyTurismo > JawzX2, Boost Addict. 1.6t, 2.7tt, 4.2t 03/16/2016 at 13:58

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Well...isn’t that an interesting turn of events.

JawzX2, Boost Addict. 1.6t, 2.7tt, 4.2t > DailyTurismo 03/16/2016 at 14:16

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The car being sold here does appear to be Euro-spec, as the official federalized 164 spec never included the projector headlamp units (though many have been retrofitted with Euro-spec lamps), and, as noted it does not have the yellow emissions compliance and “caution hot/moving parts/don’t be a dumb-ass!” stickers plastered all over the radiator cross-bar. Also, I do believe the Q4 was the first production automobile to offer torque-vectoring capability in it’s AWD system.

Though calling the Q4 a production car is a stretch as the chassis were hand-modified to accept the Q4 system and hand-finished and the AWD system itself was almost identical to the one appearing in the (then dominant) 155ti V6 touring car and was rumored LOOSE Alfa over $50K per car sold as they were essentially putting a bespoke race-car rear and center differential (along with it’s cutting-edge controllers and sensors) package in every car.

AuthiCooper1300 > MultiplaOrgasms 03/16/2016 at 14:41

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It was a bit of a scandal at the time that Pininfarina had used basically the same design for the Alfa Romeo 164, the Peugeot 405 and the 605.

But then it was not the first time Pininfarina had found itself in a similar situation.

AuthiCooper1300 > DailyTurismo 03/16/2016 at 14:56

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Regarding the 164 ventilation machinery and so on, I’ve read the original, very fragile components can be replaced with parts from the 166.

The only thing I dislike of the Q4 is the disgusting body kit. Pre-facelift, TwinSpark 164s look best - a purer, more understated design.

AuthiCooper1300 > JawzX2, Boost Addict. 1.6t, 2.7tt, 4.2t 03/16/2016 at 15:07

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Have you a source for the second part of your comment? I could understand up to a point that Alfa Romeo had decided not to change a lot of panels in the Tipo 4 platform for a car that was never going to be a bestseller. But the bit about sharing parts with the DTM 155ti V6 I find most curious. Seems to be an exorbitant loss per unit, even for a limited-run “prestige” model.

A few years back Lancia had already been experimenting with Torsen and Ferguson differentials in the works Deltas, although I doubt the electronics side was as complicated as in the Q4.

JawzX2, Boost Addict. 1.6t, 2.7tt, 4.2t > AuthiCooper1300 03/16/2016 at 16:38

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The systems were not identical , but both used a locking epicyclic viscous center unit with a torsen rear diff with computer proportioning of the torque split and links to ABS and TC. Perhaps it is a bit hyperbolic of me, but there was nothing like the Viscomatic outside of racing at the time. Viscomatic (like Nissan’s ATESSA E-TS) was developed on the heels of the system used in the Porsche 959 (also a Styer-Puch joint project) and extended it’s capability and flexibility. ATESSA E-TS Pro was also capable of real torque vectoring, but came just a little bit later than Viscomatic, and it lacked the yaw-rate and suspension velocity sensors that Viscomatic incorporated.

It is BRUTALLY hard to get solid information about the Viscomatic system in English, and the cost information is, as noted rumor. However, given that the Q4 was sold for a relatively modest premium, and that the system was, indeed state of the art, and manufactured in exceedingly low volumes, based on the best market guesses of the time the car was an EPIC loss-leader.

AuthiCooper1300 > JawzX2, Boost Addict. 1.6t, 2.7tt, 4.2t 03/16/2016 at 17:08

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Thanks, most interesting reply. Absolutely amazed about the Steyr-Puch link with Porsche though. I know the Austrians were behind a number of 4WD/AWD systems (G-Wagen, Panda –both kinds–, 4Matic, and so on) but never heard about any relationship whatsoever with the 959.

Who was behind the E30 325ix? At the time I read (in a French magazine) that its development had been outsourced to Porsche AG, but now I wonder if that was correct. I also heard that the system used in the Vauxhall/Opel Calibras and Cavaliers/Vectras was a Porsche development, but not from a good source.

I’ll keep an eye open about the Viscomatic.

JawzX2, Boost Addict. 1.6t, 2.7tt, 4.2t > AuthiCooper1300 03/17/2016 at 14:59

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just an extra asside: I have been perusing what documentation I have been able to dig up and it seems the real genius of Viscomatic was the coupling of a variable viscous unit with a variable planetary gear set. this enables not just variable torque-splitting but modification of the effective gear ratio between the front and rear axles, coupled with the torsen rear unit and tied to the traction-control/ABS (we would call it an E-Diff these days) in the front it worked somewhat like the GKN unit found on the new Focus RS (though through an entirely different mechanical arrangement...), allowing over and under driving of the axles in relation to each other and utilizing the torsen system to either drag or over-rev a single rear wheel as needed and to brake front wheels as needed which when routed back through the viscous/epicyclic center unit could effectively transfer nearly 80% of available engine torque to any one wheel!