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There was a time when the Alfa Romeo brand was the most important sports racing car manufacturer in the world. Enzo Ferrari got his start in racing at Alfa Romeo and the company can count many world Championships and technical innovations in its long and storied history.
A.L.F.A. (Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili) was founded in 1910 in Milan, Italy. The small company had racing ambitions from the start and their first serious race car was already on the circuits of Europe in 1914, but its career was cut short by the onset of World War I. When A.L.F.A. was purchased by industrialist Nicola Romeo in 1915, who added his name to the company, he helped to vault the brand onto the world racing stage in the immediate post war period.
The first International racing win for Alfa Romeo came in the 1923 Targa Florio. This put the spotlight on Alfa Romeo. At center stage for Alfa was the newly hired chief engineer Vittorio Jano. Jano’s first creation was an inline 8-cylinder engine with light alloy castings, dual overhead camshafts, hemispherical combustion chambers and eventually supercharging that was at the heart of the masterful Alfa Romeo P2 race car. This engine and car would bring Alfa Romeo the honors of winning the inaugural World Manufacturers Championship in 1925. It would be followed by many International racing wins as Alfa Romeo overtook rival Bugatti for dominance of the European circuits.
Like all car companies, racing brought glory, attention from the media and potential customers and it allowed for the testing of new technology under the harshest of conditions. From the race cars came the great road cars, 4, 6, 8-cylinder cars that shared the same basic architecture and construction methods as the race cars.
But, Alfa Romeo didn’t make regular cars for regular people. Racing was expensive and sales of cars, both road cars and race cars, remained small. Nicola Romeo walked away from Alfa Romeo in 1928 and the government of Benito Mussolini stepped in, taking full control by 1933. Mussolini saw Alfa Romeo as a national emblem to carry the glory of Italy on race tracks around the world. The government invested in both race car development and the development of fine road cars, now including bespoke cars for the wealthy and influential.
With money for new products and marketing, Alfa Romeo entered a golden age , producing some of the most important road cars in the annals of automobile history. -
Company
Alfa Romeo Automobiles
Make
Alfa Romeo
Model
6C 2300 Gran Turismo
Body Style
Sedan (Saloon), 4-dr., 5-pass.
Body Manufacture
Carrozzeria Alfa
Model year
1934
Wheelbase
115 in / 2920 mm
Length
N/A
Engine
inline-6, OHV, 140.9 cid / 2309 cm3
Horsepower
76 hp @ 4400 rpm
Transmission
4-speed manual
Original Base Price
N/A
Brand Production
N/A
This Car Production
535 / 473 * see “OUR CAR” -
The Alfa Romeo 6C 2300 was the ultimate iteration of the first successful six-cylinder Alfa road/race car, the 6C 1500, which first hit the road in 1925. Over the years the engine displacement grew as the engineering advanced. The 6C 2300 bowed to the world at the Salone dell’Auto di Milano (the Milan auto show) in April 1934. As was Alfa Romeo’s practice, the new car would see plenty of successful track time with various bodies for different types of races.
While racing brought recognition and glory, it was the road cars with engine and chassis lifted with minor alteration from the race cars that made Alfa Romeo. The racing derived chassis of the 2300 came swathed in fine coach work by the likes of Carrozzeria Castagna, Touring, Zagato, and Alfa Romeo’s own in-house shops.
The 2300 came as the Turismo, the longer wheelbase version with reduced horsepower or the Gran Turismo, the short wheelbase with higher horsepower. For 1934, the 2300 still used the “old” chassis of the 6C 1750 and 1900 cars that preceded it. This chassis had solid axles and mechanical brakes. A new chassis for 1935 with independent front suspension, swing axle independent rear suspension, and hydraulic brakes required renaming the cars as 6C 2300B.
The NB Center Alfa Romeo is a rare example bodied by in-house Carrozzeria Alfa. It is a short chassis (corto) Gran Turismo four-door saloon. The short wheelbase meant there was minimal trunk or luggage space and Alfa Romeo described the car as, “I rapidi spostamenti in città”, which translates to “for quick trips in the city.”
This car was purchased from renown collector Mario Righini in 1998. In 1999, the car underwent a restoration by Italian specialist Gianni Torelli with upholstery entrusted to Fabio Massenzi in Rome.
The 6C 2300 remained in production from 1934 through 1938. It is estimated that 1,606 examples of all variations of the model passed through the factory doors before the on-set of World War II ended production. An estimated 760 6C 2300 were produced with the old fixed axle, mechanical brake chassis. Based on chassis numbers, 535 Gran Turismo cars were built. But sources differ with some saying the number of GT cars was 473 while others attribute that total to the Carrozzeria Alfa bodied Sedans.