How Important Is RELIABLITY With Alfa Romeo's All-New Giulia? Will The FEAR Keep YOU From Buying One?

When I think of a major purchase, like a car, I think of the support network. In *my* mind, the Alfa Romeo is a quirky little niche brand in North America, with a nearly non-existent presence. Good luck getting local expertise when you need repairs or maintenance.

That aside, they're not known for their durability or lack of defects.Lastly, I'm not inspired by the look. I'm clearly not who they're trying to sell to.

Lets see: Very limited dealer support, brand not know for reliability, first year model, very probably parts availability issues... No, I can't see myself doing this.

Reliability should be OK given how heavily the supposedly all-new Giorgio platform leverages proven mechanicals.

Well, it is an FCA product so it should leverage some parts from the general FCA bin...

@Agent00R reports confirm that the Giorgio platform is heavily based on the Ghibli's platform which has a lot of Chrysler 300 in it. While I'm sure that making the platform smaller required some significant changes, this wasn't literally a clean sheet design. It wouldn't surprise me if it uses the wiring harness from the 300/Challenger/Charger for example. This is essentially a smaller Charger with an Alfa grille pasted on. This should be very un-Alfa-like in its reliability. The Ferrari inspired engine is as bespoke as the Maserati V6 that Maserati claims is totally different from the Chrysler V6 and yet it's the same engine. I suspect the Ferrari "inspiration" is "Hey the Ferrari Dino had a V6 back in the day..."

I definitely wouldn't purchase the first model year. Maybe it'd be worth considering once it's several years old and has some of the kinks worked out. Just me, though.

In this segment, people are much more likely to lease than buy anyway. So if it's troublesome you would not be stuck with it.

Thus, do a 2-3 year lease as soon as they hit the show room because that will be your best deal. This will come incentivized behind the scenes with dealers doing their damnedest to get it on the road.

The Maserati Ghibli is quite reliable because it's literally a Chrysler 300 with a new front suspension and a different body.

The the Giulia heavily leverages the Ghibli for the new Giorgio platform, the logical conclusion would be similar reliability.

Dealers are getting inquiries.

This is such a good looking car that I would be willing to take my chances.

Better yet, this is the antithesis of a Camry/Lexus ES in terms of passion and reliability

I would wait a year at least. The argument to just lease and if it's a problem is moronic since who wants to pay a payment on a car stuck at a dealership (if you can even find a decent dealer that knows what they are doing)... I'd steer clear of this thing. Just look at Fiat dealer reviews, horrendous!

Think what you will born of your ignorance of the industry, but one facet of high-dollar leases on cars is that it is not unheard of to "undo" a lease.

For example, when the ATS came out, a customer leased a 2.0T and the car was indeed a lemon. The transmission grenaded itself at just over 1000 miles, so of course it was replaced for free. Then the engine imploded at 3000 miles. That is not how the ATS performs. Quite the contrary.

GM authorized a "buy back" which essentially meant putting the customer in an ATS 3.6 for the remainder of his contract without a change in lease payment or duration.

Because buyers of luxury cars are so fickle, more tends to be done to retain them.

I do know that when FCA rapidly expanded the number of Maserati dealers so that the Ghibli would have a shot, a massive amount of training happened to have the store know how to serve customers with cash. When the 4C was in the pipeline, there was training big time. There will be training with the Giulia.

As a side note, the 4C so far is Camry reliable. Granted there aren't many of them nor have they traveled many miles, but they've probably been driven aggressively and so far nothing but smooth sailing as far as I can see.

I wouldn't call doing a two-year lease on a Giulia the minute it comes out "moronic" at all. It's largely composed of Chrysler parts, thus if you're OK with the reliability of a Charger or the Ghibli (very reliable), then the Giulia does not deserve this stupidly harsh reaction vis a vis its reliability.

And as for service, you would obviously take it back to the dealer you bought it from.

If you don't have a dealer--and this is ANY brand--near enough to where you live for convenient service, you're a moron in the first place.

Based on the stunning good looks of this vehicle, I predict it is going to do very well.

In fact, it is so good looking that I wouldn't be surprised if it cannibalized Ghibli sales, though I guess you could also argue that Alfa will be stepping stone for aspirational Maser owners.

The Giulia and Ghibli are at two radically different price points and Maserati has much more mystique to its name as well as prestige.

What I think is stupid is the Alfa Romeo "5 Series" competitor that is coming. THAT will definitely overlap with the Ghibli and as such is dumb as bricks.

I think its cool to see a sedan with a manual transmission still. And on personal note, I like the front end of this car, looks aggressive and original.

@ MDarringer...you had some good points in there...too bad you suffer from Trump-syndrome, which means and you think to effectively communicate, you have to insult as many people as possible in the process...it has the opposite effect, actually.

When this whole question comes up about Alfa reliability that is nothing more then fear mongering. The implied fear is that the build quality of Alfa's will be no better than it was in the 70's and 80's. Virtually every car made today is built to a far higher standard than any car from the 70's and 80's. This includes Fiats and Alfa's. Also as Darringer says the engine block is probably related to the Chrysler Pentastar, the chassis is probably a well modified Chrysler 300/AKA Maserati Ghibli. Therefore I think reliability is somewhat built in. I am sure driving either the Ghibli or Giulia it would never cross your mind that either car has any relationship with a Chrysler 300. Most likely virtually 95% of the parts shared with the 300 are completely modified. Further the engine internals are completely different than from the Pentastar engine. I also agree with Darringer that the 5 series Alfa competitor(Alfetta) will cramp the toes of the Ghibli so I'm not sure what the point is. Further it is not the car that going to bring enough volume to Alfa. Most likely the volume cars will be the Giulia and variants, the SUV's and the RWD Giulieta replacement. The coupe, spider, the 5 series(Alfetta)will be niche vehicles only.

Ah, the inescapable canard about Alfa reliability. I've owned about 30 cars, six of them being '80s/'90s Alfas. Drive trains are bullet proof. With L-Jet and Motronic they consistently run well. Meanwhile, I know many older Saab, Mercedes, BMW, and Porsche (not to mention about any older Brit car) owners who are constantly dealing with problems.
It seems that people who don't know better think it makes them sound smart and in-the-know to repeat an overly-repeated trope. I wouldn't know why though.

It is true that the factory quality in the '80s was poor (hardly unique to Alfa), and Alfa North America was little help (the real reason Alfa left NA; the 164 was a fantastic car), but that was a long long time ago. FCA is a different animal, obviously.