Hi Guys & Girls,

I have ordered my Silver/Red with Hardtop
last week. It'll be delivered 2nd week of
january 2001. Luckily the dealer had a
cancelation from another customer :-)

I think most people overhere are American,
so I'd like to share my decision process.
Currently I drive an Alfa Romeo Spider 3.0L
V6 (also with hardtop).
URL is: http://www.alfaromeo.com/eng/scelta/showro...showroom=spider
This car is not available in the USA.
It's a great car, but unfortunately only
frontwheel drive. The 2001 model will have a
226BHP 3.0L 24V V6 engine like in the GTV
and 166.
After having owned 4 Alfa Romeo's in the
past years I'm going Honda again (have
driven an Accord couple yeras ago).

But I looked and did testdrive the following cars:
1) Alfa Romeo Spider V6
Great car, but less sportscar than S2000
because frontwheel drive. It has great
storage facilities for a cabrio. Has the
best looks of any cabrio period. You can
drive this car easily till 180kph with
the top down. Chassis is less rigid.
2) Porsche Boxster
Fantastic handling, lacks a bit of extra
power, really need the 'S' version. Very
expensive once you start looking at the
option list. Insurance very expensive.
3) Honda S2000
Great car, cart like handling, great
performance. (But I don't have to convince
anybody overhere do I?) Easy to drive fast
(180kph and above) with top down. The
storage space is hopeless :-(
4) Alfa Romeo 166 3.0V6
Fantastic looking luxury saloon
Great handling, but it's not a carbio.
5) Peugeot 406 Coupe 3.0V6
Best looking Coupe available at this
moment (is this one available in the USA?)
But again, not a cabrio.
6) BMW Roadster 3.0i
Nice looking, great engine, absolutely
impossible to drive with top down at
speeds above 120-130 kph. You'll get
blown away.

Considered the following cars:
7) Mercedes SLK
I find the car too girly (sorry ladies).
8) Lotus Elise
Great car, but even more spartan than
the S2000

Well that was my first message, I'm looking
forward at the comments.

Ronald

 

Welcome. Obviously the people here think you made the right choice!

Since we cannot buy any Alfas, Peugeots, or the Elise here, you actually have more to chose from. Many of us looked at the Boxster and BMW, and some considered the Corvette, but it is hard to match the performance value of the Honda.

We look forward to the pictures of your new ride.

 

Thank you, I'll be happy to make pictures
available. Just bought a new digital cam
(Sony DSC-P1). So I'll also take pictures
of my current alfa.

Too bad that a lot a great looking cars
aren't available in the states. Well the
corvette wasn't on my shopping list. The
prices here in The Netherlands are realtively
high for cars (our government places extreme
high taxes on cars).

To put things in perspective some prices overhere:
Honda S2000 = 99.500 DFL = 42.000 US$
(But with hardtop, metallic paint etc 114.000DFL)
BMW Z3 roadster 3.0 = 104.800 DFL = 44.000 US$
Alfa Romeo 3.0 = 95.450 DFL
Mercedes SLK 230K 106.5000 DFL = 44.560 US$
Porsche Boxster 131.000 DFL = 55.000 US$
Porsche Boxster S 152.500 DFL = 64.000 US$
Chevrolet Corvette Convertible= 190.050 DFL = 79.500 US$

So actually the price difference between
Honda, Alfa Romeo, BMW and Mercedes isn't that big. The Chevrolet is realy out of this
league prices wise. For that money I'd rather
buy a TVR! (But I presume that one is also
not available in the USA?)
With Mercedes and Posrche the extra options cost a lot of extra money. And the stock cars
don't have a lot of extras.

I'm anxiously awaiting the delivery.

Greetings,
Ronald