Alpine A110 History
The new Alpine A110 is undoubtedly an attractive car, but its inspiration was just as pretty, even if it wasn’t built specifically to be a ‘looker’. Light in weight and made largely for competition, the fact the original A110 looked good doing its work on the racetrack or rally course was incidental.
A Renault Connection
The brainchild of Jean Rédélé, Alpine the brand was founded in 1955, but Rédélé’s connections to Renault went back much further. His father was a mechanic for Renault’s first factory Grand Prix team and ran a Renault dealership in Dieppe in northern France. Following the end of World War II, Jean took over that dealership and started racing in 1950.
Campaigning Renault 4CVs with his own modifications, Rédélé was successful enough to attract the attention of Renault management, which led to a level of factory support. This in turn delivered more success, including a class win in the Mille Miglia road race and Criterium des Alpes of 1954. The latter event inspired the ‘Alpine’ (pronounced ‘Al-peen’) company name, as Rédélé claimed he particularly enjoyed driving the demanding roads of the French Alps
Italian Influence
The first Alpine, called the A106, appeared in 1955, with an example campaigned by Rédélé finishing second in class on that year’s Mille Miglia behind a Renault-engined ‘Rédélé Speciale’ that he had also designed.
One of the few fibreglass-bodied cars available in France on a production level, the A106 used the chassis, 745cc engine and most of the other mechanical parts of the rear-engined Renault 4CV. This was a deliberate move on Rédélé’s part, as he believed it would make repair and servicing easier.
Styling was by Giovanni Michelotti of Farina and Vignale, who had designed bodies for Ferrari and Maserati, but would be better known to some for the later work he did for Triumph, including the TR4, Herald, Spitfire and Stag.
Despite the talented hand of Michelotti, the A106 was a little on the dumpy side in terms of styling, but the A108 he penned in 1958 was much more attractive and would form the basis of the A110 that followed, specifically the berlinette coupe, which became the best-known variant.
Firmer and Faster
Over the A108’s lifespan, Alpine switched the platform from a Renault chassis to a bespoke backbone to reduce weight and increase stiffness. Mechanicals were still Renault but had been upgraded to the 845cc engine and other parts from the then-new Dauphine.
As good as this package was, it was starting to get left behind in competition by the early 1960s, so when Renault launched their R8 model in 1962, Rédélé would utilise that model’s larger engine, all-wheel disc brakes and other mechanical parts to upgrade the A108 and create the A110. While the earliest A110s used the R8’s 956cc inline four, most were equipped with the 1108cc version that arrived in 1964, or the 1255cc and 1289cc versions that followed.
Of course, these increasingly larger engines in the lightweight, fibreglass-bodied A110 made it even faster, which in turn made it very successful in competition, predominantly rallying. The ultimate iteration of the A110 was a 1600cc version that used a lighter, aluminium-block engine from Renault’s 16 TS.
WRC Trailblazer
In 1970, when a series of existing national rally events from Kenya to Sweden were combined under the banner of the ‘International Championship for Manufacturers’ (IMC) by the FIA, the Alpine A110 1600 was one of the most competitive cars going around. Up against Saabs, Lancias, Datsuns and Fords, the Alpine-Renault (as Rédélé’s operation was then labelled) A110s won events in Italy and Greece, only losing the first IMC crown to Porsche at the final round.
In 1971, Alpine-Renault won four events in the eight-round IMC rally calendar – all with Swedish driver Ove Andersson at the wheel - to easily claim the manufacturer’s title, but couldn’t repeat the dose in ’72, when Lancia was victorious. In 1973, the IMC evolved into the FIA World Rally Championship (WRC), which was still a manufacturer’s championship only: a driver’s title wasn’t added until 1979.
For the inaugural year of the WRC, the A110 had grown again, this time with a 1.8-litre engine and a 5-speed gearbox. Amongst other changes, the Alpine-Renault works racers also received larger wheels and brakes than the road cars, as well as repositioned air intakes for the engine (still rear mounted) and a centrally-positioned fuel tank.
Against mostly the same sort of cars they had battled with in the IMC – Saab 96 V4s, Datsun 240Zs, Fiat Abarth 124s and Ford Escort RS1600s – Alpine-Renault was victorious in six of thirteen rounds to win the championship.
Enduring Legacy
That 1973 WRC title would prove to be the high point in the A110’s competition career, but it’s mainly thanks to this success that the A110 is still admired today – and certainly better-remembered than the Alpine models that both preceded and followed it. As a replacement for the A110, the A310 had actually arrived in 1971, but the popularity of the A110 would see it sold alongside the new model until 1977.
Larger and heavier, without offering any more power (at least initially), the A310 was much more plush than the A110, with the higher levels of trim and materials in the 2+2 cabin reflecting Alpine’s desire to move upmarket and compete with Porsche’s 911. The A310 was produced until 1985, when it was replaced by the GTA, which in turn evolved into the A610 that was introduced in 1991.
The failure of this model in the marketplace saw Alpine road cars cease production in 1995 and Renault drop the Alpine name, although the Dieppe factory would remain in operation, building Renault-badged cars.
In 2006, the first signs of an Alpine revival were presented in the form of the ‘Alpine 210 RS’ concept, but the GFC two years later terminated further development. Another concept – the ‘Alpine A110-50’ – was released in 2012 as a one-off to mark the 50th Anniversary of the original A110.
In that same year, a joint venture was announced between Caterham Cars and Renault, with the aim of co-developing a low-cost sports car that would wear the Alpine badge for some markets and Caterham for others. Renault later bought out Caterham’s stake to go it alone in developing a new Alpine, which was presented in concept form – the ‘Alpine Vision’ – in 2016.
At the 2017 Geneva Motor Show, the production version of the Alpine Vision concept was revealed, looking very much like the concept, but officially wearing the A110 badge for the first time. Released in Europe the same year, followed by other markets in 2018, the all-new A110 has been met with widespread enthusiasm, boosted by the fact that the motoring press has been almost universal in their praise of the car.
But, getting back to the original A110, sources vary on production numbers – some say around 7,500 were built, with others claiming more than 8,000. Either way, they’re rare in Australia, but it’s interesting to note that, of the handful to be found here, several are used in competition, mainly sprints and hillclimbs, with some circuit racing and the odd historic rally thrown in, too.
Words: Mike Ryan Photos: Renault media
