Alfa bella

STYLISH SMALL SUV HAS THE HUGE TASK OF REVIVING THE ITALIAN BRAND'S FORTUNES. SO DOES IT BRIM WITH THE MUCH-NEED BRIO?

- GEORG KACHER

THE TONALE is the first Alfa Romeo which had full access to the Stellantis parts bin. And as an SUV, it should, in today’s commercial environment, be a licence to print money. As it happens, Alfa needs plenty of money to fund the transformation from DOHC fame and quattrovalvole emotion to anonymous inverters and nondescript performance electronics.

Tonale is, in fact, the final old-school product to be released before the E-age begins late next year with a set of four dedicated electric vehicles on Stellantis’s ‘STLA’ large vehicle architecture. The newest addition to the range is based on the oldest platform the engineers could find, namely the Fiat-Chrysler CUSW components set first introduced in 2010 and used until 2020 in the Alfa Giulietta. It features MacPherson struts allround, but according to chief engineer Daniel Guzzafame, the platform is now quite different to that under the Jeep Compass: “Materials – we used aluminium stamping – weight distribution; the suspension [is] specific, the electric architecture is new, the steering column and rack and, by consequence, the steering ratio is specific to Tonale. I’m calling it an evolution because actually, if you take it part by part, the only thing common is the central floor,” Guzzafame explains.

Like the Stelvio, the Tonale is named after a mountain pass in the Dolomites. “No more peaks and summits from now on,” promises the CEO Jean-Philippe Imperato, formerly with Peugeot, grinning broadly. “Our third SUV which is currently ghosting through the media will certainly not be named as rumoured after an Italian lake, mountain, city or region.”