Special Sundays: The Alpine A110

Welcome back to Special Sundays, where we re-visit automotive history, and take you back in time to the automotive legends from the 20th century!

This week’s special featured car is the Alpine (Renault) A110! The A110 isn’t a very well known car, and the company isn’t very well known either, but the car is quite a special and beautifully designed one. In production between the years of 1963 and 1973 and succeeding the A106 and A108, debuting at the Paris Auto Show, this car was one decade ahead of most other cars style-wise.

The A110 used many Renault parts like most Alpines, including a Renault 1.3-litre/1.6-litre inline-4. During its production, it used not only Renault engines, but also Gordini (A branch off ‘RenaultSport’) 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3 litre inline-4 engines. The design was of Lotus form, coming from the 1960’s Elans, probably explaining why some had Lotus engines. The car won many rally competitions during its years including many rallies in France in the 60’s and 70’s, making it arguably one of the best rally cars of its time. In total, around 7500 A110’s were made, and their power ranged from 41kW (55 hp) to 104kW (140 hp). They were simply angry sports cars made for racing.

In 1984, Alpine created the GTA, which was later redesigned and renamed to the A610 in 1991 in hope of increased sales. The sales did not increase, so Alpine had to discontinue the car in 1995, making it the last production Renault to carry an Alpine badge. The Alpine company was discontinued as a result, and the Alpine lineup was spiritually succeeded by the Renault Sport Spider in 1995. Although in February this year, Renault unveiled an ‘Alpine Vision’ concept, and it is supposedly going to be put on production in 2017 to rival the Alfa Romeo 4C and Porsche Cayman!

Alpine Vision Concept