Overview

Seems crazy, when you think of the heritage of the marque and all that, but Alfa Romeo has hit the bull's-eye with the common rail, turbo diesel version of the 156 sports saloon. Its appearance was greeted with more indrawn breaths here than elsewhere, because, although the JTD is the first Alfa Romeo of its kind on the UK market, the company already does substantial diesel business on the Continent.

Apart from the 2.4-litre five-cylinder Unijet engine, pretty well everything else about the car is standard 156. There are various extra-cost add-ons which, if you go all the way to sport Pack 3 with its Recaro front seats and Momo leather trim, can raise the price to £21,994.

So how are the sound effects when, wincing, you fire up this diesel alfa for the first time? Not bad at all. Alfa has managed to conjure up a fairly realistic sports saloon exhaust note.

Most significant statistic is the slamming torque of 224lb ft at 2000rpm - compare that with the 199lb ft at 5000rpm which comes with the three-litre V6 GTV. In mid-range, this 156 is a real charger.

On a test route of mostly B-class roads in the Scottish Borders, with few long straights but plenty of bends, hills, dips and rises, the extra weight of the JTD - which makes it the nose-heaviest of the 156s - was obvious in the way its front end would drop down sharply from an enthusiastically tackled brow. Otherwise, it was typically sure-footed, seeming like all good sports saloons to shrink to suit the dimensions of the road, and this terrain was ideal for its performance characteristics.

Third and fourth gear are enough in these conditions, and there's no real point in snicking down to second except for a particularly sharp corner, because this is, after all, a low-revving diesel. If you let the revs rise too much, you don't have much time before you urgently need another upward change. With the torque peak at 2000rpm and the power peak at 4200rpm, the game is to rely on the mid-range pull this car has in spades. Lean on the throttle out of a medium speed corner and it simply bullets away. Yet, like all common rail types, the JTD will waft along main roads at a satisfyingly economical rate.

Skip the agonising about whether the words "Alfa Romeo" and "diesel" should ever appear in the same sentence. The engineers in Milan have kept the faith.

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