Portuguese Gtas'

[SprintGtVeloce]

Hello to all!

First of all I would like to say that I'm portuguese and have several vintage Alfas. My love for Alfa Romeo has been improving for the last decade and the more I read, the more cars I buy and the more knowledge I have, more interest and more questions rise in my mind. Until now I've studied deeply the "Bertone" models including the Gta.

Regarding my country, I know that were several Gtas in Portugal and Angola and i've been searching and enquiring about portuguese Gtas' on every internet corner where I possibly get a valid answer, i also have spoken with several living portuguese guys that told me some storys about this matter.

Although Angola was a former colony of Portugal in those days, if someone wants to discuss Angolan cars let's open a new thread, I would like to stick to gtas from Portugal in this one.

I think that it is fair that before asking about portuguese gtas I will tell what I know about them, if you want to add something please be my guest, I (we) would appreciate deeply.

The first one is still in Portugal and was restored in the 90's. It is a Giulia Sprint Gta from 1966.



The second one was a 1969 1300 Gta junior that lived in the streets of Lisbon until 1982 or 83. This car was bought by Xavier Moreira and (probably) sold abroad. I think that was originally white and painted grey afterwards.



The third one was the 65' Carlos Gaspar Giulia Sprint Gta. It raced in Portugal and a few years later was sold to Peixinho who raced it in Angola with the plate AAB-56-12.



Then there was the ones that raced for the Mocar racing team. Both were 1300 Gta Juniors and were driven by the brothers Sá Nogueira, Bernardo and Domingos. I was told that this cars were italian champions and sold in 1971? to Alfa Romeo Portugal (Mocar).



After Mocar they were sold to Bacelar de Moura and Carlos Bello respectively.

Bacelar de Moura Gta in 1979:



They raced until the late 70's. Bacelar de Moura's Gta was destroyed in the 1980 "garagem Aurora" fire:



Carlos Bello's Gta had an accident in a 1977 race and after that he sold it probably to England, at least I was told so.





I was also told that in 1982 or 83, Carlos Bello sold a truck full of spare Gta parts to England as well.

There were at least two Angolan Gta that pass through Portugal, the Don Best one (portuguese plate was BP-19-02) and the Gtam with the plate ST-76-00.

Besides all the Gtas I showed you above, I think that were 1 or 2 more in Portugal. There are a lot of storys and some are quite easy to link with each other, unfortunately I have no photos to prove it to you, neither to myself!

Many Gta storys end at Xavier Moreira. He had a lot of parts and, to my knowledge, he bought some in the early 80's. i know that he also sold some parts and probably some cars to Switzerland and England. He still has 3 engines, one with injection, but I don't know if he has any Gta... probably no. Xavier is now a shoerepairer and has a store in the heart of Lisboa. I met him once and talked about the Gtas, but he is very proud to say... zero, nil... he won't say anything. He just smiles and say that everything is "top secret" (yes he says that in english, like as an american farwest movie). I'm pretty sure that he will take the secrets with him 6 feet under.

Any clues about the former portuguese Gtas?! Please develop this issue. Thank you and best regards to you all.

Pedro Marques

[dbest]

Pedro, thanks for starting what I hope to be a very interesting and informative thread. I too have tried to obtain information from former Portuguese GTA owners but so far have had very limited success. Hopefully things will improve.

I did not know that the AAB-56-12 GTA was the former Gaspar car, one more piece of information to ponder. Do you know the serial number of the car? Attached is a photo of the car driven by Carlos Gaspar at Porto in 1966.

Have you contacted Altino Fraga? He raced GTAs in Angola and now has a dealership in Lisboa? I don’t know if he brought any cars back from Angola but he may have some more information

A.Fraga - Automóveis


Also here is a link to a short interview with Xavier Moreira which shows some of his trophies and motors. Unfortunately I do not speak Portuguese so I cannot understand the audio:

País - Antigo corredor de automóveis é sapateiro em Lisboa - RTP Noticias, Vídeo


Regards, Don

[yvesmontreal]

In 1985 I exchanged correspondence with Mr. Jose Moreira about GTAs he had for sale. I still have his notes: he had s/n 613338 (1600), 775542 (1300/1600) and 775988 (1300). He also had 6 1900s for sale, and a GTAM (s/n unknown) not for sale plus lots of parts.

I still have from the same period a copy of the GTA register. No other GTA was listed in Portugal.

[SprintGtVeloce]

Don Best: PM on your box.

Regarding the Peixinho car, angolan plate AAB-56-12, it had plate MO-44-88 by the time it was driven by Gaspar in Portugal. I don't know the chassis number, but i will within a couple of months... I guarantee.

Haven't spoken to Altino Fraga yet, but when I get some spare time, I'll do him a visit. Thank you for the contact Don.

The Xavier Moreira interview doesn't show nothing interesting, besides the Gta(m) parts on the background. I know he has a Gtam but no one knows the serial, probably because it is a "look alike" or replica. He raced a 2000Gtv and I think that it is the same car with Gtam fenders and with some Gtam parts... made in Xavier Moreira's Autodelta, if you know what I mean.

Answering to yvesmontreal, first of all thank you for your great contribution. Xavier had in fact several 1900s and a Gtam (the one I talked about above) and he had, to my knowledge, a couple of Gtas and many parts as well.

The serial 613338 is from the first car in the uploaded photos. This Giulia Sprint Gta is still in Portugal and changed owner in 2008. The car made part of that huge portuguese collection that everybody talked about a couple of years ago... a farm with welded doors, man from New York, blá blá blá. It was a great lie made by someone that had nothing to do. The serial 613338 passed through the welded doors in 1994 (!?) and began the restoration process, supervised by Xavier. I was told that during that process the car had lost his "charisma", the process wasn't 100% accurate.

Regarding the serial number 775988 I would like to know more about it. Do you know where it lies or what was the original colour? When did Xavier told you that information? Thank you for you cooperation.

Best regards to you all.

[SprintGtVeloce]

Forgot to tell that still regarding the Carlos Gaspar Gta, I'm not so certain that it was the Peixinho car at Angola. It is a fact that the car went to Angola and there's a lot of people swearing about beeing the same car, but you know, the years pass by, memories are lost and there might be some confusion, or not. We must doubt of everything to be more certain, at least I think that's the way we must follow.

If you look at the next photo published on the "Il Quadrifoglio" magazine (by the way it is a nice collection to have), It is probably the Peixinho's car when it arrived in Angola. 1300?! Very confused.



There's a new site with new photos of Angolan cars. If help needed translating give me a call, I will do my best.

Motorsport in Angola - Old Times

Best regards
Pedro Marques

[dbest]

Pedro, wo we know the date of the picture of the #34 GTA? My guess would be late 1969 or early 1970. The car is a GTA Junior judging by the rear fender opening and the white side stripes. I compared the picture to my files of the Angolian AAB-56-12 and came to the conclusion is that it may be the same car or not. It doesn't help that race cars seem to get modified and/or painted every week.

The six pack of beer on the hood is a nice touch though.

Regards,
Don

[SprintGtVeloce]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dbest Pedro, wo we know the date of the picture of the #34 GTA? My guess would be late 1969 or early 1970. The car is a GTA Junior judging by the rear fender opening and the white side stripes. I compared the picture to my files of the Angolian AAB-56-12 and came to the conclusion is that it may be the same car or not. It doesn't help that race cars seem to get modified and/or painted every week. The six pack of beer on the hood is a nice touch though. Regards, Don

[yvesmontreal]

The letters I received from Moreira are from summer 1985. He wanted $2000 US for 613338 "not in good condition". I was supposed to go shopping in Europe but instead I was sick and could not leave.

Regarding GTAm serial numbers, they were not specific numbers: these cars were based on US spec 1750 GTVs 105.51 153XXXX. Some of the cars were built by Autodelta, but some others were built by agents around the world. I believe Jim Kartalamakis knew of a GTAm that was put together by the distributor in Athens. The GTAm we had over here was crashed and rebodied with the bodyshell of a 2000 GTV. Hard to keep track of what is what...

How many GTAs were in Angola? A Portuguese panel beater worked on two of my Alfas; he told me tales of his years in Angola, of fixing a fender bender on a GTA belonging to a work colleague after a race weekend...

[dbest]

Yves, interesting story. Is your panelbeater still around? It would be fun to ask him if he replaced a damaged left rear fender on a white car with one from a red one. If so it was my car.

I estimate there were around six or seven GTAs and GTAms in Angola. Supposedly there were two Autodelta prepared GTAm cars sent to Angola in 1971/72, also the Chatz car and at least three other GTA or Juniors. One GTAm is well known AR1533246, the other AR1533245 may have been destroyed in testing at Luanda but I only have sketchy anecdotal evidence for this. I have never seen any pictures or race results for a second Angola GTAm.

Hopefully we have not strayed too far off topic, but it is interesting how small the world is becoming.

Regards,
Don

[SprintGtVeloce]

Regarding the Gtam, there were in fact two in Angola.

The first one had an angolan plate AAV-98-96 VIN AR1532346. Later had the portuguese plate ST-76-00 and now stands in Italy. Peixinho and Jaime Melo raced with it in Angola. Later Jaime Melo raced with it in Portugal and the last known portuguese owner was Xavier Moreira.



The second one had a plate AAD-95-18 chassis number AR1532345. This car was delivered to Socoina S.A.R.L. and Peixinho raced several times with it. Stayed in Angola and probably destroyed.



Autodelta had a customer catalogue and everyone could buy Gtam parts. When we talk about Gtam the scenario becomes completely different, unfortunately.

I'm with Don Best regarding the angolan Gta numbers, I'll stick within 6 or 7 also, but I'm not including the Gtams.

[dbest]

One thing we are certain (?) of is two GTAm were sent to Angola: AR1532345 and AR1532346. However there is conflicting evidence as to which is which. Pedro have you seen documentation linking the chassis numbers to the number plates? My understanding is that AR1532346 had plate number AAD-95-18 and AR1532345 had plate AAV-98-96. This is mostly based on various internet postings and some information from Centro Documentazione.

From my note sourced from a website which I cannot presently locate;

O de matrícula angolana AAV-98-96 com o número de chassis AR1532345 correspondente a um Alfa Romeo 1750 gtv de 1971. Foi uma encomenda directa da Alfa Romeo à Autodelta e foi posteriormente entregue ao Peixinho .

From Centro Documentazione;

According to our documentation files, the chassis number AR 1532345 originally corresponds to an Alfa Romeo 1750 GT Veloce USA (105.51), manufactured on the 17th May 1971, completely knocked down for Autodelta tuning and sold on the 9th June 1972 to Alfa Romeo Germany, Frankfurt.
The body colour is white, with black tex interiors.

It got even more confusing when I found a picture of AAV-98-96 driven by Peixinho in the 1969 Rally of Portugal.

No information was available from Centro Documentazione regarding AR1532346.

Regards and sorry for the confusion,
Don

[Subtle]

Oh--this is interesting.

[yvesmontreal]

These serial numbers are interesting... The Fusi tables list production of the 105.51 1750 GTV USA starting in 1968 with s/n 1533201 ; so GTAMs did have their own range of serial numbers, they just didn't have their own type number.

[Zagato_Olaf]

Quote:

Originally Posted by yvesmontreal These serial numbers are interesting... The Fusi tables list production of the 105.51 1750 GTV USA starting in 1968 with s/n 1533201 ; so GTAMs did have their own range of serial numbers, they just didn't have their own type number.

[SprintGtVeloce]

Hello Olaf, welcome to this thread!

I have a Grace magazine at home with an article about angolan Gtam AR1532346. I will digitalize it and place it over here for you to see. I'm abroad now and I will get home on friday or saturday.

Best regards.
Pedro Marques