Tuning the Alfa Romeo Alfa Twin Spark

"Comprehensive guide to performance parts and tuning the Alfa Romeo Alfa Twin Spark engine!"

We are frequently getting posts about the best tips for Alfa Twin Spark mods that work. So let us look into Alfa Romeo Alfa Twin Spark tuning mods and outline the best mods that work on this great engine and point out some problems along the way.

The Alfa Romeo Alfa Twin Spark are popular engines and with the ultimate uprated upgrades like a remap, turbo improvements and camshafts you will dramatically increase your driving opportunities.

We shall detail the best approach to Alfa Twin Spark tuning and provide tips on the best modifications for your car.

The optimum Alfa Twin Spark upgrades on an engine are in our opinion the ones that give the biggest return for your cash.

We won't be swayed by popular Alfa Twin Spark upgrades, they need to be cost effective.

The camshaft profile plays a big part in the engines power output so camshaft upgrades make quite a large difference. The intake and exhaust durations will alter depending on the chosen camshaft profile, so large bhp gains are on offer for camshaft upgrades.

NB: Fast road camshafts normally boost the power throughout the rpm range, you might lose a little low end bhp but the top end will be lifted.

Motorsport camshafts, boost the top end band but as a result the car will not idle smoothly and low end power nearly always suffers.

A Motorsport and race camshaft will just annoy you whilst in heavy traffic.

You should ideally match your torque band to your typical driving style so for a car used daily stick with a shorter duration Alfa Twin Spark camshaft

Each engine responds better to mild camshaft durations so view each engine as unique.

The ECU mapping and fuel pump and injectors also have an effect on the torque gains you'll achieve.

Extending exhaust or intake durations can alter the torque band and on most engines the exhaust and intake durations do not need to match, although most cams and tuners use matched pairs there are some advantages to extending the intake or exhaust durations.

Alfa Twin Spark Best Tuning Mods & Upgrades

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Tuning Stages

Stage 1 Alfa Twin Spark modifications: Fast road camshaft, Remaps/piggy back ECU, Drilled & smoothed airbox, Intake headers, Sports exhaust manifold, Panel air filters.

Stage 2 Alfa Twin Spark modifications: Fast road cam, Ported and polished head, induction kit, Sports catalyst & performance exhaust, fuel pump upgrades, high flow fuel injectors.

Stage 3 Alfa Twin Spark modifications: Adding or Upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Competition cam, Crank and Piston upgrades to alter compression, Twin charging conversions, Engine balancing & blueprinting, Internal engine upgrades (head flowing porting/bigger valves).

A remap allows a tuner to fully realize the full potential of all the upgrades you've done to your Alfa Twin Spark.

It will usually give around 30% more power on turbocharged vehicles and you can expect to see around 15% on NASP engines, but figures achieved usually rely on the upgrades you've done and the condition of your engine.

Getting fuel and air into your Alfa Twin Spark is the main goal to any engine performance tuning task.

The intake plenum take the air during the suck phase from the air cleaner and allow it to be drawn into the engine cylinders with fuel for the squish phase.

Structure and flow characteristics of the Plenum can make a large change to fuel delivery on the Alfa Twin Spark.

Many mass produced engine plenum chambers are in dire need of aftermarket tuning parts, although some manufacturers provide reasonably good plenum chambers.

Fitting big valve kits, doing a bit of port matching and head flowing will also lift bhp and torque, and more importantly will raise potential for a greater bhp and torque increase on other upgrades.

Turbo upgrades for the Alfa Twin Spark

NASP engines need quite a lot of work when you add a turbo, so we have a separate guide to help you take into account the pros and cons of going this route on your Alfa Twin Spark

The more air you can get into an engine, the more fuel it can burn and uprating the induction with a turbocharger upgrade makes major power gains.

If an engine is turbo charged parts are going to net you a larger power gain and you'll see that turbocharged engines are made using strengthened components.

There are weak spots for every engine, with some being over specified and some only just able to handle stock power

We recommend you find these limitations and fit stronger pistons, crank and engine components to survive the power.

We see many guys spending a lots of money on turbocharger upgrades on the Alfa Twin Spark only to have the engine block explode soon after it's been completed.

Bigger upgraded turbo chargers will usually suffer low end lag, and smaller turbo chargers spool up really quickly but don't have the peak rpm bhp gains.

In the last 10 years the market of turbo units is always evolving and we are seeing variable vane turbo units, where the vane angle is altered according to speed to lower lag and increase top end performance.

Twin scroll turbo units divert the exhaust flow into 2 channels and feed these at differently angled vanes in the turbo. They also improve the scavenging effect of the engine.

You'll commonly see there's a limit in the air flow sensor MAF/MAP on the Alfa Twin Spark when a lot more air is being drawn into the engine.

You'll see that 4 bar air sensors coping with quite large power gains, whereas the OEM air sensor was restricting power at a much lower level.

Adding a supercharger or additional turbo will make large bhp gains, although more complex to configure. We have this in depth look at twinchargers if you want to read more.

Uprating Alfa Twin Spark fuel injectors

You will need to ensure that the engine is not starved of fuel so will need to look at the fuelling when you start exceeding 20% of a performance increase.We would recommend you to over specify your injector capacity.

The accepted safe increase is to add another 20% when buying an injector, this takes into account injector deterioration and provides a bit of spare capacity should the engine need more fuel.

We think this one is common sense, but you'll need to match your fuel injector to the type of fuel your car uses as well.

Best Alfa Twin Spark performance exhausts

Only look to uprate your exhaust if the existing exhaust is actually creating a restriction in flow.

On most factory exhausts you'll find your flow rate is ok even on modest power gains, but when you start pushing up the power levels you will need to get a better flowing exhaust.

Sports exhausts can help equal out the flow of gases through the engine.

But if your exhaust is too large, ie: over 2.5 inches bore, you will lose a great deal of the flow rate and end up lacking power and torque.

Usual exhaust restrictions can be located the emissions filters installed, so adding a faster flowing race alternative will help avoid this restriction.

History specs and performance of the Twin Spark

The Twin spark, uses a clever twin spark plugs to ignite the charge in each cylinder. In 8v engines both sparks happen concurrently, whereas in 16v engines the sparks would be timed for maximum effectiveness slightly apart depending on load etc...

This allows a very lean mixture to be used and offers a really smooth idle.

Twin Spark 8-valve engines

• 1.7 L (1,749 cc 113 bhp) @6000 rpm,  (108 lbft) @3500 rpm
• 1.8 L (1,773 cc 131 bhp) @6000 rpm,  (122 lbft) @5000 rpm
• 2.0 L (1,962 cc 146 bhp) @5800 rpm, (137 lbft) @3000 rpm
• 2.0 L (1,995 cc 139 bhp) @6000 rpm, (138 lbft) @5000 rpm

Found in

• Alfa Romeo 75
• Alfa Romeo 164
• Alfa Romeo 155

Twin Spark 16-valve engine

• 1,370 cc (1.4 L 102 bhp) @ 6300 rpm, (91 lbft) @ 4600 rpm
• 1,598 cc (1.6 L  103–118 bhp) @ 5600-6200 rpm, (103–108 lbft) @ 4200-4500 rpm
• 1,747 cc (1.7 L 138–142 bhp) @ 6500 rpm, (120–125 lbft) @ 3500-3900 rpm
• 1,970 cc (2.0 L  148–153 bhp) @ 6400 rpm, (133–138 lbft) @ 3500-3800 rpm

Found in

• Alfa Romeo 155
• Alfa Romeo GTV (Type 916)
• Alfa Romeo Spider (Type 916)
• Alfa Romeo 145
• Alfa Romeo 146
• Alfa Romeo 166
• Alfa Romeo 156
• Alfa Romeo 147
• Alfa Romeo GT

Tuning the Alfa Romeo Twin Spark (TS) and best Twin Spark (TS) performance parts.

Problems and issues to look out for on the Alfa Twin Spark

The Alfa Twin Spark engines, if regularly serviced and maintained, are generally very reliable and have few issues.

Regular oil changes are vital on the Alfa Twin Spark, particularly when the engine has been modified and is putting down more power than the manufacturer intended.

For more information on Tuning your Alfa Twin Spark engine please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss tuning options in more detail with our Alfa Twin Spark owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.

We need your help to complete and improve this page, so do give us your feedback in the comments box below.

We really like hearing from our readers, and hearing about which upgrades were the most effective for them, it helps us improve our recommendations and articles to reflect current trends in modifications and ensures that our Alfa Twin Spark guides and tips are kept up to date.

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This article is flagged for an update, so please pass on specific tips below that I can include. All articles, and content was written by me, Waynne Smith TorqueCars founder. Some outlines are just too general so I appreciate your feedback and suggestions. This entry was filed under Alfa Romeo. You can leave a response below or join our forum to discuss this article and car modification in detail with our members.

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