Start with what the Lancia Dialfa is: a 4-door cabriolet with 3815 cc straight-6 40 hp, built from 1908, when a car was a rich man's adventure and every maker was a workshop. What it meant takes a little longer.
How it came about
The Lancia 18/24 HP Dialfa was the second model built by Lancia, produced in 1908. The car was based on the four cylinder Lancia Alfa, now with a straight-6 engine. With 40 hp, it could achieve a top speed of 110 km/h (68 mph). Only 23 examples were built, all in 1908.
The hardware
The engine is 3815 cc straight-6 40 hp. On the scales it comes to 750 kg. Drive goes through a 4-speed manual. The layout matters: a front engine drives the rear wheels, the classic proportion — long bonnet, cabin set back — that most people picture when they picture a sports saloon or a grand tourer. The wheelbase is 324 cm. These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.
Family and rivals
In the Lancia line-up the Lancia Dialfa has a clear place: it handed the line to the Lancia Beta. The cars a buyer would have weighed it against include the Ford Model T, the Oldsmobile Model M, the Delahaye type 28 A torpedo. Its Lancia stablemates include the Lancia 037 and the Lancia 2000.
Owning one today
There is no federal ownership record for the Lancia Dialfa — it predates the complaint database or was never sold in the United States — so MotorJury publishes no running-cost figure for it. For a car of this age the price is set by the collector market and the condition of the individual example, not by a formula.