Alpine A310
Alpine
Alpine A310: The Wedge-Shaped Successor
The Alpine A310 was a rear-engined sports coupe of the 1970s and 1980s that carried Alpine's lightweight ethos into a bolder, wedge-shaped era.
The Alpine A310 arrived in 1971 as the successor to the original A110, adopting a dramatically different look with sharp, wedge-shaped styling that broke from the rounded curves of its predecessor. Like the A110, it kept its engine mounted at the rear and used a fiberglass body over a steel backbone chassis to stay light.
Early A310s used a four-cylinder engine, but Alpine broadened the car's appeal in 1976 by introducing a version powered by a Renault-sourced V6, giving the A310 more grand-touring character alongside its sports car handling. The V6 model became the more common and better-remembered version through the rest of its production run.
Produced under Renault's ownership of Alpine, the A310 helped bridge the brand's rally-bred origins with a more modern, road-focused image through the late 1970s and into the early 1980s, before giving way to the A610 as Alpine's next rear-engined GT.