Fully Evolved

Oliver Koerfgen doesn’t modify Alfa Romeos, he simply finishes what the factory started when it comes to models like the GTV6 and the 75. “They invested a lot of money into the R&D–with the De Dion transaxle, the 50/50 weight distribution–but not in the execution,” he says. He’s been advocating for the enormous potential of these cars for about 30 years, wrenching on them by night while he worked as a mechanic for Ferrari in Switzerland. 

Now, that’s all he does. He’s the one-man band behind OKTech in Switzerland.  He only works on three Alfa models: The aforementioned GTV6 and 75, and then the Montreal, realizing their full potential by completely reengineering the powertrain and suspension. He started wrenching on the GTV6 in the ‘90s, and now he’s using decades of knowledge to build the fastest and most “complete” versions of this trio. To date, he’s built about 6 street cars and 6 race cars, with 3 race cars and 5 street cars on the docket waiting to be built. In the beginning, each car took about 3 years, but as Koerfgen engineered the parts and built up the institutional knowledge, the timeframe for his builds has shrunk. Now it’s about 1-2 years. 

La bellezza è negli occhi di chi guarda, or “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” doesn’t apply when it comes to famed Alfa Romeo models like the Giulia 1600 Sprint Speciale or the 33 Stradale. Their beauty is unequivocal; but once the flowy lines of Alfa models from the ‘50s and ‘60s gave way to the eventual blockiness and sharp edges of the ‘80s, opinions are divided. 

But to Oliver, these are the exact models that captured his heart when he was a kid, “when I was somewhere between 10 and 14 the GTV6 landed in Switzerland,” where he grew up. “I knew from the sound when one was driving by, and I’d run outside and look at the car.” He grew up riding in the back of his father’s Alfetta, but that was a 4-cyl model. It was the V6 that hooked him. 

He admits that driving something like a GTA with a peppy four cylinder is certainly magical, but “once you’ve driven a V6 with proper power, you can never go back,” he adds. The problem is there are so few experts when it comes to getting “proper” power out of these Italian V6s. That’s why he had to do all the engineering himself. “You don’t really know anything about the engines until you push them,” he says. That’s why he spends dozens of hours running his motors at full tilt. It’s all part of the development process. 

One of the first things he did after adding a new performance camshaft was develop a billet aluminum intake plenum with 3D-printed trumpets that are adjustable on the fly so that he could tune them while the car was on the dyno. When ALLOY visited the shop, a 1983 Alfa Romeo Formula 1 car built by Autodelta was strapped onto OKTech’s Dyno. It was in for an entire rebuild, right down to the rivets in the body. 

He’s sent cars to America, Australia, and all over continental Europe.  An IMSA Alfa 75 build is waiting for some final touches before heading to Malta before the year is over. 

Released to memorialize the 75th anniversary of Alfa Romeo in 1985, The Alfa Romeo 75 was just about as “1985” as it gets with a wedge-shaped body, rectangular headlights, and an upward sloping body line to a high tail. About 387,000 of them were made from ‘85-’92 when production ended, so it certainly was a commercial success in-period, but the chunky styling has kept it off mainstream enthusiasts’ radars for the most part. The IMSA-inspired example at OKTech has been completely re-engineered, starting with the boosted 4-cylinder and ending with a 7-speed sequential gearbox. It follows the formula of the famed 75 Evoluzione, but dials the whole thing up. 

Koerfgen’s customers are the type of enthusiasts who collect Ferraris and Lamborghinis, but the appeal of an OKTech build is that every single one is unique. When it comes to his street car builds, he has one rule: “It’s important that a street car remains visually as original as possible. Everything underneath can be upgraded, but visually it has to respect the original design.” Race cars are another story. They’re built to Group H rules. 

It’s these inner circle international Alfisti that keep Koerfgen’s books full. He has no website, has never done any advertising, and keeps the location of his shop mostly hidden. He already had more than enough clients before he made the jump to his own business. For 20 years his 9-5 was working on Ferraris, but his 5-9 was working on his true passion: Alfas. Eventually this became untenable when his baby daughter entered the picture. His wife had suggested that he needed to make a choice–work on the Alfas full-time or tone it down.