Meet the world’s most expensive Sierra Cosworth
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Out of season race tracks can be bleak; not least Donington's Tarmac Lake on a cold December morning. It'll be different at the Performance Car Show next week where the ford sierra rs500 btcchina you see here will be pride of place in the warm and dry of the NEC. If you want to visit the show tickets are available herebut ahead of that I'm to be treated to a private viewing out in the wild.
Before that five of them are on their way to join myself and PH snapper Chris for an exclusive preview. Well, that's what we're hoping. And this child of the 80s is anxiously wondering if Santa really can come early. You won't miss us. A diesel Mazda 6. A Zipcar Ford Focus. A mint black Sierra RS Cosworth. A couple more SUVs with closed trailers. Panic over, bleakness forgotten, the rsowners.
And then another turns up. Good lord, it's only a Dick Johnson RS! I had that giddy feeling of an year-old at his first race car meet. A blast of December wind wakes me from my ford sierra rs500 btcchina time to get to work and follow the RS story car-by-car, as you'll be able to do yourself at the Performance Car Show next week.
Let's start at the beginning Gary and Billy Lali Here's where it all started. It's your archetypal homologation special. The project was initiated by the legendary Stuart Turner, by then Ford's motorsport director, who chanced upon a Cosworth development of the trusty Pinto engine that gave the iron block a new light-alloy twin-cam valve head. Turner said stick a turbo on for at least hp in street and hp in race guise, and we'll place an order.
This one is an original and concours beauty. Owned by Billy Lali for a couple of decades, seeing it as it looked in the showroom reinforces what a monster it must have been alongside ford sierra rs500 btcchina period Fiestas and Orions.
Son Gary has brought it to Donington for the day and ford sierra rs500 btcchina remembers the attention when out with his dad in it. Even the standard RS Cosworth has all the gear, including a viscous coupled limited-slip differential, Ford's own electronic ABS and a specially built Borg Warner five-speed gearbox. Stiffer springs, uprated dampers and thicker anti-roll bars were backed up by Ford SVE detail tweaks such as solid plastic bushes for the front and rear links.
Plus, of course, that wonderful bodykit, making the three-door bodyshell stiffer and lighter than the five-door look so delicious. The front air dam cut lift, the hole between the headlights fed the intercooler and, of course, that rear wing cured the Sierra's high-speed lift issues. But even as the first RS Cosworths hit the showrooms, Ford was already working on the next step Ford Sierra RS road car Owner: Once Ford had built the requisite 5, RS Cosworths, Group Ford sierra rs500 btcchina rules allowed an upgraded 'evolution' model to be launched.
This could carry changes focused on improving its racing potential, provided Ford sold 10 per cent of the original number as road cars. Ford sierra rs500 btcchina car, brought to Donington ford sierra rs500 btcchina his son Nick, is a total jaw-dropper. It too does the concours circuit - Nick even showed me the original fog lights, which Ford supplied in boxes in the boot you get extra concours points for having them, apparently.
To think some of them were chopped up for racing! Ah, but of course they weren't. The RS was launched to homologate the changes, not for conversion itself. The RS road car owned by Kevin Murby is also black. So a group of us gathers to play spot the difference.
Brake ducts instead of front fog lights? The extra cooling duct below the grille? There's a front splitter. Famously, a Gurney Flap on the 'whale tail' and an additional bootlid spoiler. Ford sierra rs500 btcchina course, the tape stripes on the side and, for the engine, eight injectors instead of four disabled on the road car. Oh, and the larger Garrett T4 turbo. Then RS guru Paul Linfoot comes over to give his expert view. There's a bigger water pump, larger-capacity oil pump and ford sierra rs500 btcchina - indeed, "virtually all the plumbing is unique".
The engine has a thicker cylinder block so the race cars could pump out ford sierra rs500 btcchina powerand pressurised oil cooling to each piston, for dealing with hp instead of hp but plus in racing guise.
There are more heat shields. The battery tray is modified. It's a completely new front bumper, too: Below the surface, racing teams could now alter the rear semi-trailing arm inner pivot point.
All ford sierra rs500 btcchina right-hand drive, all had sunroofs and 'RS' stickers ford sierra rs500 btcchina the back, were black, 56 were white and 52 Moonstone. But RS owners could claim kudos from the conversion being done by Tickford in the UK, who ran through the many pages of changes made by Ford at a rate of 15 a day.
And ford sierra rs500 btcchina they were approved, in Augustthen the race teams could get to work. Back then, ford sierra rs500 btcchina was the Kaliber car, the very same one that went up against Steve Soper's Texaco car during that famous Brands Hatch battle. It's now wearing Mobil ford sierra rs500 btcchina colours because in it went over to Australia, courtesy of Peter Brock. Amongst other things, he scored pole position in that year's Bathurstwith an amazing lap that even today ford sierra rs500 btcchina belief.
And who was he sharing the car with? Why, none other than Andy Rouse. Andy Rouse Engineering actually built it, one of dozens the BTCC legend would turn out over the years at one point, he was employing 30 people simply to cope with demand. So you could say it's a car with history - something owner Rupert Kent proudly runs through. This is a car he's been trying to buy for more than a decade, and realised his dream just six weeks prior to the shoot.
There's a period RS Components digital unit inside. A complex ARE-designed roll cage. Rupert tightens the centre-lock wheels with a period wheel brace actually a suspension upright, "one of the strongest things they made!
It's such an evocative machine. Jerry Mahoney may have taken the RS's first BTCC win, but Rouse took this car to all but two of the remaining races that year - only being denied overall BTCC honours ford sierra rs500 btcchina the indecipherable multi-class rules being run at the time he made do with the Group A championship instead, and 10 pole positions It's living history and it took all my effort not to continue my tour of every scuff and scrape and hearing the stories behind them.
That's because the 'works' car was waiting He added it to his collection a couple of years ago, and has since treated it to fresh paint and stickers plus refurbed wheels in the original yellow the car also later ran in Texaco livery, Paul has discovered. The chassis is genuine Eggenberger fare chassis numberbuilt by Ringshausen Rennsport for Manuel Reuter in late He drove it in the DTM and it was the first RS to race in the German touring car championship, scoring a podium at its debut Diepholzer Flugplatzrennen event.
It raced again in but was then retired and became part of a private collection: Eggenberger cars are special, of course. Reudi Eggenberger's Swiss racing team had done amazing things with turbo Volvo s and put this experience to making the Ford Ford sierra rs500 btcchina XR4Ti quick. It was Eggenberger that Ford officially teamed up with to help develop the RS Cosworth and, later, hone the changes that would create the RS The Rouse cars like Rupert's may have received semi-official support but Paul had been lusting after an official Eggenberger car for years.
Since buying it, he's also confirmed with Kai Ringshausen that it's the real deal, and even received Reuter's seal of approval. It's a divine machine, as spotless as the two black road cars, and yet another significant piece of RS history - remember, it was a sister Eggenberger-created car, Soper's Texaco-liveried machine, that capitalised on a free date in the European Touring Car Championship calendar to race against Rouse at Brands.
It also proves that RS racers weren't converted RS road cars: After building it, Dick raced it inscoring a win and a couple of podiums; team-mate John Bowe took over driving duties intaking it to second in the ATCC - behind Johnson. A highlight in was coming second at the Bathurstdespite only ford sierra rs500 btcchina the third team car.
Umpteen protests, initiated by Tom Walkinshaw, saw a chaotic build-up to the event, and several Sierras retired ford sierra rs500 btcchina the race, leaving this car as the sole survivor - "Johnson and Bowe pulled rank to take over driving duties with lead driver John Smith," says Ford sierra rs500 btcchina. He went on to become champion in another RS, leaving Graham Hathaway to drive it to a sole podium in - before taking it to Malaysia for a few years, becoming Malaysian Touring Car Champion.
After a few years in Thundersaloons and UK Ford Saloon Cars, Andy bought the car and gave it another title win inrounding out the racing record of this multiple-winning racing RS It was actually the first Sierra to win in Australia, and has another claim to fame - it won the Australian GP support ford sierra rs500 btcchina, although sadly for Johnson, this was a non-championship race.
Lloyd, who himself has raced in the Bathurst he's done the N24 several times as well visited Johnson a few years back, who remembered his first RS build well. No static museum piece, Lloyd still drives it hard today, and it too has seen action at the Silverstone Classic. On one track day, he popped it in the gravel, much to Linfoot's dismay. It's meant to be driven hard! Join the PH rating wars with your marks out of 10 for the article Your ratings will be shown in your profile if you have one!
I took one of these as px ford sierra rs500 btcchina many years ago and I think we gave the guy 10k for it, I remember thinking it was a stupid amount of cash for a rusty old Sierra Ah well. I really enjoyed the disastrously expensive and plod-attracting experience of running a bhp 3dr during the 90s, it made a charismatic rallycar non of courseand an epic racing car. This is heaven for a Cosworth lover like me! Wish Ford still made cars this exciting.
They still look ford sierra rs500 btcchina now, as said, they must have looked bat s t crazy back then. View all comments in the forums Make a comment. What is sequential turbocharging?
