If Autoshite did rally cars

[eddyramrod]

We had a rally in our village last Saturday.

 

How about that! Yes, from about 9.30am the village square (which is no more than a slightly wider bit of road, paved in brick and fronting the council office) filled up with rally cars, which then set off at intervals. The roads were NOT closed while all this was going on...! So here are a few of the cars...

Genuinely Autoshite rally cars, if ever I saw any! The Escort belongs to a friend of a friend, by the way.

 

I live just down the hill; close enough to walk up with my chihuahua while the cars were gathering! Lounging around for the rest of the day, I kept hearing cars, it seems they were using our square as start/finish point for a number of road stages. If I stood in the right place I could even see them over my neighbour's garden and the adjoining building site, which runs through to the next road.

[RedSparrow]

 

Apparently still popular as an amateur rally car. Why I wonder?!

 

Some chap on flickr says:

Actually, they were excellent Rally cars. If I remember well, these special ones were equipped with a 3 cylinder 2 stroke engine boosted to 130HP (instead of 50...) for 900kg, not too bad for the time. The Rally Trabants ahd a 2cylinder developping 80HP (instead of 26 for the normal car)

 

I think they look good anyway. And that's all that matters.

[eddyramrod]

I posted a pic of this, "under construction" a while back, so here it is, completed:

Very shortly it'll be heading for the port of Limassol, it's going to a UK buyer.

Meanwhile, look at these, then I'll tell you something...

My friend Andreas, who has been building the white Escort, was showing me some old photos of his rallying days. All three cars above featured in those photos, usually sideways on a gravel corner. Nice to see somebody keeps these things: not just the photos, the whole cars! He also had photos of a couple more Sunbeams, which I know he still has but I haven't been able to photograph, and a Polski Fiat which apparently has gone.

[DSdriver]

Jean Francois Piot - Renault 17 Gordini

Leo Bertorelli and Peter Hilliard on the RAC rally in Alfashite.

Leo manufactured ice creams and very nice they were too. Peter who lived next door but one to me always had a freezer full of good stuff.

[ashmicro]

I have a pic (possibly a video still) that I took about 15 years ago at Nutts Corner Raceway (when I was supposed to be marshalling ). A very early Sunbeam with a Mazda RX-3 rotary engine. He got shitcanned a couple of times by the scrutineers for the car being too loud. At the opposite end of the shite scale was Denis Biggerstaff's Metro 6R4 with the "grenade" engine:3.5 litre twin turbo 24v V6 by Goodman. It was basically a hastily rebuilt knackered engine with two truck turbos and the boost wound right up. Reputed to be 1000BHP. At another meeting we had what looked like a very battered yellow Gartrac G4 (rwd Escort mark 4). It turned out to be an ex Martin Shanche car, by then owned by Jan-Artur Iversen, the man who invented the original Tetra Brik packaging for milk etc. The car looked like shit, but went like shit off a shovel. 700BHP, and the fibreglass bonnet was held down by three bands of duck tape.

[Felly Magic]

Martin Shanche? The nutter in anything fibreglass with a Ford engine, with a bull like temperament. if it was red, he would try to ram it. I remember him getting banned for his on track antics. Stood in the middle of the track almost getting knocked down If I remember.

[Betaphile]

Moskvitch Group B:

 

 

 

From this excellent site, which also yields these other unheard-of Group B/S racers:

 

Charade DeTomaso 926R

 

Starion 4WD Group B

 

RX-7 Group B

 

Kadett 4S

 

"Opel was working on a group B/group S car, the Kadett 4S based on the Kadett E/Astra MkII shell. Again Opel went shopping at independent tuners and tried to put the pieces together. This ended in quite some PR embarrassment as Opel proudly announced they had this superb 500hp engine, only for the press to realize – and of course taking profit of this farce – that what Opel praised in highest respects was a Ford engine they purchased through Zakspeed! However, when Group S was due to be dropped by FIA they build another one and fitted both with 2.4L Manta 400 engines for the Paris-Dakar - to face a disaster there due to lots of broken shocks."

 

Delving into the archives a bit further, there's this:

 

 

 

Polonez body on a (pre-wrecked) Stratos chassis, apparently...

[Talking Hoarse]

 

Apparently still popular as an amateur rally car. Why I wonder?!

 

Some chap on flickr says:

Actually, they were excellent Rally cars. If I remember well, these special ones were equipped with a 3 cylinder 2 stroke engine boosted to 130HP (instead of 50...) for 900kg, not too bad for the time. The Rally Trabants ahd a 2cylinder developping 80HP (instead of 26 for the normal car)

 

I think they look good anyway. And that's all that matters.

I know that Wartburg! It is quite regularly out on Nescro events, driven with great enthusiasm and makes a wonderful 2-stroke howl. And .... I think I am right that owner used to assist /support the works Wartburg service crews when they competed in the UK in the RAC rally.

[Betaphile]

 

 

 

Carlos Sainz in a SEAT Panda, this...

 

Dakar Panda 4x4 (!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Non-Stratos-powered Polonez

 

 

 

 

Plymouth?

 

Dodge Colt

 

YEEE-HAARRRR

 

(Dodge Omni, if you were wondering... I was)

 

 

 

Ligier

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(OK, the Dattos here aren't technically rally cars - this is the Ivory Coast, a Marlboro-sponsored event, but some bright spark at Bastos got the jump by handing out a bunch of sunstrips to the locals)

 

Mazda?

 

 

And finally, not really shite, but I love this pic

[Betaphile]

 

Audi 200 Quattro

 

Not remotely shite, but awesome

 

Shevy Shuvit

 

DS23 'Elevator Edition'

 

SM 'Hacksaw Edition'

 

Visa Maxi

 

TRS 16V

 

Dacia 1310

 

Duster ice racer (so it's not a rallycar, sue me)

 

 

PAGING HIRST CORSE

 

 

 

Ford RS1700T Group B - axed before it ever saw a rally

 

 

 

 

GAZ M21

 

Aleko 2141

 

 

NSU TT

 

Avenger GT

 

Colt Lancer

 

Starion

 

 

Micra

 

 

Vectra 4x4

 

 

Calibra

 

 

 

 

 

6R4 prototype

 

 

 

Ker-RUNCH

 

 

 

Corolla GT

 

 

 

 

VW Fox-cum-quattro Sport lookalike

 

[M'coli]

This photos reminds me of a CCC article about a privateer rallying a Lada, from about 1992 I think. There was a Jim Bamber cartoon with a bobble-hatter looking off to the right of the page and a play on words of "That car's gone right off the stage", as in, it's gone into the undergrowth. It might be my browser, but:

"Eee, that poor lad, E's gone right of t'page!"

[fotorabia]

1978 factory spec...

[Betaphile]

 

Brian Culcheth and Johnstone Syer took this Marina 1.3 to second in class (behind a Skoda 120S), and 16th overall, on the 1973 1000 Lakes...

[scooters]

Daf 55

 

with the Variomatic system Daf were involved in rallying until the sale of the cars unit to Ovlov in '74

 

Monte Carlo and the Coupe Des Alpes usually but in 1968 a Daf 55 was one of 20 odd cars to actually survive the London to Sydney rally - the special edition launched to comemorate this was called the Daf 55 Marathon and came in saloon and coupe form - it had a rude boyz exhaust system and a gordini tuned renner 1.4 engine. For those of you who don't know the 55 came with a water cooled renner engine and was the beginning of volvo's later collaboration with Renner in the world of engine design.

 

I've owned and driven a 55 marathon saloon and it was quite the most fun I have eva had in a car driving one on gravel and in the snow - it behaves like a speedboat - the variomatic belts acting like a LSD - fyi the later 66 and Volvo 370 did not have this characteristic as they were single belt variomatic systems whereas the 55 was a twin belt

 

here's a 55 from the period - black bonnet with crazy dutch orange were the colours

 

 

here's a photo of a 55 Marathon Coupe where some horrible bastard has shoved in a v8 - gawd knows how the variomatic copes with the torque without lunching itself - I assume they have put in a modern chain driven CVT

 

[AnthonyG]

The 'Plymouth' referred to above in Betaphile's pics is a Plymouth Arrow, a Colt Celeste sold as a captive import in the US.