You Can't Make It Better | Ford RS200

Welcome to Petrol Lounge! Petrol Lounge is proud to present the Ford Escort RS200 Evolution. The RS200 is a purebred legend in the rally world. Let's take a look at what owning and driving this beast is really like and where it came from.
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#ford #rs200 #evo #fordescort #PetrolLounge
Intro Music: Inside Out by Adrian Walther
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[@gaillaffer7579]

Summer 1986 , I was parked up on M25 and A127 interchange at Codenham hall lane, waiting on a delivery of parts from co worker and one of these pulled up behind me. 2 guys get out to borrow some of my tools. They’d just picked it up from Boreham and were on the way home and some belts were slipping. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven being so close to one.

[@timothyjones9804]

I used to live in Hatfield Peverel, just down the road from Boreham. When I was a kid Ford would blast these up the A12 to HP, turn off and blast them back down the lanes to Boreham for testing. A very happy childhood for a rally fanatic.

[@-PLAYER0NE-]

What an incredible machine i love all of the group B cars. Thank you for explaining the gear lever next to the shifter because i always thought it was like a normal 2/4 hi setup. The truth is even cooler

[@jimmyjackx8174]

Great piece of information about this car. A pity that we did not hear the sound of the engine or you going for a spin in the car! A pity for the RS200, it broke down A LOT in 1986. Only one podium managed by Kalle Grundel at Rally Sweden in 3rd place. I have an 1/18 white model of this car and it will have the decal on it from Kalle's car. Keep up the good work Petrol Lounge and show us some more group B cars!!!! P.S. Is this car in your collection? Is the miles/km of 992 correct?

[@mrmando69]

Correction -The drivers changed the spare wheel very frequently.

[@kennedysingh3916]

Watched from Old Harbour Jamaica and I would love one of them.

[@venshenoy6826]

One of my favorites from the collection there!

[@chrisbiewer-rallye-info]

Thanks for showing us your car. Is the RS200 shown here an Evo? All RS200 had the red gear knob for switching between RWD and diff locks. And the original RS200 had a 1.8L Turbo engine, including the competition ones. Power was max 420BHP for the competition RS200. Ford decided on an Evo variation with a 2.1L Turbo engine for more power and converted 20 of these cars to 2.1 Evo. These should have been ready for competition in 1987. Of course by then the groupB was banned and the 2.1 Evo was never used by Ford itself. The Evo therefore is an extremely rare car.

[@bernarddavies4145]

All the fords of this era had a orange hood release under the wheel in the uk

[@therealgaragegirls]

The MazdaSpeed version of the Autozam AZ-1 seems to have borrowed a lot of its style from the RS200.

[@reggiemoore21]

I would have to agree

[@victoriabailey1337]

Stig Blomqvist World Rally Champion developed that car not Jackie Stewart. Stuart did a lot of work for Ford back then hence why his name is probably all over the manual. A lot of the parts are from the Ford Sierra. even the doors are cut down Sierra.

[@trondaas9685]

The front window frame, front window (screen), A-pillars, the roof to the end of the doors and the B-pillars are all based on a Ford Sierra 3 door chassis. These parts are made from fiberglass on the RS200, they were steel on the Sierra. And yes, the doors are cut down about 8 cm ( 3.25" ) compared to the Sierra. All internals in the doors are Ford Sierra, no power windows, except for the side windows, they are shorter at the bottom compared to the Sierra door windows. The wiper mechanism, arms and cowling as well as the heater and the steering coloum is also from a Ford Sierra. They truly raided the Ford parts bin when they built these.....

[@PS-ps8mo]

Graham Robson the author ran a couple on the road for Ford during the development phase, no doubt he was the ghost writer of the parts attributed to Jackie Stewart.

[@PS-ps8mo]

@@trondaas9685 and toggle switches are straight out of a Mk2 Fiesta

[@DanteICE]

Also maybe should have mentioned that Jackie Stewart was an Ex-F1 Champion, and widely known in the racing scene.

[@chrisbiewer-rallye-info]

Sorry having to correct here. Jackie Stewart together with engineer John Wheeler did the initial development work, later joined by Marc Surer and Malcolm Wilson. Stig Blomqvist still had a contract with Audi in 1985, doing the WRC with Audi and helping to develop the Sport quattro S1.

[@SB-vb8ch]

Awesome car, good overview, technical knowledge needs some work. Dual dampers for endurance, different spring rates is just a tuning refinement, it's all linked so the wheel rate is a combination of the geometry & the two springs....nothing to do with bumps, roll, jumps etc...not how springs work! Not sure if there is some confusion over anti roll bars (sway bars in American speak) & coil springs. cente console / dash isn't out of a production car...just the switchgear. They all had nominal power as sold, certainly nowhere near 600bhp, probably half of that.

[@ElQuesoGuapo]

About those Mickey Mouse ears, we took a close look at them, and they currently do nothing. I assume that Ford added them for future proofing. But on the RS200 in this video, they're dead ends.

[@nishiki7047]

For increased air flow to the engine for cooling

[@chrisbiewer-rallye-info]

They are probably dead ends on this car but where needed on the groupB competition car. Btw it is interesting to see development cars chassis 1 & 3. They had no "roof cooler", no Mickey Mouse ears, not even a rear spoiler. The initial idea was to have a beautiful, clean coupé. The front spoiler is hidden under the front bonnet, see what is hidden under the front bonnet air ducts. However first tests revealed thermic problems and a lose rear end, so during development chassis 3 grew all sorts of wings and coolers. It was indeed a fascinating development phase. Shame I can't add photos here. Chassis 3 also had the engine bonnet opening from the roof to the rear, which of course was very unfortunate for easy servicing and then was changed to the other way round as seen on the car here.

[@borregoayudando1481]

I feel like the RS200 is actually an optimized Meyers Manx.

[@hybridAbsol]

Imagine using it during Miami Vice :p

[@r5coscosworthworx253]

Lovely example but please ditch the darker blue Ford badging, not period correct for the time

[@K-Effect]

The way he describes driving this car it reminds me of a Australian cattle dog

[@nishiki7047]

At the time these things were racing in Europe, American motorsport was in the dark ages 😂

[@nicks9707]

Of course drivers change tires mid stage. Happens all the time…

[@connor45rm85]

this car was not designed to be jumped, the double shocks are for long travel forest events, this car doesnt have 600hp, stock cars had 237bhp and the evo was unquoted.

[@kevinparker461]

And a few in the UK have even more than 600 bhp. The standard car was a 1.8 Cosworth BDT & the Evo was a 2.1 BDT built i believe by Brian Hart?, when they were built they were built having the capabilty of 600 + BHP

[@PS-ps8mo]

@@kevinparker461 agreed The Garret T04E is out of puff before 600bhp likewise the one used in the RS500 was at the max by 500 bhp, claims over that are spurious unless they have had the Rouse / Dick Johnston " alterations" !

[@gusgacmul]

rubbish .. quoted at 515bhp standard

[@enigmatwist6548]

@@gusgacmul No only 250bhp although there was an S spec and Tickford option that upped the power to 350bhp. There was an EVO too but as previously stated that was unquoted.

[@davidjenkins1958]

Ford being an American car company I could never and still can not understand why Great Britain has some of the coolest cars made by Ford. The only thing I can think of is that here in the U.S we have some of the stupidest rules when it comes to the automotive industry, look how Ralph Nader almost completely destroyed the Chevrolet Corsair.

[@kevinparker461]

This is European Ford, just seems to do its own thing as long as Ford in the US let them.

[@markhuckercelticcrossbows7887]

they were ¨built!!¨ by reliant, not ford

[@AE-jd1yu]

Ameerika rallybcaybgamepladõy

[@Penri1215]

What is Rally Racing? The whole World other than America knows it as RALLYING, not rally racing, The drivers are known as RALLY DRIVERS, not racing drivers. Stick to thing you do going round in circles in the south.

[@chrisbiewer-rallye-info]

I must admit that annoys me too. Rallying is quite different to racing. Especially when it is said "rally car racing", what a waste of a rally car, it is called rally car, so go rally it not race it. Why make it sound over complicated. The same as the Americans keep saying "horse back riding", makes me immediately wonder which part of a horse American girls normally ride!