This ones a bit of a personal one. When I was around six years old I fell in love. As you can imagine, it was with the motor car – village life may seem idyllic once youve become bored of the city experience, but all I could think of is exiting the village in the noisiest, fastest, most extreme, most offensive way possible. Handily there was a racing car that suitably inspired me – the Eggenberger Texaco Ford Sierra RS500 Cosworth. Just typing that makes my hairs stand up. Dressed in black with red lettering it was Darth Vader on wheels, and just as angular. It was deeply cool. The racing car was something else, too – a turbocharged 500bhp+ through the rear wheels in a time before electronics and four-wheel drive had taken over the sport. It soon would, of course – Godzilla, in the form of the Nissan Skyline GT-R R32 would soon advance the game forwards in Australia, where the turbo era reached its highest point. Indeed, the RS500 reached 600bhp+ in the hands of Dick Johnson. And while the Australians arguably built the fastest Sierras, the Texaco stars were iconic cars of the era. How so? I count up just how many toy versions of it I owned. There was the SCALEXTRIC set, which also featured Dick Johnsons Sierra. There was the Matchbox Superkings version too, plus a smaller Matchbox toy as well (though that used the XR4i body shape). But, I hear the cry, its just a bewinged Sierra, and ugly to boot. Really this is a pure motorsport homologation special, design specifically to do one thing – dominate touring car racing. And in terms of race wins, it did in the late-Eighties (though BMW M3 aficionados may disagree on the finer points of that...). It also democratised high performance in a way no previous car had; simply by reconnecting some injectors you could turn 224bhp in the standard road car to somewhere near 300bhp, allowing owners to embarass stockbrokers in their Porsche 911s. It was an attainable dream, unlike the Testarossa and Countach, so it adorned my bedroom walls. Alas, its somewhat less attainable now. Just 500 RS500s were built, and a fair few have been crashed, stolen and crashed or simply disappeared. This means that mint RS500s can reach £60,000 to £70,000. So not really that attainable anymore. You can still watch the touring car action on Youtube, however – check out this fantastic duel with Andy Rouse here https://youtube/watch?v=NxFjyMUWLF8 or this overview of the Eggenberger RS500s here: https://youtube/watch?v=wFKOR1TfjIA&list=PL1178A0367467768E This brings us to this car, a replica of Steve Sopers European Touring Car Championship car. Now we dont really cover replicas at Classic Cars magazine, but seeing as genuine Eggenberger Sierras are worth at least £300,000 these days, the estimate of £32,000 - 36,000 for this makes it worth covering. While there are a couple of things that arent quite Eggenberger-spec, the rest of it is nigh-on perfect. In fact, almost better than Eggenberger themselves. The auctioneer explains: According to marque specialists Oakfields, who offered their knowledge and assistance during the build, it is believed to be the last known genuine, right-hand drive 909 Sierra shell in existence. The shell had been stored by Malcolm Wilson Motorsport for over a decade and it was passed on to an employee, who himself stored it until it was discovered by the current owner. Once the shell had been purchased, the owner turned his attention to the drivetrain, running gear and body panels. Genuine RS Cosworth panels and parts were sourced and the highly reputable Ford engine builder Ric Wood was brought in to assemble the mighty YB powerplant. Featuring a 200 block, modified head, custom profile camshafts, Pectel engine management, T3 hybrid turbocharger and Mongoose side-exit exhaust, the engine has been built to handle 500bhp, but is currently limited to 360 bhp with 400 lb/ft of torque. The suspension features AVO remote reservoir three-way adjustable dampers with custom top mounts. The front brakes are AP Racing 5000 four-piston calipers with 320mm discs, the rears are standard RS Cosworth. The gearbox is a Borg Warner T5 five-speed gearbox with Gripper limited-slip differential and the pedal box has been custom built by Historic Race Car Preparations. Check out silverstoneauctions.co.uk for more details.
Posted on: Tue, 30 Dec 2014 13:00:01 +0000
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