Mitsubishi Colt Lancer 1600 GSR , 1st place, 1974 WRC Safari.

This little car really suprises me,  whenever i take it off road  i am reminded that this car is  from the same era as a Mk1 Escort but the difference in the standard  cars is really something else.

I loath driving a standard escort, but  the Lancer comes with a 5 spd gearbox disc brakes , suspension that in standard form is way better than Fords offering, shame about the recirclating ball steering system though not quite your Mk1 escort steering rack.

Its not possible to compare a modified escort against this but its still a very good car of the era and performs well as a classic rally car..

The  1973 Southern Cross rally was the Lancer GSR  debut and  after coming home in 1st  driven by Andrew Cowan  it claimed 2nd  and 3rd  as well.

Then it was off to the Safari to really test its worth.

 1974 saw Joginda Singh win the Safari and again in 1976 with another 2 Lancers in 2nd and 3rd position.

I restored this particular model  to replicate the 1974 WRC  Safari winning car.

 Some very rare parts have been  sourced from Mitsubishi's pre Raliart rally division known as Coltspeed, the engine has been rebuilt  to  C1 spec with a 200cc overbore, porting  raised compression ,C1 spec camshaft and tubular manifold.
The rear axe is fitted with a heavy duty LSD and 4.6 ratio final drive.
Suspension is heavy duty  C2 spec.
 A 1/2 cage  follows  the original  Lancer gsr 1974 car's  spec.



Interestingly Andrew Cowan established   Ralliart after campaining the lancers  in the 70s and 80s and was still one of the senior  directors until his recent retirement.

Lancer GSR on display at the launch of the Lancer  Evo X.

Joginder Singhs 1974 car

Later 1976 car different livery and no opening 1/4 windows.

Andrew Cowan.

Mk1 Escort SR20 6 spd 245hp Turbo

Restoration of Alans  Mk1 Escort.
Story so far, 3 months ago.
Bought in what appeared good condition, recently painted and bubble arched.
Staring us in the face was the fact it didnt have any inner rear arches,  painted and blended in bubble arches, but no inners, the seller   a young thai lad handed me some plastic pick up truck wheel arch liners, this was'nt going to cut it in the real world.

Before any of the entertainment started at the bodyshop i built up a pair of Original MK1 escort  front legs, with Bilstien Subaru gc8 yellow inserts, RX7 calipers and discs.

A set of deep dish 15" alloys, 8" front  195/50 , 9" rears 205/50 were sourced new from Tikseries.

Front cut Nissan Silvia S15 sourced   with the famous SR20DET,  final evolution limited edition of 245hp coupled upto a  6 speed gearbox, the turbo on this final generation is the  Garret GT28  , hi-tech inconel turbine wheel and ball bearings.Standard boost runs 9-10psi , the turbo could run 15 very comfortably and with roughly 8hp per psi that would push it  very close to 300hp!
Way more than Alan requires sadly.

Our last peice of the Japanese transmission puzzle had us salvaging a Mitsubishi Sapporo  rear axle, featuring disc brakes and a LSD , this combination would be the equivalent to an Atlas Capri, only the Capri comes minus the lsd and discs !

Onto the bodyshop" 1 month  finished sure "says the owner, i've come to expect to double or triple whatver timescale they estimate, sure its a months work, but the real world  means it doesnt get worked on every day, sometimes for weeks at a time nothing happens.

At the body shop our  panel beater , a young thai alcoholic, given the task of restoring this car to concours condition would proceed to tell us no problem and within 2 weeks our faith in thailand was restored and some quality work took place.

Sadly after finishing the nearside sill , inner rear tubs, our panel beater went off to bkk with the message the doctor had told him he needed 6 months off work to recover from all the hard work he had done.

In stepped  Mr Gai. , who finished off the rest of the work and unearthed even more hidden scrap metal cleverly disguised with body filler.

Meanwhile our Welsh mates at Motorsportools provided us  the opportunity  to spend a good couple of grand on Grp 4 Escort parts Heavy duty clubmans 4 link kit, round turrets, Bilstien coilovers 2 "1/4 springs Panhard kit 2.9 ratio rack ,Compression strut kit, Adjustable forged lower control arms, lowered rack crossmember to suit the taller sr20,polybushes and AVO stlye old skool dep dished leather steering wheel, to name a few of the goodies.


Time is now January, engine has been installed once to work out the engine/gearbox mounts, taken out , engine /gearbox mount fabricated, and the engine dry fitted  again then taken out.
Engine room details such as air filter box cut into the inner wing with ventilation hole swaged in, 7 lucky holes have been  cut and swaged into the front rad panel for the intercooler and BMW radiator, holes in the bonnetslam panel made  redundant from the absence of the original bonnet opening mechanism have been filled and smoothed,   the plan is to keep the safety latch  though , whilst using old school bonnet pins.

The car has been transported over to the fabrication shop for its roll bar.
Pics as it stands now