eggcatcher

I read this in autosport (very reputable UK motorsport mag), origionally sourced from germanys biggest motorsport mag, it appears Hyundai are looking into WRC again, with the i20. not sure if its a model available in the US, but very popular with old ladies in UK, silly eco-boxes of crap. Despit taking it rallying, I'm not expecting a tuned version for the road- F2 Evo aside (and even that was held back, not the car it could have been), Hyundai miss the point of motorsport. Upon entering, you build a tuned version for the road, in limited numbers, sold for little or no profit, but instead a show of what your in house petrolheads can come up with.

http://www.specialstage.com/2012/05/...o-wrc-in-2013/

wheel_of_steel

Oooohhh. I'd be keen for a works i20. I wonder if they will ask that british company if they are still keen

eggcatcher

Unlikely, MSD went bust in the early noughties, it was announced as the main reason for Hyundai pulling out of WRC.

Annoying they went bust though, my plate in my Evo's gone, I can't get a replacement as there's no-one to get a replacement from.

HyundaiKitCoupe

^Plate? Do you mean sill?



I heard MSD are still in business, but doing small scale things. I also recall that Hyundai pulled out due to its own financial reasons. There were few mechanics (far less than the other works teams) and they were underpaid, which is why the sued Hyundai. Hyundai pulled out just before San Remo 2003 for restructuring reasons (increasing qiality/brand rep), CEO embezzlement (using company money to fund Korean construction), and labor union strikes in November of that year.



I would have thought the Veloster would have been a good platforms, but it looks like they're following the success of the Prodrive Mini Cooper. I don't like today's WRC in comparison to the past decades, mostly because the cars are all ugly and have little to do with their road-going counterparts however, the front bumper and livery of this i20 reminds me of the 1999 Accent WRC:



I'm curious, is Robert Kubica on that Autosport cover? He's supposed to be on it this month.

eggcatcher

this times a million. In the 90s WRC cars were based on road cars that were 2.0 turbo and 4WD before tuning, Scoobys, Evo's, Celica GT4s, Escort Cosworth, and Skoda Octavia VRS (1.8T in this case). Then along come those silly little french companys and enter WRC cars based on 1.6 FWD cars. That Pug 206 had those ugly extended bumpers as the car was to short to meet regulations without them! They spend well over anyone else budget, pricing proper rally cars out of WRC.



And I have the sills, F2 Evos came with a plate from MSD, stating the number it was (eg 367 of 1500). Mine has lost its plate- it's 99.9% definately an Evo though, everything else checks out, if it is a copy it's a good enough one to fool me and a Hyundai technician.



Yes it's the one with Kubica on the cover- it's weekly not monthly over here though.



And lastly, I only found out this a couple weeks back, those Accent WRCs used 300bhp Beta engines. No idea of torque though, WRC regs limited power to 300, but there was no torque limit, it was claimed that by the late noughties the Fords had 300bhp and 500 lbs/ft!

Loneshark

as long as hyundai doesnt take on Castrol as its main sponsor, im cool... lol

wheel_of_steel

Let's be honest, the WRC accent had almost nothing to do with the road going LC accent. The closest thing I've seen is my mate's TRA special, which was a stock LC with lowering springs and WRC vinyls. They only made like five of those.

HyundaiKitCoupe

Times a million! I loved Henning Solberg's outing in the 2000-spec Mitsubishi Lancer in this years Swedish rally. I'd much rather watch these cars than any of today's cars that resemble Baha/Dakar SUV's rather than actual cars.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llnYDF_ED1o



Not to mention today, it's more like a videogame today. Drivers are fighting for every inch like in Formula 1, not fighting against nature. And yeah I agree the budgets play a huge role unfortunately. It should be less expensive to attract more manufacturers. There used to be 7 manufacturers. Now there were TWO. It's going to be four next year but that's still crummy.

eggcatcher

Go back another 10-15 years, then you get the insanity that was group B. Best bit was, as organisers were canceling it, Audi and Lanci were pushing for a group S, Lancia even building a 650bhp mid engine prototype Delta!