1985 Ford Sierra XR6 *Sold £8,250*

Description

• Ex-race winning car
• Road legal
• Tuned, balanced, and ported engine
• Ford Motorsport livery

Ford Sierra XR6. A race car for the road.

These rare, bespoke, South Africa only versions carry a rich heritage and today are very sought after.

Cast your minds back to South Africa’s pre-democratic era, international sanctions imposed on companies meant the US car maker had a severely limited access to a wide range of models available overseas. This forced the South African arm of the Company to draw on its technical expertise and improvise basically.

That approach saw the birth of a period of homologations that produced several road cars that spilled over into the motorsport world too. The XR6 was one of many that inspired massively successful cars like the Cosworth today.

Background

Our experienced vendor has a number of good contacts in South Africa and that is where this one came from.

A large, well known Dealer Group in SA, CCD Autos, owned and successfully raced this car in Group One Races with another well-known name in SA, Jacques Blom who also built the engine. The specs for that are below.

In their hands, this Ford Sierra XR6 won a First in Class, it raced in at least three enduros and one 24hr race. That is testament to its build quality. It is a genuine XR6 as seen from the bodyshell tag, not a so-called ‘recreation’ or snide-one as some like to say. It has a full SA Race Passport which we are told is transferrable, but winning bidders would have to check that out. Our vendor, Ben has provided loads of images of it’s racing past which are in the lot gallery.

Engine

The centre-piece of this XR6 is the engine.

The base line is the mighty Essex 3.0 V6 which needs no introduction. We are led to believe that this engine could possibly now be a 3.4ltr. Now. We say that because of two things. We’ve been told. And we’ve looked at the spec sheet below and in the gallery. Additionally, our experienced vendor, describes the engine as “a bit of an animal”. We guess in laymans terms, it’s fast.

However, the only gold plated, cast iron, bomb proof way of anyone telling is to take the engine apart, measure the bore and stroke, do the calculations and see what that tells you. Our vendor wants you to have the information, but is dead straight too. So there you have it.

Lets move on to what we do actually know from the documents provided.

The engine was built by Jacques Blom of FP Engineering 91 Voortrekker Road, Parow, Cape Town South Africa. A copy is in the gallery.

Here’s what we know. The original throaty 3.0 V6 needs no introduction. In standard form it is good for about 140bhp.

This one was totally stripped. According to the invoice, it’s been bored, the crank has been ground and obviously all new shells including small ends.

The two cylinder heads were stripped, ported and rebuilt with big valve units. The heads were then skimmed.

When it came to re-assembly, the whole unit was balanced and the flywheel was lightened.

Here’s where the story about the 3.4ltr gets interesting. The invoice talks of a “conversion”, including “re-working the compression”. We do have contact details for the engine rebuilder and if the winning bidder wants to follow things up, we will of course provide them with details.

The engine runs twin DGAS 38 Webbers, with three branch heat wrapped header pipes.

It is little wonder our vendor describes it as “an animal”, we doubt he means pussy cat either.

Running gear

None of the above is any good if the XR6 doesn’t go around corners.

As you’d expect of a Class winning race car, the suspension is suitably set up.

At the front it has a fully, three position adjustable cross-member. The entire suspension is poly bushed. It comes with modified strut towers in order that caster and camber can be set to suit any given circumstance. Standard anti-roll bars are fitted.

This Ford Sierra XR6 has a four wheel disc set up, which are vented at the front. The standard VR6 has drums on the rear. To balance the braking power there is a brake bias adjuster fitted.

On the road we’re told it drives very well. It is road legal and having that balance of a very successful track car / competition race car that can be used on the road is a great bonus.

Interior

As you can see from the gallery, the interior is as you’d expect. The roll cage is welded and bolted via strengthening plates. We’re told by someone who knows – we clearly don’t, we’ll admit that – with a couple of additions it could easily be ready to compete in UK competitions

Outside and underside

When our vendor, Ben received the car it was in plain white. The fabulous, but rather expensive looking Ford Motorsport livery was put on by Ben and looks cracking. Not too much, but just enough. The XR4i spoiler is an addition. These were fitted on the XR8.

To follow on the XR6 and will be included for the winning bidder are original XR8 wheel arches and front grille. We did tell you our vendor was a straight chap!

In that same vein, Ben has inspected they car. Although it was a very successful race car, he can see no evidence of major damage or reconstruction. You will have to look for it, but he thinks the NSF front wing has been painted at some point as well as the OSR door. That is good for the bump and grind of production car racing. It has probably fared so well because it was always out in front on its own all the time!

We were also told that there are no signs of it even being welded either.

Our view

This rare Ford Sierra XR6 was designed and built to win races, which is did very successfully. The beauty of the race car Class it operated in, was that it was based on real-life production models. This XR6 is civilised enough to live with on the road too. Although describe as ‘an animal” it is still tame enough to be around.

That versatility would suit a number of bidders. On the road it is a great fun car that gets looks and starts conversations wherever it goes. It could be used like that without ever even going near a race track car park. If a winning bidder want to test its limits and have the odd track day experience, it would suit a ‘run-what-you-brung-event’ Do they still exist or are we stuck at Santa Pod in the ‘80s?!

However, if you did want to ‘race’, this is brilliant base car that already has race winning pedigree.

We should just mention what an incredible sensible reserve it has too.

Fast fun and value. A race car for the road.

If you’ve got any detailed questions you’d like answering, please do let us know

Vehicle Location: Otley, West Yorkshire LS21– it’s the responsibility of the winning bidder to make collection / transportation arrangements directly with the vendor

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