Even if you were a mere fetus in the mid-80s, you must know by know of the legendary Group B rally cars — machines like the Audi Quattro, Ford RS200 and Peugeot 205 Turbo — that kicked off the AWD era. But Toyota had a dog in the race too, and despite it being RWD, the mighty TA64 Toyota Celica TCT dominated the Ivory Coast and Safari rallies, winning the latter three years in a row. But the ace of the African deserts was actually introduced in Group 4 a year before Group B rules went into effect. Now there’s one of those for sale in Italy.
The Gr.4 Celica may have lacked the TA64’s 290-horsepower 4T-GTE but it was powered by the holy grail of old school Toyota motors, the 18R-G-based 16-valve 152E, still good for 250 horses on decade-old technology. At €250,000 ($323,000) it ain’t cheap, but your kidney’s buying a piece of Toyota racing history.
Hat tip to Marv666.
Oh I want so bad!
Me too! 😀
Sexy!
You might want to kick the tires first. Remember these re-builds and what it took?
http://www.mat.fi/n_index.php
great article, I agree, Toyota has plenty of racing history under its belt. I admire there ingenuity and of the result is this celica.
152E engine is already an history, celica is a big plus.
152E this historic engine can be found for sale in our country, Philippines.
http://www.astrocoffee.com
that is actually an RA63 Group 4
it was built concurrent with the Group B car
and actually won before the turbo cars
I want that bumper for my rallyX Subaru XT i’m working on.