Lancia Stratos - The best Rally car with rear drive

Description

The first purpose-built rally car in the world was developed purely to win the world championship. Created in a limited production run of specialist cars, it also happens to be the best-looking rally car of all time. The Stratos was a very successful rally car during the 1970s and early 1980s. It started a new era in rallying as it was the first car designed from scratch for this kind of competition. The three leading men behind the entire rallying project were Lancia team manager Cesare Fiorio, British racer/engineer Mike Parkes and factory rally driver Sandro Munari. n 1971 Lancia presented the Lancia Stratos HF prototype. The prototype (Chassis 1240) was fluorescent red in colour and featured a distinctive crescent-shaped-wrap-around windshield providing maximum forward visibility with almost no rear visibility (which was unnecessary for rallying anyway). The prototype had three different engines in its early development life: the Lancia Fulvia engine, the Lancia Beta engine and finally the mid-mounted 190 bhp (140 kW) 2418 cc Dino Ferrari V6. Lancia did extensive testing with the Stratos and raced the car in several racing events where Group 5 prototypes were allowed during the 1972 and 1973 seasons. Production of the 400 cars required for homologation in Group 4 were launched in 1973 and the Stratos was homologated for the 1974 World Rally Championship. [3] The Dino V6 was phased out in 1974, but 500 engines among the last built were delivered to Lancia. For racing <b>...</b>

Keywords

Lancia, Sratos

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