Peugeot 205 Turbo 16 Evo 2

Information

This chassis debuted as part of an all-new two-car entry for Evolution 2’s third competitive outing and round ten of the 1985 World Rally Championship: Rallye Sanremo.

This car was allocated to Bruno Saby and Jean-Francois Fauchille while chassis C204 went to championship leaders Timo Salonen and Seppo Harjanne. The cars arrived with new separate suspension set-ups that could be switched between stages. They weighed 960kg and produced between 460bhp and 480bhp depending on boost. This rally also marked the arrival of power steering for the T16.

Having briefly led, a series of niggling engine problems for the car saw Saby drop down the order before he eventually succumbed to a cylinder head problem on the penultimate day. Team-mate Salonen also experienced a troubled run but managed to bag second for Peugeot albeit six-and-a-half minutes behind Walter Rohrl’s new Audi Quattro Sport E2.

Peugeot skipped round eleven of the WRC (the Ivory Coast Rally) but returned for the ‘85 season finale: the RAC Rally held from November 24th to 28th over 880km of gravel and tarmac special stages. Following the debut of Audi’s E2 Quattro a few weeks prior, the RAC marked the arrival of an even more extreme Group B challenger: Lancia’s turbocharged and supercharged Delta S4.

Kalle Grundel and Peter Diekmann were allocated this car while Salonen and Harjanne were out in their Sanremo entry (chassis C204). Unfortunately, neither of the works Peugeots made it to the finish. Grundel crashed out on stage 20 and Salonen retired on stage 21 with no oil pressure.

Meanwhile, the new Lancias finished first and second with Henri Toivonen / Neil Wilson leading home Markku Alen / Ilkka Kivimaki in an ominous statement of intent for 1986.