Honda Civic Type R Rally Debut
May 12, 2008 by George Skentzos
Honda Australia has made a strong debut in the Rally of Canberra, finishing in 5th place overall on Day 1 with a specially prepared Civic Type-R.
Unfortunately it was the close-ratio six-speed gearbox in the Civic which let the team down, forcing its retirement on Day 2 of the rally.
The Civic Type R they had been racing was purpose-built by JAS Motorsport and is powered by a Mugen DOHC 2.0-litre engine pumping out a phenomenal 186kW from its naturally-aspirated four-cylinder engine.
Managing Director of JAS Motorsport, Mr. Alessandro Mariani said, “We are frustrated with the failure of the transmission which prevented the Civic from achieving an impressive result in its Australian debut. However, we enjoyed the experience and are very committed to the next Australian event.”
Not deterred by this result, Honda is set to return in the Melbourne rally this October – and rightly so, the Type R looks brilliant on the dirt!
Print it: 
***** PRIMO ITALIA *****
Wooosh – follow the tail pipe if the gearbox works.
Go Honda. Good to see a new car in the ARC.
Once they sort out the gear box issues this car will do very well. I wonder if having a naturally-aspirated engin will give them an advantage in the reliability stakes?
186kw without a turbo is awesome.
Jimbo – i agree.
Australian Rally Championships (ARC) that is currently dominated by the TRD S2000 Corolla’s driven by Neal Bates and Simon Evans is slowly but gradually growing which is good news.
VW has just entered with a specifically prepared Polo sourced from South Africa that infact won the South African Rally Championships last year and now Honda with the Type ‘R’.
That now makes Toyota, Mitsubishi, Subaru, Ford, VW and Honda competing in the ARC.
Co-incidently without destracting credit from the Type ‘R’ – the TRD Corolla’s also utilise a normally aspirated 2.0 engine that is good for exactly 200kw’s.
A 200kw Corrola is even more awesome in a beige kind of way, and a VW now. I need to look more into the ARC.
Jimbo – visit the ARC website and read up all about the event. The more you learn about the Australian Rally Championships the more i am sure you will find it interesting and it is very competitive with a growing field from more manufactuers.
VW and Honda joining the battle against Toyota, Subaru, Mitsubishi and Ford is great for the sport and i hope the competition grows even further over the years.
If i remember correctly, isn’t the TRD Corolla that they use AWD?
I had a look at the web site. The ARC is looking like it is starting to heat up at the moment. I have to remember to watch the Canberra rally when its on TV on the 25th.I really hope Peugeot decides to get in on the action too with their new rally 207 S2000.
Alborz – correct !!
Neal Bates who is affiliated with TRD Australia obtains a regular Corolla and guts it until all that is left is the body, dashboard and pedal box.
The TRD racer then utilises the engine and AWD system from the Celica GT4 along with the cross members, control arms and tail shaft.
Neal’s team then replaces the viscous centre diff with it’s own active centre diff while a tougher racing dog-box transmission replaces the standard Celica manual which allows for clutchless shifts.
Fully adjustable coil-over suspension is fitted along with light weight magnesium wheels while carbon fibre is used for items such as footwells braces, toolboxes and fuel tank cover.
Each car takes the rally team about 800 hours to complete
Power : 200kw @ 5000rpm
Torque : 530nm @ 3200rpm
Weight : 1385kg
Price : $180 000
* 2.0 normally aspirated engine
referance … WHEELS December 2007 pages 88 – 96
ps. the TRD Corolla is best described as a mutant (page 91)
Alborz – a good subject for you to publish would be about ARC in general especially with more manufactuers coming onbaord with a gradual increase of fanfare participation aswell.
ARC is our own local rally championships which i hope grows in numbers of competitors, fanfare and recognition over the next few years.
I believe it will be good for competitive motorsport in Australia.
“Power : 200kw @ 5000rpm
Torque : 530nm @ 3200rpm
Weight : 1385kg
Price : $180 000
* 2.0 normally aspirated engine…”
Unless the engine was sourced from a small plane,Toyota could in no way,engineer a NA engine with the above torque and power figures at the stated rpms.
\”Power : 200kw @ 5000rpm
Torque : 530nm @ 3200rpm
Weight : 1385kg
Price : $180 000
* 2.0 normally aspirated engine…\”
Unless the engine was sourced from a small plane,Toyota could in no way,engineer a NA engine with the above torque and power figures at the stated rpms.
They should make a road-going version of that Corolla.
They do Al. It’s called the Blade. Not sold in Oz though, wish it was!
Yes more on the ARC is a great idea, will look into it.
I think an AWD turbo Corolla would do wonders for the brand. The GT4 drivetrain is really starting to age@
Alborz – agree.
An AWD Corolla would do wonders for the brand. Personally, i believe Toyota should not have bothered with the Blade and Master G and focused on developing a high powered AWD performance Corolla for world consumption.
Who knows why Toyota do the things they do sometimes.
However – a good article or two on ARC will be appreciated and will help to promote the event especially considering more manufactuers are entering the competition.
Cheers
530 Nm in a 200 kws corrola, 2 litre Normally aspirated engine hahahaa, whoever wrote that needs to check them selves, my uncle is a psychietrist i ll give you his number, even if it was turbocharged it woudnt be able to have that torque unless u borrowed a jet engine , hmmm woudnt really fit under the bonnet,