Group A - International Touring Car Formula

[jimdigris]

An interesting piece of the history of Group A is how the cost quickly escalated. In 1984 when CAMS announced Australia would be adopting Group A for 1985, part of their reasoning was the cost would be lower and the privateers would stand a better chance. This proved to be folly. In 1984 the cost of building a good Group C commodore was between 45-60k, in 1986 the cost of building (or buying a customer car) a commodore was 80k. In 1990 when asked about the progress in building the Nissan GTR, Gibson replied "you are looking at possibly the first half a million dollar group a race car"

Here is an interesting pic, it shows just what it takes to win Bathurst in Group A. Grice went to Bathurst in 1986 with no less than FIVE spare Roadways (read Les Small) built spare engines! yes FIVE! Now you think about it, in 1986 a customer Group A engine sold for between 15-20k from the likes of the HDT, Perkins and Roadways. That's a serious investment!

[rogered]

An interesting piece of the history of Group A is how the cost quickly escalated. In 1984 when CAMS announced Australia would be adopting Group A for 1985, part of their reasoning was the cost would be lower and the privateers would stand a better chance. This proved to be folly. In 1984 the cost of building a good Group C commodore was between 45-60k, in 1986 the cost of building (or buying a customer car) a commodore was 80k. In 1990 when asked about the progress in building the Nissan GTR, Gibson replied "you are looking at possibly the first half a million dollar group a race car"

Here is an interesting pic, it shows just what it takes to win Bathurst in Group A. Grice went to Bathurst in 1986 with no less than FIVE spare Roadways (read Les Small) built spare engines! yes FIVE! Now you think about it, in 1986 a customer Group A engine sold for between 15-20k from the likes of the HDT, Perkins and Roadways. That's a serious investment!

i tend to think there was a fair amount of profit in it for the builders of these cars and engines. Despite apearing hi tech, they were pretty basic builds at the end of the day.

[Milan Fistonic]

The Petch Sierra at Pukekohe in 1990. Drivers were Brancatelli and Gravett.

[Milan Fistonic]

Robbie Ker, Bob Jones VL Commodore. Pukekohe 1990

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by jimdigris
An interesting piece of the history of Group A is how the cost quickly escalated..... In 1990 when asked about the progress in building the Nissan GTR, Gibson replied "you are looking at possibly the first half a million dollar group a race car".....

Of course, such statements helped build credibility for the amount of money he asked (and got) from the sponsors...

And it would approach truth if you counted in some of the overall development work on the model by the makers. To build a car, and then a second car, sees the build price come down each time.

I also agree that there must have been some pretty handsome 'fat' in the engine costs, they were fairly ordinary engines though meticulously machined and assembled.