What's a good rally car for under $5000?

Someone's retarded. and it's not the Dodge Neon fans.
The Neon is a fantastic sport compact.
Pic related was a factory effort in Rally America and won the entire series, every single rally, in 2004.

A Suzuki something. Light weight with decent powered somewhat torquey engines. They don't have a rice tax like Honda's and Toyota's. I guess they're popular rally cars in poointhelooland.

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>RWD
good luck with that

what makes them so good? i didn't even know they where considered sports cars until now i just thought they where cheap shitboxes

rwd is better desu

>tfw trucks with handbrakes
i just want a cool rally truck

Twin Cam Excel with a roll cage, good quality shocks+springs and headers with a dump just after the cat.

Yo i used to do deliveries ina neon they are the best front wheel whips around. I now own a jzx, ask me how to handrbake

Unless you're a burger, in which case neon like the other guy said.

Small cheap shit econoboxes with good aftermarket support make the best rally cars and always have.
>Oh no i rolled it and now it's fucked
>Off to get another one for $200 and throw the good bits off the wrecked one on it

Not for rallying. Watch videos of Porsche's and BMW's trying to rally, it's all wheelspin and noise. Meanwhile the FWD shitbox cars are railing the shit out of most corners.

It started because the Neon chassis, at its core, is the ultimate evolution of the Chrysler K-car platform. So it has well over a decade of development, almost 2, to perfect it.
As a result, the Neon was fantastic on track. the multi-link independent rear sustension made damned sure the thing could corner like a housefly. The 16 valve 2.0L engines, whether SOHC or DOHC were powerful and respond well to modifications.
The problem with the Neon was the automatic transmission, when were 90% of them. The automatics were 3 speed units that commonly broke, which gave them their shit car reputation. Ask anyone who have a manual transmission equipped version though and they will sing its praises.
Chrysler campaigned the Neon in SCCA Showroom Stock racing, where the only allowed modifications were a stripped interior, a roll cage, racing seat, and a fire suppression system... You know. safety shit.
The Neon DOMINATED the class. Honda, Nissan, and Toyota actually tried to have the Neon banned from competition it was so good. That success on the track translated into success in rally.

To this day, similar SCCA classes are dominated by Neons and Chevy Cavaliers.

MK1 focus.

You're welcome.

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This is true.

I rally crossed my Subaru and zero parts broke. The only thing I noticed is that the power steering pump was a bit unhappy for a while.

AWD Celica
AWD Gen 1 or 2 Liberty
Lancer
Galant

One Honda Civic at the rally cross I went to placed top 5, another Honda Civic placed near the bottom. The one near the bottom burned tons of oil and lost it's muffler.

The one near the top had a roll cage, but looked like it was at stock ride height, and didn't sound like the engine was modified. The guy just drove it really hard.

Nothing broke on either Honda though.

You don't want AWD if you're starting out. You'll constantly be slower because you train yourself to let the AWD save your stupid ass. The way to do it is to start out with a FWD car and master the understeer, and the scandinavian flick.
Then go to RWD briefly to master over steer.
Once you've mastered both on dirt and gravel, THEN you get a AWD car and dominate. At that point you don't rely on the AWD to save your ass, which leads to faster times. Ever been to an SCCA rallycross event? It's not uncommon for the FWD Dodge Neons, and Ford Focii to post better times than AWD turbocharged Subarus

The best rally car for $5000 is one that's already setup and log booked by your national Motorsport body.
Join a relevant car club first, and see what's out there.

The way I understand it is the MK1 focus is starting to gain ground in the rally world again because the platform is becoming so cheap. It's not uncommon to see them over in Europe now with Cosworth RWD conversions competing.

>It's not uncommon to see them over in Europe now with Cosworth RWD conversions competing
Calling bullshit on that one. What possible class would they be running under?

Your mom lol

Couldn't tell you, I'm not from that side of the world. I just know that the MK1 Focus has become very popular with the Cosworth YB conversion both for drift and Rally.

>very popular
Exactly where are you buying this info?

Not the other user, but there seems to be a good number of them out for sale.

gumtree.com/p/ford/-reduced-too-sell-ford-focus-st170-coverted-to-rwd-rally-rallycross-/1179719274

That would be a fun little car.

Shit loads of forums, different teams popping up and kits for different engines besides the YB.

mdvse.com/pagefull.php?page=14&precat=Projects^1

A lot of them are one time posted for sale on different rally sites.

You probably don't know this, but most people who are really into racing don't post on image boards, let alone forums.

Are you sure you don't mean the cosworth Duratec engines? Focii from 2003-2011 (2005 it became standard) in America came with the duratec stock, It's popular to go through the cosworth parts catalog and build a Cosworth I4 from the duratec while remaining FWD.
cosworth.com/duratec
cosworth.com/media/354336/duratec_performance_parts_list_v3_9.pdf

No, I mean they do a full conversion to RWD with the Cosworth YB.

As seen here, It's a very popular conversion over there.

BTW, the converted Duratec engines are known to Cosworth fans as the YD engines.

Yeah, you just can't race them in any rally category.

Isn't most of the money go to the suspensions? Rally cars go up and down crazy

ugly?
it's rally racing you fucking fag

Usually they have to run standard suspension geometry, so you're basically limited to struts and spring rates.

Wrong.

Evan SCCA allows something like this, It would run under the Section E.Modified Category. And there are plenty of events that don't even require such regulations.

Seems to me you you don't know what you are talking about at all.

Seems to me like you're talking US specific categories.
Elsewhere in the world you're quite limited in regards to what is and isn't allowed, ie; Group N, Clubman and Classic categories.

There are thousands of sanctioned rally events in Europe a year. All with different rules and regulations. I'm not even going to bother looking them up.

Especially since the US series like SCCA have some of the strictest and most retarded regulations out there.

>Section E. Modified
Wait, are you talking about fucking rallycross?

SCCA rally cross is the same classes used in SCCA rally as well.

It's like you don't even bother to read the regulations..

As well, These YB conversions are legal in UK MSA.

msauk.org/assets/144-155commonregulationsforcompetitorsvehiclesj-2.pdf

And more for their Autocross / Rally Cross

msauk.org/assets/217-232specificregulationsforautocrossandrallycrossn.pdf

And Rally

msauk.org/assets/293-338specificregulationsforrallyingr.pdf

It's amazing how you bench racers think the only cars that are allowed to compete are factory non modified cars.

Stop watching WRC.

Any running shitbox

Most of your money is going to go towards a rollcage, skidplates, and long travel suspension

My dad drives a new S Class and he still misses his '95 Neon

So what your saying is manual neons should be memed on Veeky Forums more?

Exactly

you sound like a fag but maybe you've got a point

I used to rally an 83/84 VW Rabbit with a 92 Passat engine dropped in.

It was fucking retarded fast. Loved that car, I think I paid maybe 3k for it? You can probably find something similar

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