1987 Ford Sierra RS 500 Cosworth from UK and Ireland - Comments

The standard one won't keep up with a cossie, especialy the escort. And the other comment is right, your VTEC is not designed for boost, its designed for high compression, high revin, low torque. It would have a very short life expectancy with a turbo on it, A bit like plugging a 12v light bulb into a 24v supply.

Yes, the Honda will most definitely keep up with and pass the Escort Cosworth!!

Forget 0-60 as any car with 4wd has advantage here. From 0-100 the Integra is about a second or more faster than the Escort, meaning after the 0-60 dash is done, which if I remember correctly the Escort can do in about 5.5 seconds (4wd) and the integra 6.2.. that's when the Integra cruises past all the way up to about 150mph, leaving the Escort standing.. and that's a 1.8 litre NA engine beating a 2 litre turbo.

The honda VTEC 18 16v performs well against the cossie because its in a car that is stripped out and weighs a lot less, put the honda engine in an escort cossie and race another one it will be left behind. But this is besides the point, the integra will not beat the escort cossie unless its tuned, even in that lightweight body.

Sorry for bad english :)

cossie engine was made in 1986 - s2000 and other hondas magic VTEC engines from 1996 (here I could be wrong)

think about computers and other stuff witch improved engine manufakturing...

I have been driven rally escort cossie 400 bhp from 1999 till 2002 (crash) and it has only one major problem - heavy weight. but when many metal plates where changed to carbon and all unneeded stuff was drooped out it was a perfeckt car.

I have been driving civic gen 3 with b-10 vtec turbo engine and after that s2000 with 2,2. they had not perfeckt handling abilities but perfeckt aerodynamics and weight figures. but still they were not a competitors for escort. maybe hondas are winners on the track because the cars are new comparing to cossie, but ford is better car for pure simple muscles

once again sorry 4 bad english. I be hoping that you get the point :)

The Cosworth engine needs no excuses made for it. It's a race engine detuned for the road. It's won BTCC titles and World Rally titles. It's even won at Bathurst.

It's a big old lump of cast iron which makes it heavy, but nigh on indestructable, and find me another engine fitted to road cars, apart from the Nissan RB26, which can reliably make 200 bhp per litre on a standard bottom end, or 400 bhp per litre if you have the money to spend.

Big up your VTECs all you want, and they are fine pieces of engineering, but the Cossie YB is a legend, and has proven itself in all forms of motorsport for nearly 20 years. If offered the keys to an RS500 or a Type R, frankly it would be the easiest decision I would ever make.

I have decided that I am going to advise everyone I know to sell whatever they have, be it a Cosworth, Porsche, Noble, Ferrari etc etc, and buy an Integra Type R. My Carrera 2, and my RS500? Gone tomorrow. Clearly they are but a pale shadow of a front wheel drive Japanese buzz box available for 5 grand in a free-ad near you. Judging by the way its owners hijack every performance car review on this site with willy waving and "mine's better than yours" rants, it must be true.

Can you lot listen to yourselves? Not everyone's idea of a performance car is a stripped out, bum basic front driver that needs 6000 RPM before it can out accelerate the family diesel. Yes, the Type R Hondas are good budget performance cars, but not the be all and end all. The Cosworth is a legendary performance car, and the RS500 the basis of one of the most successful competition cars the world has ever seen. The Integra frankly is disposable in comparison.

I bet your owners club meetings are a gas. What do you do when surrounded by identical cars? Start on each other and claim your model year has 0.5 lb ft more torque (at a billion more RPM) than your mate's, or just bathe in a glow of superiority, and congratulate each other on being masters of the universe, and Kings of the road?

I came on here to read a review from a fellow RS500 owner, and couldn't believe what the comments degraded into. Some of you really need to get out more.

The reason why the power kicks in at 6000rpm is because it's like a race car, and the feeling the Honda gives you is just like a race car.

The Integra is one of the best front wheel drive cars ever. If you compare it to any other N/A 1.8s, it would have similar torque, probably even more. The VTEC engines are amazing.

How much exactly does a cosworth cost, and how much does the integra cost, its just got a ford badge, cosworth developed the engine etc.

Well I've struggled to read all of this but can't resist a comment too. I love the Honda engines and the way the VTEC kicks in. They are generally great on the road too. Don't know of anyone who has been disapointed with them.

Then I drove an rs500 and had to get one. Its simply a case of (way too much maybe) brute power. Mines got a few basic mods and is (only??) 408 bhp / 407 lb torque at the wheels - sorry not sure of the actual flywheel output.

Believe it or not this is pretty much standard - one fuel rail (it comes with two fitted and eight injectors) was disconnected for the showroom etc. The sales brochure clearly points out that its built for 450bhp if you want to wire it all up... its rough and ready power 'out of the box'really.

The old shells are more a worry than the engine so a lot of work is needed to make them handle well mind you. I don't care what is best, only what is more fun to drive, hence the 500 is now the car for me.

I own an RS500, and I can bet you any money that my mildly tune example (at 300bhp) could slate a Type R or an Evo 10.

My RS500 has been lightened with a fiber glass bonnet, front and rear back bumper and spoiler.

I've also put in a dump valve, more air intake, stronger head gasket, manual tuned engine and a stage 1 chip. Not much to put on 60bhp.

Pretty much any turbo engine can gain good power with very simple mods, add a chip and hell even a diesel can gain 50-80bhp.

I stumbled across this looking for parts and read some of the posts made. And thought I would just post a video link. This is a buddy of mine that has a stock S2000. The only things added were the turbo and bigger injectors

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQst99sHUsc

Talk about weight and torque and rally stages and cast iron blocks and 4wd all you want, fact remains in STANDARD form the Honda is quicker. Book figures prove this.

This whole argument is gone completely off the track. Honda a good engine? Well yes. Dismissing the Cosworth Engineering, this is something you will never be able to do. It's been proven time and time again, and written in the history books, long before Honda thought of it. It's really that simple, so the the last comment on here this (5th June 09), well that's simply not the case, research your facts.

I did.

JDM Honda Integra Type R

0-60 6.2 sec

0-100 16.5 sec

Standing quarter mile 14.2 seconds

Top speed 146mph.

Escort Cosworth

0-60 6.2 seconds

0-100 17.4 seconds

Standing quarter mile 14.9 seconds

Top speed 137mph.

Now how is the Cosworth faster?