[gatagato]

The Lancia Delta S4 was a Group B rally car that competed in the World Rally Championship in 1985 and 1986, until Group B cars were banned from competition by the FIA.

Lancia Delta S4

Group B was a set of regulations introduced in 1982 for competition vehicles in sportscar racing and rallying regulated by the FIA. The Group B regulations fostered some of the quickest, most powerful and sophisticated rally cars ever built. However, a series of major accidents, some fatal, were blamed on their outright speed. After the death of Henri Toivonen and his co-driver Sergio Cresto in the 1986 Tour de Corse, the FIA disestablished the class, which was replaced as the top-line formula by Group A. The short-lived Group B era has acquired legendary status among rally fans.

The car replaced and was an evolution of the Lancia 037.

Lancia 037

Date of Homologation 1 November 1985, four-cylinder 1.8 engine combined supercharging and turbocharging to reduce turbo lag at low engine speeds: officially, the car produced 480 horsepower (350 kW), but the one that participated in the 1986 World Rally Championship developed over 560 horsepower (417 kW). In 1985, Lancia engineers tested a S4 engine under extreme conditions, reaching 5 bars boost, developing around 1000 horsepower. Independent figures show the S4 could accelerate from 0 to 100 km/h (62 mph) on gravel in under 2.3 seconds. An engine capacity multiple of 1.4 was applied to forced induction engines by the FIA and the choice of 1,759 cc put the S4 in the under 2,500 cc class, which allowed for a minimum weight of 890 kg (1,962 lb). The combined super/turbocharger system (often referred to as twincharging) was a development of the 037 engine that produced 350 hp (261 kW) with a supercharger only.

Twincharging = turbocharging + supercharging. This technology is very rarely used because most racing restricts to one means of forced induction, and rarely on road cars as its benefits lie mostly in the realm of boost curve fine tuning (quicker boost response) and allowing for said with the use of a freer flowing turbine/housing spec on the turbo to make it more efficient (or less inefficient, compared to the tighter housing needed to minimise lag) at higher rpm. Such twincharging does still see use in some hillclimb racing, where throttle and boost response are paramount over peak power concerns. The S4 itself, when everything worked perfectly, managed to hit 2.2 bars (32 psi) boost.
Basically, the car was able to express its power at its best at both fast and slow speeds.
In competition the car won its first event, the 1985 RAC Rally in the hands of Henri Toivonen and carried Markku Alén to second in the drivers' championship the following year. For two weeks after the end of the 1986 season Alen was champion until the FIA annulled the results of the Sanremo Rally due to irregular technical scrutineering. Alén had won that event and the loss of points handed the title to Peugeot's Juha Kankkunen. All told, in 1986 there were 3 wins for the Delta S4 (Sanremo not included). The Monte Carlo Rally by Toivonen, Rally Argentina by Massimo Biasion and the Olympus Rally by Markku Alén. The car also won the 1986 European Rally Championship with Italian driver Fabrizio Tabaton, whose car was run by Italian team HF GRIFONE in ESSO livery. The factory supported Jolly Club team also ran cars in TOTIP livery, one of which was for Dario Cerrato.

Accidents
Joaquim Santos

Unfortunate Joaquim Santos, local driver on a Ford RS200, was seeded 12th driver to start on first stage. Lead drivers were already through and road was clearer but still there were occasional spectators standing in middle of the road. Coming from fast right hand bend and into a tighter right hander over a small crest on downhill section, Santos lost control of the car and spun right into thick crowd. Two children and a woman were killed on the spot and dozens more injured, with one of the injured children later dying in the hospital.

This accident is often mentioned as one of the causes of Group-B ban; however, it was caused by the driver having to try to avoid spectators that were in the road.
You can see it here @ 2:08, but better if you watch the whole thing, so you'll see the idiotic behavior of many spectators during the rally.
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This lead 22 drivers to officially state that they did not wish to continue with the Portuguese Rally for the following reasons:

1- As mark of respect for the families of the dead people and for those injured.

2 - There is a very special situation here in Portugal: we feel it is impossible for us to guarantee the safety of the spectators.

3 - The accident on Stage 1 was caused by the driver having to try to avoid spectators that were in the road. It was not caused due to the type of car or the speed of it. We hope that our sport will ultimately benefit from this decision.


The accident occurred in Corsica one yar before to Attilio Bettega actually pressured the safety aspects of Group B cars.


Toivonen-Cresto fatal crash

Henri Toivonen (25 August 1956 – 2 May 1986)

Toivonen - Cresto in action during Rally de Corse in 1986.

Finnish driver, super-fast, characterized by an unmistakeable style, great risk-taker, Toivonen died along with his co-driver Sergio Cresto in an accident on 2 May 1986 while leading the Tour de Corse rally in Corsica where he inexplicably missed a tight left-hand hairpin bend and plunged into a ravine, incinerating the car and the two drivers. The accident was the last nail in the coffin for Group B, banned within hours of the accident by Jean-Marie Balestre, then President of the FISA.

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Toivonen's Lancia Delta S4 after the fatal crash: the only remains of the car were the spaceframe, and the exact cause of the crash had never been estabilished.

Toivonen expressed several times his doubts about the car: once he said that "he had not the courage to fully push the throttle until he realized that he had to drive as if the car was travelling on railroads" (in/out). Another time he said that the car was "faster than the driver's thoughts".
After the first leg of Rally du Corse, he commented:

"This rally is insane, even though everything is going well at the moment. If there is trouble, I'm as good as dead."
He was unable to control his powerful car, though he was one of the best, if not the best: when he tested his Delta S4 at the Estoril circuit he did set a fastest lap time that would have qualified him in sixth position at the 1986 Portuguese Formula 1 Grand Prix: on a rally car.

Until his end he kept trying to figure out the limits of the car, and it's obvious that someone just did set the bar too hight, which is very easy to do when the ass sitting in the car is not yours.
His death most likely saved the lives of many other rally drivers, but it has been a loss hard to accept.

Too fast to race (HQ) (Group B Rally Cars)
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lancia_Delta_S4
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Group_B
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Toivonen
http://www.juwra.com/portugal_1986_disaster.html
http://www.m5board.com/vbulletin/gtb...percars-4.html
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attilio_Bettega

[zen0]

Group B rally cars are amazing. Those machines and their drivers were true legends of motorsports.

[Kadavar]

Rally is just so boring now, miss those golden days!