RE: Shed of the Week: Proton Persona GTI

[Lukeypoodle]

I had a 1.3 proton compact as a daily for 3 years.

I'd rate it as one of the finest cars I have ever owned. Never cost me a penny.

[ChevronB19]

I was racing in an historic series at Mallory c. 2004, which happened to be combined with a 750MC meeting.

There was a young guy there in a Satria who absolutely blitzed the field, including focus rs, Clio 197 etc. Obviously the other cars were better, and he was by far the better driver, but it was great to see someone in a theoretically inferior car thrashing others. And yes, he was on a serious small budget, this wasn’t the case of buying success through mods by any way!

[AshD]

If i squint the wheels on it look a little bit like the ones I had on my V8 GT, and sadly i spotted right from the first picture that the car was parked in Wrest Park in Silsoe for its photoshoot. Minutes away from me, which sadly still isnt enough to make it interesting.

[velocemitch]

Its been mentioned before, but these have sort of become the Mk2 Escort of the Road Rally world, particularly in the North of England.
Lots of Mitsubishi Evo parts bolt straight on, other bespoke parts are also available, they are tough, with the Right suspension they can go down a very rough Lane faster than just about anything else and are still relatively cheap, but not dirt cheap for the reasons mentioned.
If you look at the entry list and more importan the results you will see the top ten of most Northern Road Rallies, particularly the rough and fast ones are dominated by Protons. Rally drivers are not sentimental, they drive what has been proved to be the best for the job.
I bet that car ends up on the Road Rally scene before long.

[greenarrow]

haven't seen one of these for years......!! I remember them getting good reviews when new. Autocar preferred it to the 206 GTI of the day. Werent very fast though. Not sure why, but I recall neither EVO or Autocar got 0-60 below about 8.7 secs..the claimed 7.8 is just fiction...and the ton was about 28 secs which even back in 1999 wasn't very quick. The 106 GTI was time around 22 secs for the dash to 100.

[s m]

greenarrow said:

haven't seen one of these for years......!! I remember them getting good reviews when new. Autocar preferred it to the 206 GTI of the day. Werent very fast though. Not sure why, but I recall neither EVO or Autocar got 0-60 below about 8.7 secs..the claimed 7.8 is just fiction...and the ton was about 28 secs which even back in 1999 wasn't very quick. The 106 GTI was time around 22 secs for the dash to 100.

I wondered where he had got the 7-second time to 100 from too for the article?
Maybe that one had the Mitsi rally bits already on?!?

EVO managed 60 in 9.4, and 100 in 36 seconds ( maybe it was wet that day although it didn't seem to affect the other cars on test like the Saxo VTS, 106GTi )
Autocar clocked 60 in 8.9 and 29 seconds to the ton.
Easy prey for an old Manta from the 80s in a drag race

As per the Lotus mods article above, they didn't have the budget to do anything to the engine ....just the handling


Shame Proton couldn't have got the engine that Mitsubishi used in the Cyborg at around that time - 170ish bhp - that managed about 24 seconds to 100 when tested against the 306 Rallye.

About the same performance as a Puma with that engine in

Edited by s m on Sunday 19th November 13:34

[Ilovejapcrap]

I seem to recall a review with Vicky butler Henderson driving one.