Tuesday 1st August 2017

Ford P100 XR8: You Know You Want To

After an 80s fast Ford? For £14K you could have a FWD Escort... Or a V8 pick-up!

---

While we can all look on astounded at the money now required for a classic fast Ford, the deeper reality is really rather sad. Not only does it mean fewer and fewer people can actually afford Sierras, Escorts and Fiestas, but it also means less of them being used. If you spent £100K on an RS500, would you be out driving it on a Sunday morning?

Cortina at the front...

What fast Ford fans need to do, then, is think a bit differently. One possibility is just to get something more modern; a Mondeo ST220 is very rare, very good and still very cheap, for example. And a standard, orange, five-cylinder Focus ST will surely always be in demand; this one is £7K.

The other option is a proper wildcard, and that's what we have here. This is a Cortina-based P100 pick-up, a car that was made for 20 years between the 70s and 90s with Cortina and Sierra front ends. You probably used to see a few knocking around, before they all sort of disappeared. But as you might have guessed by the 'XR8' tag though, this is no regular Cortina pick-up - there's a V8 in it.

Yes, like the other South African fast Fords featured on PH, this XR8 has 302 cubic inches of Detroit muscle under the bonnet. So it's 4.9-litres rather than 5.0 but, still, look at it! That's what V8s should look like, shiny and simple and so damn cool. There's a manual gearbox as well...

This isn't some rolling shell project pick up either, with recent new dampers, powder coating underneath to prevent rust and gleaming red paintwork. For something that's now 36 years old, it looks remarkably good. Of course there's only so much you can tell from the pictures, but there's much to be encouraged by.

... not a Cortina at the back!

And it's for sale at £14K. That's quite a lot of money for a toy - kudos if you did take it on as a commercial vehicle - but not ridiculous as fast Fords go. See, value is always relative. And when an Escort RS Turbo is the same money as the XR8, things are starting to look up for the pick-up. Which one is actually faster on a road is up for debate, but which one is going to cause the bigger stir at a classic car meet? Exactly. And when some Fiestas are for sale at £30K, this looks like an absolute bargain. Well, almost.

The P100 is registered over here, will be sold with 12 months' MoT and is HPI clear. There's even finance available, adding further temptation... Yes, it's a bit silly and, yes, it doesn't carry the same prestige as a UK car, but that's the whole point. As the market becomes ever more serious, so the fun is being taken out of some great old cars. For showing two fingers to the car collecting and cocooning crew, for being different and for presumably being hilarious fun, it's hard to think of much better than a V8 Cortina pick-up. Go on!

---

FORD CORTINA XR8 PICK UP
Price: £13,950
Why you should: V8!
Why you shouldn't: Er, image?

See the original advert here

[drgoatboy]

A friend of mine had the sierra shaped P100 with the horrible diesel unit (non turbo) that you could get in the Sierra back in the day.
Surprisingly tail happy with nothing in the back. Imagine this would be a hoot, but £14k worth of fun? not so sure.....

[sidesauce]

[paulwirral]

I had a couple of those back in the day , standard ones obviously , very tail happy and rot like an over ripe pear .
I seem to remember there was a race series for the sierra model ?

[Coatesy351]

paulwirral said:

I seem to remember there was a race series for the sierra model ?

Wesbank Modified Saloons

[Lowtimer]

Yes, there was a UK Ford P100 single-make race series in the Sierra era for, I believe, one year.
They were the support races for 'big' truck races.

[paulwirral]

Lowtimer said:

Yes, there was a UK Ford P100 single-make race series in the Sierra era for, I believe, one year.
They were the support races for 'big' truck races.

I thought I remembered it !

[AC43]

Kind of amusing. But more terrifying.

I still shudder when I remember the chassis "composure" of Mk 3 and Mk 4 Cortinas.

They were....errr......."challenging".

[sidewinder500]

Had one of those a a daily workhorse with big roof rack back in Sydney a long time ago with huge wheels and slightly jacked up.
Really scary in the wet or at enthusiasticly exited roundabouts but huge fun otherwise.
Big V8 in front, driven wheels and no weight in the back, what a concept!

[rtz62]

Quite scary I would imagine, especially with a load on board and a wet British summer evening...
There's a P100 (the Sierra model) near me with a tuned Cosworth Turbo engine under the bonnet.
Now to drive that I'd definately need bicycle clips on the bottom of my trouser legs.....

[TonyRPH]

A friend of mine in SA had the 3L V6 version of this, and even that was a proper handful even in the dry.

I can't imagine it being possible to use the torque / power in this at all...

Especially as it seems to retain the leaf spring / live axle set up.

No doubt an IRS would help... a bit..!

[Toltec]

paulwirral said:

I had a couple of those back in the day , standard ones obviously , very tail happy and rot like an over ripe pear .
I seem to remember there was a race series for the sierra model ?

They were cleverly designed to become faster with age due to a built in weight saving feature, right up to the point at which the rear wheels were only connected to the front via the prop shaft alone.

[s m]

A quirky thing no doubt but if I had 14k to put into a fast Ford I'd rather sink it into a proper homologation XR8 like the one below sold a year ago

£10k XR8 Sierra

Or just buy the real deal RS Cosworth and get arguably the best variant for driving, a 2wd 4-door - still get one for 14k - probably not in as good nick as that P100 but retain value just as well.....as long as you can live without the whale tail!

[And172940]

I went to a truck racing meeting at Brands Hatch where they had the P100 race.
Didn't really work, you could go and get a pint when they entered Clearways and get back in time to watch them go around Paddock Hill Bend.
At the same meeting there was a big crash so they brought out the Pirelli wheelie truck to amuse the crowd whilst they cleared the track, and it crashed.
It took ages to recover that, lol.

[paulwirral]

And172940 said:

I went to a truck racing meeting at Brands Hatch where they had the P100 race.
Didn't really work, you could go and get a pint when they entered Clearways and get back in time to watch them go around Paddock Hill Bend.
At the same meeting there was a big crash so they brought out the Pirelli wheelie truck to amuse the crowd whilst they cleared the track, and it crashed.
It took ages to recover that, lol.

They had a crappy transit spec pinto in , and geared to pull loads , I'm guessing it was just a bit publicity for the new sierra model when it came out .
I did put my balanced 2.1 bored lightened flywheeled free flow manifolded and bigger carbed stock car engine in my cortina type p100 to run it in , as you may guess , it highlighted the boundarys of the cortina front , transit rear suspension ! It was st to be fair but fun at the time as I was young and daft .

[S0 What]

drgoatboy said:

A friend of mine had the sierra shaped P100 with the horrible diesel unit (non turbo) that you could get in the Sierra back in the day.
Surprisingly tail happy with nothing in the back. Imagine this would be a hoot, but £14k worth of fun? not so sure.....

That would be the peugeot engine, not the best (understatement), imagine a smaller 2.1 non turbo in a Mk2 granada and thats even worse
Shame Ford never made these but TBH having driven a 3.0 version (SA build) i bet it's fun getting the power to the ground but hey that's half the fun of it, buying new rear tyres every month if you want a hot cortina the XR6 is much better than the UK versions and the interceptor is better again (more power) or maybe the uber rare xocet

[Tartan Pixie]

Awesomesauce.

Dodge ram style Americana always looks a bit out of place in the UK but I can't decide whether this would be a more fitting version for the UK or a bland tribute.

Like it all the same.

[And172940]

I had a petrol Sierra shape one in the late 80s, it was painfully slow but actually quite good fun in corners if you were brave, or stupid like I was in my late teens. You could slide it about a bit if you were brave with a bit of trail braking.
The fuel consumption was beyond terrible.

[PistonBroker]

There's a bog-stock Sierra front-end P100 two roads along from me. Presumably with the diesel in it. Apart from that one, I haven't seen any in ages.

I have thought I should leave a note. I'd take the minty E36 328i Touring he's got as well if he insists.

[AdeTuono]

I used to own the Australian version of the P100 Sierra, badged as a Falcon XR8. Engine was, as far as I remember, the 302 V8, prepped by Tickford. Never saw another over here. Wish I'd kept it.



Also had a Holden HSV V8 pick-up with the LS1. Remember surprising an M5 who couldn't shake it off on night.Again, not too many over here. Should have kept that too...


Both very tail-happy, but a total hoot to drive. I do love my V8 pick-ups!