fr3nzy

Absolutely, we all have our personal preferences, I appreciate the fact that some people obviously don't like the Mk5 and Mk6 RS but as the founder of www.RS2000-16V.com club, I come up against this kind of ignorance every day. These models never got the glamour of other RS marques and the only people who really developed the engine (Mountune) won't share their secrets so the myth that their untunable was born and accepted by everyone, the actual fact 280bhp NA was easily dooable and that's what the Tarmac rally cars used.

In actual fact if you allow yourself to get to know these motors, you might find their pretty nice, just don't expect Cosworth level of performance and you might be pleasantly surprised. The problem is they have an image created by a select few who don't get the concept and some who think they don't even deserve the RS badge and will openly diss the brand. Because it's not as quick as their Cosworth then the assumption is it's a piece of crap, it was never meant to compete against the cosworth but unfortunately the cosworths existence pretty much caused the RS2000-16v to fail in the markets, added to this a group 17 insurance code when in the 90's, insurance had gone sky high (mate of mine was paying 8k for his stock Escos) and sales were poor.

It's often referred to as the GTI copy, when in fact the GTI came about after the Rs2000 was cancelled, its the GTI that was made to look like the RS2000 and not the other way round. Either way, Im sure if ford had stuck the maxi arch kit to the cars, sales might have been better.

My motor has surprised quite a few people and resulted in them changing their mind, I started the club all those years ago to try and change the mind set some people have and raise the image of the brand.

It's often a struggle and usually a losing battle but I keep trying.