We’ve previously seen images of Proton’s World Rally Championship contender, the Putra WRC that never made to the competition stages, though now we can see the rally car up close and in detail.
A brief recap – rumour was that British racing outfit Prodrive was commissioned by Proton to build the Putra WRC to contest the 1998 season of the World Rally Championship, and though the national automaker had competition experience and success in the national championship with the Petronas EON Rally Team (PERT), top-flight rallying was another game, and thus Prodrive entered the picture.
Given the Putra’s Mitsubishi bones, the Prodrive-built 4G93T would be a natural fit, and to that a six-speed sequential gearbox and four-wheel driveline was mated. Perhaps it was no surprise that the Putra WRC would bear more than a passing resemblance to the Subaru Impreza WRC98 racer, as both were Prodrive builds from a coupe base.
Reasons for the Putra WRC project’s untimely demise remains conjecture, though now we have images of the car up close, and it appears to be receiving restorative attention. Check out the images here courtesy of Jay’s Speed-graphy.
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finally cleaned up, redeem a bit and to be recognize?
great to see it’s not under the sun to be rotten.
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Yes Roti, Perodua must learn a lot from big companies to become a Game Changing company like what you said.
Unfortunately, Perodua is under Daihatsu and Toyota so until today not learning anything and only doing rebadge since day 1.
If Proton cars had quality, the car company would not have gone under in the first place.
When you are old and suffering from bladder leaking and broken bones, do you blame your parents for giving birth to you or do you blame yourself for not taking good care of your own body while you still can?
Nowadays you hardly see any Proton on the roads. Even old Protons have disappeared. They cannot last long like how Mercedes can tahan lama. I wish Proton made quality cars that could last long lifespan.
Even Putra, quite a few were sold 20 years ago, but today, none on the road.
You must be living in North Korea or Soviet Union territory where everything is communist. I bet u owned few Lada where after more than 20 years, its still there.
You are wrong. You check and see how many Proton cars are on the road? Nowadays, I saw many old Proton cars and new Proton cars on the road nowadays especially X70, New Persona FL, New Iriz FL. So don’t ever give me such fake news again and say got there are few Protons on the road
Anyway, of course, Proton would actually can last for longer term
What r u talking about?
What r u talking about?
Pipu still talk about old P1 cars with fond memories. No one talks about old P2 cars the same way. P1 not just game changer but history maker. Kudos!
Gerenti kene cilok kalo simpan parking luar. kih3
Bossku, yg dua pintu ni kalo parking dalam pn diorg sanggup angkat gate utk cilok.
from good sources, the car was never kept outside and rotten. the pictures taken of the car outside was when the workshop was being refurbished by an outsider.
My God that’s beautiful
It looks like to be in GTi Silver too. Nostalgic car in nostalgic colour.
I dont even bother to read the article on the Civic type-R concept.
Wonder why they havent drive this thing on their road tour?
I will gladly pay to have a ride in this than the Lotus Elise at the road tour.
My suprima s GTi far better la..
bet it didnt enter the comp due to very limited OEM parts for Putra (although visually it looks like a common Wira but mechanicals would be different for such 1.8 liter coupe) at that time and considering the slow selling model, parts would be scarse to support the entire rally campaign. and to compete against WRC giants at the time like Citroen, Ford and Peugeot will mean the team will struggle like a dickwad.
Mechanical parts scarse? Cars at WRC level uses very few road car parts, unlike say Group N rallying. Other than the engine block and head, all other mechanical parts such as transmission, control arms, dampers, turbos, radiators etc. are all bespoke.
Nope…
Its about overall cost. Competing in WRC is not like taking part in a rempit event. With no big sponsors, no chance of them making it there.
OMG
The unicorn is finally out!
What might have been… Hopefully the car can inspire current and future proton engineers and designers to create and build fun and exciting cars.
BTW
Where is the current whereabouts of the Rally Safari 1997 Satria?
Satria whereabout unknown but the wira used by karamjit lying at a workshop in usj behind summit, saw it 3 years back.
In all there is about 8-10 Proton Wira Turbo 4WDs (not including Ralliart Malaysia cars sometime masquerading as Protons on rally events)
The Satria 1.6 Group A with 6speed gearbox, water-cooled dampers and brakes, snorkels are one of a kind.
My RB22 STI smokes this Putra away it can even see my taillamp.
Agreed but nobody will bother about your car when its parked beside this old Putra.
but your rb22 is only a road car.. this is a full blown WRC car, built by the same people who built the world championship winning WRC subaru.
Yeah, vape smoke right?
Once upon a time we had grand dreams for Proton – was a Malaysian dream but alas with all GLC companies, personal agenda and ego got into it and everything fell apart. Such a pity to never see Proton make it to the WRC.
not WRC, but at least in the 2nd tier, proton satria neo s2000… proton motorsports team entered several rounds of the SWRC and won rally of finland and sweden. you can choose and play the car in the 2013 WRC official game. the same car also won the asia pacific rally championship.
i thought it used 4g63?
Nope, it is a rebored 4G93 engine. Why? It was the WRC regulations of the time, engine used must be available in the base car, which our proton putra have only the 4G93, not the 4G63.
Later the regulations was changed to have any engine from the manufacturer range.
The reason why Satria Neo S2000 can use a renault engine (because proton waja uses them) and the Iriz R5 using a mitsubishi engine (because the engine is used in proton inspira)
Yes we drool over it ages ago…and still
but the million dollar question would be why this pop up now on Paultan?? out of the blue…could this be to check out viewer’s feedback on the Putra concept??
perhaps proton wanted to do something similar once again but need some feedback from public but wish not to say it out loud in case the public dont favor it any longer
i would love to see satria and putra moniker back again on the road with newly launched car… modern styling , better engine..but i guess, this is not a simple equation for proton or any car maker as it would take millions dollars worth of risk
anyhow someone said about proton car is no longer visible on the road now…must be blind or someting, X70 is everywhere…
That someone who said few proton on the road was discovered to be living in North Korea.
Because I had the opportunity to do a photoshoot with this car and decided to share a more in-depth look at it.
My iris 2016until can’t soft engine problems knowing sound even sent proton servos kluang no response…….jrj5284
Oh my English!
Very good.. You have a soft engine..
If only they have the passion like in the old days
Too late, too old, too slow, too bad, to make any impact in the WRC….