The Toyota 87C, also known as the TOM'S 87C, was a Group C prototype sports car, designed, developed and built by Toyota, for use in sports car racing, specifcally the World Sportscar Championship, between 1987 and 1988. [1] [2] [3] [4]
The Toyota 87C, also known as the TOM'S 87C, was a Group C prototype sports car, designed, developed and built by Toyota, for use in sports car racing, specifcally the World Sportscar Championship, between 1987 and 1988. [1] [2] [3] [4]
In the winter of 1986/1987, those responsible for motorsport at Toyota decided to step up their commitment to the sports car world championship. First and foremost, this meant more money for the development and use of racing cars. With the start of Group C in 1982, Toyota got involved in sports car racing. However, the vehicles have not yet been built or used by Toyota. The development and construction of the racing cars were in the hands of the technicians at Dome, a company founded in 1978 by Minoru Hayashi that specialized in building racing cars. For example, the previous model of the 87C was officially called the Dome 86C.
TOM'S Co. Ltd. took over the races. - Tachi Iowa Motor Sport - is named after the two founders Nobuhide Tachi and Kiyoshi Iowa. The racing team, founded in 1974, took care of the logistics of the operations, while Toyota was partly responsible for operational planning. This variant of team leadership is not uncommon among manufacturers in sports car racing. The connection between Audi and Joest Racing may serve as an example from the present.
The main innovation in technology was the engine. The previous 4-cylinder 4T GT engine, which was based on mass production, was retired. The new 2.1-liter 4-cylinder turbo engine was given a completely new engine management system and delivered 620 hp (460 kW). After the first test drives, the wall thickness of the engine block was increased, which made the unit heavier but also more durable.
The racing car designer Masahiro Ohkuni moved from Dome to the group and developed three aluminum chassis together with Dome technicians. The cars looked very successful and compact. However, the 87C lacked sufficient downforce from the start; the main reason why the cars were too slow on the fast Le Mans circuit. In 1987 Toyota was almost exclusively interested in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, where overall victory has been the big goal since entering sports car racing. However, this focus on one race was a certain developmental disadvantage compared to the competition. Although the vehicles were registered for a few races before Le Mans, the car and the team were missing racing kilometers, which also served to eliminate weaknesses in aerodynamics and tuning.
Two chassis were used by TOM'S; Chassis 001 was taken over by Dome and entered there as Dome 87C for a total of six races.
The 87C made its racing debut at the Suzuka 500 km race. The race was the first race event of the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship that year. No compromises were made with the drivers and the cockpits were entrusted to experienced pilots. In the 87C with starting #36 sat the Formula One World Champion of the 1980 Formula One season, the Australian Alan Jones, who was able to sign up after a failed Formula 1 comeback. His partner was veteran long-distance pilot Geoff Lees. After finishing fifth in practice, the duo finished third overall, on the same lap as the winners Hideki Okada and Mike Thackwell in a Porsche 962C and another Porsche driven by Kunimitsu Takahashi and Kenny Acheson. In the second race, the Japanese championship round in Fuji, there was a surprising overall victory for Jones, Lees, and Masanori Sekiya. [5]
After a sobering Le Mans test weekend in May 1987, where the fastest car, Raul Boesel's Jaguar XJR-8, missed a lap by almost 10 seconds, the TOM'S racing team came to the actual race in June with two cars. The car with the number 37 was driven by the two Japanese Masanori Sekiya and Kaoru Hoshino and the Englishman Tiff Needell. Alan Jones, Geoff Lees, and Dome works driver Eje Elghthe prototype with the number 36. The operation turned into a disaster. Alan Jones was left on the track after 19 laps without fuel because the team miscalculated the amount of fuel after the second pit stop. The sister car drove only twenty laps longer, then the drive ended with an engine failure. [6]
The racing type was far more successful in the Japanese sports car championship than in Le Mans. Lees, Sekiya and Hitoshi Ogawa won the Suzuka 1000 km. The 87C was last used at the factory in the 1000 km race at Fuji, the last race of the sports car world championship in 1987. [7]
At the end of the year a chassis was sold to a private team and introduced as the new works car, the 88C.
Jan Lammers is a racing driver from the Netherlands whose most notable claim to fame is victory in the 1988 Le Mans 24 Hours for Silk Cut Jaguar/TWR, next to a four-season spell in Formula One in 1979-1982, driving for Shadow, ATS, Ensign and Theodore. This was followed by a comeback with March for two races in 1992, after a world-record time gap of ten years.
The 1993 24 Hours of Le Mans was the 61st Grand Prix of Endurance, and took place on 19 and 20 June 1993.
The Toyota TS010 was a Group C racing car built by Toyota for the Sportscar World Championship, All Japan Sports Prototype Championship, and the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Dome Co. Ltd, literally "child's dream", is a Japanese racing car constructor involved mainly in open-wheel and sports car racing.
The Peugeot 905 is a sports-prototype racing car built by Peugeot's racing department, Peugeot Talbot Sport.
TOM'S Co., Ltd is a factory supported racing team and tuner of Toyota and Lexus vehicles. Their head office is located in Tokyo, Japan. They are currently heavily involved with Super GT, Super Formula and Super Formula Lights. TOM'S creates aftermarket parts for current Toyota vehicles, and have also created their own special edition of certain current Lexus models.
Masanori Sekiya is a racing car driver, most famous for being the first Japanese driver to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans, in 1995.
The Nissan R90C was a platform used for Group C racing cars built in 1990 by Nissan Motors for competition in World Sportscar Championship (WSC) based in Europe and the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship (JSPC). The cars based on the basic R90C platform would compete until 1993 before Nissan chose to withdraw from sports car racing, not returning until 1997. It won three JSPC championships and several significant endurance races during its career.
The Sard MC8-R was a modified and lengthened version of the Toyota MR2 (SW20) built for GT racing by Toyota's SARD works team.
The Toyota 88C was a racing car entered by Toyota from 1988 to 1989. It is the successor to the Toyota 87C and the predecessor to the Toyota 88C-V. Like other Toyota-powered sports prototypes of the era, it was designed and built by Dome. The 88C is an evolution of the 87C, both models sharing the same chassis number designation. The 88Cs competed in the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship, the World Sports-Prototype Championship, and the North American Camel GT Championship.
The Toyota 88C-V was a Group C sports prototype entered by Toyota in 1988. The race car has a top speed of 375 km/h (233 mph), accelerates from 0–100 km/h (0–62 mph) in 3.8 seconds, produces 809 CV at 8000 rpm and weighs 850 kg (1,870 lb). It is the successor to the Toyota 88C and the predecessor to the Toyota 89C-V. Like other Toyota-powered sports prototypes of the era, it was designed and built by Dome. The car was a new design, developed around the Toyota's R32V 3.2 L (200 cu in) turbocharged V8 engine, which replaced the 88C's standard turbocharged Inline-4. The 88C-V competed in the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship.
Eje Elgh is a Swedish racing driver and television reporter. He currently works as an expert commentator for Formula One in Sweden together with Janne Blomqvist. The two have worked together as Formula One commentators for a long time, first for TV4 and then for Viasat Motor when they took over the Formula One broadcasting in Sweden.
The Toyota 90C-V was a racing car built by Toyota, developed as a Group C1 car. It took part in the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship, the World Sportscar Championship, and at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
The 1995 All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship was the third season of Japan Automobile Federation GT premiere racing, and the second under the promotion of the GT Association (GTA). It was marked as well as the thirteenth season of a JAF-sanctioned sports car racing championship dating back to the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship. Once again, the GT1 class champion was the #1 Calsonic Nissan Skyline GT-R driven by Masahiko Kageyama, and the GT2 class champion was the #70 Gaikokuya Nissan Skyline driven by Yoshimi Ishibashi and Kaoru Hoshino.
The Sugo Inter 500 km, was the fifth round of both the 1991 All Japan Sports Prototype Championship and the 1991 Long Distance Series, held at the Sugo on 15 September, in front of a crowd of approximately 45,000.
The Dome RC83 was a Group C sports racing car built by Dome in 1983. A replacement for the RC82, which had been unsuccessful in its two 1982 entries, the car featured a 4-litre Cosworth DFL V8 engine and was developed in-house, unlike the RC82, which had a March Engineering chassis. One car was built. The car was replaced by the Dome 84C partway through the 1984 season, although the two cars did overlap during that year.
The Suzuka 500 km, was the opening round of the 1987 All Japan Sports Prototype Championship was held at the Suzuka Circuit, on 12 April, in front of a crowd of approximately 18,000.
The March 86G was a Group C and IMSA GTP sports racing car built by March Engineering. Built as simply a chassis with no engine, it was branded as one of three cars, the BMW GTP, the Buick Hawk or the Nissan R86V depending on which engine was placed in the chassis and which team was running it. There were a number of subtle bodywork changes to reflect the manufacturer which ran the car.
The 2020 Super GT Series was motor racing championship based in Japan for grand touring cars. The series is sanctioned by the Japan Automobile Federation (JAF) and run by the GT Association (GTA). It was the twenty-eighth season of the Japan Automobile Federation Super GT Championship which includes the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship (JGTC) era and the sixteenth season the series to compete under the Super GT name. It was the thirty-eighth overall season of a JAF national sportscar championship dating back to the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship.
Tetsu Ikuzawa is a Japanese former racing driver, team executive, and businessman from Tokyo, Japan. He is one of the most successful and prolific Japanese drivers from the early years of the nation's automobile racing history. Ikuzawa was the first Japanese driver to regularly compete in a number of notable European championships, namely the British Formula Three Championship and European Formula Two Championship. He was also one of the first Japanese drivers to compete in the 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance race, making his first start in 1973 for Sigma Automotive alongside his countryman, Hiroshi Fushida. In domestic competition, Ikuzawa won the 1964 and 1967 Japanese Grand Prix sports car races, and the 1977 Fuji Grand Champion Series.