The black RS Turbo
Every Series 1 RS Turbo left the factory in white, except one. Ford built a black car for Princess Diana. It sold at auction in 2022 for £722,500, around six times its estimate.
Stranger than fiction
Ford Escort facts
Royal cars, cancelled rally monsters and a spoiler you could delete: the Escort stories most owners don't know.
An engagement present
Prince Charles gave Lady Diana Spencer a Mk3 Escort Ghia shortly before their 1981 engagement. That car sold for £52,640 in 2022.
Harrier: 1,500 and done
Ford celebrated its 1979 world rally title with the Escort Harrier: 1,000 in Diamond White and 500 in Strato Silver, built between December 1979 and spring 1980. It cost £4,330, £345 more than the Sport it was based on.
BDA stands for…
Belt Drive, A-type. Cosworth put a 16-valve, twin-cam head with toothed-belt cam drive on Ford's humble Kent block and created one of the most successful rally engines ever.
Hand-built in Essex
From 1970, Ford's Advanced Vehicle Operations plant at Aveley assembled the Mk1 RS models. Cars with genuine AVO history now sell for a significant premium.
The Escort that never was
The RS 1700T was a rear-drive, turbocharged Mk3 built for Group B rallying. Around 18 prototypes were made before Ford cancelled it in favour of the RS200, and only a handful survive.
The optional wing
The RS Cosworth's whale-tail spoiler made real downforce at speed. From 1994, buyers could order the car without it.
Insurance nightmare
By the 1990s, performance Escorts were among the most stolen cars in Britain. Cosworth and RS Turbo insurance could be eye-watering, which is part of why unmolested survivors are rare.
Not all Escorts are Escorts
The North American Escort (1981–2003) was a separate design, and the name was revived for a Chinese-market saloon in the 2010s. None of them share the European rear-drive DNA.
Britain's favourite
The Escort was Britain's best-selling car for most of the 1980s, and more than 4 million were sold in the UK over its life.