It was a truly horrible, wet and windy autumn day when we got our hands on Eibach's latest project car. And yet, apart from hindering our photography, the weather conditions did not detract from our enjoyment of the car.
The Mitsubishi Evo VII is one car that relishes wet and muddy roads. A potent rally homologation special, along with its deadly rival, the Subaru WRX, it has won a ton of trophies for its maker, and positively revels in such slippery conditions.
As we blasted down some streaming wet and mud-strewn country roads at speeds that would have been downright crazy in a two-wheel-drive car, we were truly amazed at the fantastic handling balance and sheer grip this car can generate in such filthy conditions.
Telltale indicator lights for high-, mid- and low-friction surfaces are neatly incorporated into the rev counter, and a button on the dashboard alters the play in the electronically controlled viscous coupled differentials according to the driver's wishes. Sensors look at parameters like slip, grip, yaw, lateral acceleration, steering angle, speed and throttle opening and adjust the slip at the differentials accordingly. We played with this for while and found we could generate even more grip on the slippery wet roads as the differentials varied their lock-up to cope. It all conspires to make even a halfway decent driver look like an ace.
Eibach's unique input into the project, apart from coordinating it with a group of partner suppliers and sending it round its international motor show circuit, is the lowered and uprated sport springs and dampers. Eibach used to make only Pro-Kit springs and anti-roll bars, and recommended a pairing with Bilstein, Koni or Sachs dampers.
However, the company has started offering its own complete spring damper packages. Sachs makes the dampers to Eibach's specifications under the Pro-Damper label. A combination of Eibach Pro-Kit springs and Pro-Dampers is sold as a Pro-System and is cheaper than buying the components individually. Pro-System Plus adds the Eibach anti-roll bar kit to the spring and damper combination.
Our Evo VII had the height-adjustable Pro-System fitted, and as we soon discovered the kit provided incredible control at speed, coupled with a sporty but comfortable ride even around town.
Just as impressive as the car's chassis performance is its straight-line go. With a healthy 280 bhp out of the box, the 2.0-liter, 16-valve, turbocharged and intercooled twin-cam motor is already impressive. But RalliArt in Germany has modified the intake, ECU and exhaust on this bright yellow car to boost power to a rousing 320 bhp. Bastuck, a specialist exhaust maker in Saarbrucken, makes the exhausts for RalliArt. The company's sport exhaust liberates around 5 hp more, and sounds great under acceleration