Remembering Japanese cars from the past
What’s more 90s than visiting the Fuji International Speedway circuit with your friends? Especially if most of them own a sportscar?
Fuji Speedway International visit
Yes, that’s a whole bunch of AE86s, a Celica XX, a 280ZX and…and… a Sprinter AE82? And is that a female driver next to the panda white Levin AE86?
Definitely a picture worth keeping in your family album! :)
Found at ????????
Today I own my TA60 Carina for exactly three years! I bought it on the seventh of the seventh of the seventh (07-07-2007), so in other words: lucky seven! This is what the car looked like when I bought it:
When I bought the Carina TA60
You can even see my old AE86 parked in front of it!
I bought the car after my girlfriend (in the meanwhile she became my wife) became pregnant of our son. When test fitting the child seats in the AE86 it was clear that the only way to fit the child seat was to put it in the front seat. Since everyone trying to sit in the back of the AE86 was complaining about every speedbump I took, cramps and more of that I realized it would be impossible to keep the AE86. So I tried to find a four door Cressida, Corona or Carina and found this Carina in a good deal. Basically the TA60 Carina can be considered a four door AE86 with a puny engine: it has (almost) the same axle, the same gearbox, the same steering rack, same front struts and the only difference is the absence of a 4AGE and a LSD!
Carina TA60 Enginebay: the indestructible 2T engine!
About the Carina itself: when I bought it it had only 73000 kilometers on the odometer. It had been imported from Germany and I am the third owner of the car. The car belonged to elderly people living near Koln and the car is exactly how you would expect elderly people to buy a car in the early 80s: lowest spec possible and automatic. :(
Actually the car having an automatic gearbox saved the Carina from being exported to Africa: they only want manual cars for export to Africa.
Celica Supra (Celica XX) wheels
The car is basically still the same as when I bought it: it still has the same engine, autobox and open diff. Only upgrades done were shocks, brakes (mintex up front), Marchal yellow foglights and Celica XX alloys. I do have plans for engine and gearbox swap, but I still haven’t made up my mind yet on which engine and gearbox… Could be a 4AGE, 2TG or even an 18R-G.
My Carina: Marchal yellow foglights
Normally it is impossible to get it sideways, but on rainy days this car is a hoot and I love it when I manage to get it sliding! Also people do not expect such an old clunker to do stuff like that and certainly not a family car! The car learned me much more than the AE86 could ever have done! ;)
The Carina brought me luck so far: never had to spend large sums of money on it and it only failed on me once because I neglected to buy gas in time… Currently the age of the car is showing its toll: the bootlid and the roof have start to show some rust so there is definitely a need for a respray sometime soon!
And this is how the Carina looked this morning at 6:00:
Carina TA60 headlight and foglight
She is cheerful, isn’t she?
It has been some time since I posted the last rustoseum, so here are some more! What about this poor GA61 Celica XX? It already looks way beyond reasonable repairs:
Toyota Celica XX GA61 Rustoseum
It was supposed to be the flagship of the Celcia XX range… What happened? Did the owner think it got out of fashion? At least the 15 inch 6J Celica XX rims look salvageable…
How about this Silvia S13 in the foliage then?
http://www.banpei.net/blog/japanese-rustoseums-part-nine
Nissan Silvia S13 Rustoseum
Sure enough its headlights were stripped, but apart from that it still looks quite complete… Maybe still salvageable?
And the last one, a (former) white MR2:
Toyota MR2 AW11 Rustoseum
It still looks okay and complete: not too much rust. Now is that picture playing tricks with me or does the car next to it have some bosozoku exhaust pipes??
This is about the coolest wheel pic I’ve seen this month:
Glow in the dark rims!
The only problem is that you need to shine some light on it first… So, where can I get some of that paint to accentuate my 15 inch Celica XX rims?
Found at Jasonsgrainofsalt
On a Celica Supra forum I found a topic about a Japanese Celica XX Meeting. For those who don’t know the Celica XX: outside Japan it got sold as the Celica Supra MK2, also known as the MA6x and the GA6x. So it shares the same platform as the Celica and Carina A6.
I this topic I found a picture of one Celica XX wearing Toyota Soarer MK1 rims:
Normally I would have called them “Celica Supra rims”, just like I did with my rims on the Carina. Technically they aren’t Celica Supra rims since they featured on the Celica, Carina and Soarer as well.
Anyway, as you can see the Soarer rims have the Soarer logo (a griffin) on the centercaps instead of the Toyota logo on the normal rims. Of course I love to have these centercaps on my rims as well! Anyone got a set of those centercaps lying around?? ;)
Just came across this Celica XX advertisement from 1981:
As you can see the Celica Supra is being drifted through out the whole ad. Did they actually think in the 80s that a car is faster when it is able to drift??
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