Tag: toyota comfort

Manga Car Spotting – Nissan Cherry X-1R and Honda N360 – Restore Garage 251

April 24, 2018 / banpei / 0 Comments

Manga Cars

A flying Nissan Cherry X-1R coupe and a rusty Honda N360 will feature in this fourth episode of spotting manga cars! I’ll read this Japanese manga of Restore Garage 251 and I found over 25 different cars in it!

Restore Garage 251 by Ryuji Tsugihara

Restore Garage 251 revolves around Satomi Yumejiro and his grand son, who restore old Japanese cars. In each restoration there seems to be a background story: either some owner / ex-owner wishing to restore their lost love or some special car that is restored and given to a collector. The great thing about Restore Garage 251 is that it also focuses on the technique behind the restoration: how carburetors work, how a steering rack works and how you can mend metal into place. Definitely a manga that I would love to see translated and published in English!

You can find the video and the high resolution scans of the panels containing manga cars below: Continue reading

Top Gear missed it’s chance with the Toyota Comfort GT-Z!

July 8, 2013 / banpei / 0 Comments

Today I watched the second episode of the new Top Gear season (season 20 already!) where Hammond organized a Taxi race. In this race he featured taxis from various countries like Russia, India, South Africa but for some reason he left out Japan. Now this is a missed chance as Japan would have an adequate contentder:

Okay, the supercharged 3S-FE may not be the most powerful of the whole bunch, but with its tweaked suspension it probably would have beaten the competition in half a lap… Or could it be that they were actually frightened?

See the full video of the Comfort GT-Z here: Continue reading

Carina Sightings: CT141 Corona taxi

May 6, 2009 / banpei / 0 Comments

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%88%E3%83%A8%E3%82%BF%E3%83%BB%E3%82%B3%E3%83%AD%E3%83%8A

It can be yours: Toyota Comfort GT-Z

February 26, 2009 / banpei / 1 Comment

Some time ago I wrote about the Toyota Comfort GT-Z being an ideal family car. Also Mike Garrett wrote about the Toyota Comfort GT-Z on Speedhunters last week. Well, it can be yours because there are two for sale on Goo-Net!

Toyota Comfort GT-Z on Goo-net
For only 12500 euros this baby is yours! May sound like much, but this GT-Z only drove customers (if it has seen customers at all!) 43000 kilometers, so that’s practically nothing! And it is one of 59! Absolutely unique! :)

However… Unique? What about this then?

Toyota Comfort GT-Z on Goo-net
Another GT-Z for sale??
And it is cheaper than the other one: only 11800 euros for a car that only drove 46000 kilometers! Sounds like a bargain! :)

Both cars have the same color (navy), still have the stock bodykit and RS Wantanabes and imagine: both can be obtained for the same amount of money as you would normally spend on a Toyota Corolla AE86 in the same state with the same mileage! Think about it: this car has serious potential (3SGTE anybody?) and there is nothing like it anywhere in the world! Except Japan of course…

You can find the cars here:
Toyota Comfort GT-Z #1
Toyota Comfort GT-Z #2

Ideal family car: Toyota Comfort GT-Z?

February 19, 2009 / banpei / 0 Comments

Some days ago I mentioned that I would not buy a Carina after this one. What would be my successor for the Carina then? Well, I don’t know that either but time will tell, maybe an Lexus IS300 (Altezza) or perhaps another car. At least I’m always looking around for fun cars and I found another one: the Toyota Comfort! :)
Toyota Comfort standard trim
Toyota Comfort in standard trim

The Toyota Comfort was designed in 1988 with only purpose to serve as a taxi. More or less something like the Austin FX4 you saw around the UK up till five years ago. The current model is based upon the Crown S130 platform, but with a shortened floorpan to make it more agile. The Comfort features a 3Y-PE engine on LPG or a 3C diesel.

Very good looking supercharged TRD Comfort GT-Z in black

But the more fun is the limited (59 vehicles) TRD Comfort GT-Z. This car features a supercharged 3S-FE and has, of course, a TRD suspension which is much stiffer than the standard Comfort. The supercharged 3S-FE outputs 160HP which should move this car happily around every corner. ;)

Enginebay of the supercharged TRD Comfort GTZ

And if that is not enough: there is also a TRD Comfort GTZ which runs on the track. It’s got the supercharger replaced for a turbo. I suspect it is mainly being used for drifting seeing the D1 sticker.

TRD Comfort GTZ racecar with Turbo-ed 3S-FE

Just imagine what the movie trilogy Taxi would have looked like if it had featured this car instead of the 406. ;)