(first posted 11/23/2017) To properly understand the Corolla, and why it has perpetually been so successful, one needs to spend a couple of hours driving the freeways of Los Angeles. You will see innumerable Corollas from new to 20 years old or so, being driven by working women; in particular, immigrant working women. The kind of women who clean houses and offices, provide care-giving to kids, the disabled and old folks, cook, sew clothes, make things, sell things, and do so many of the other essential jobs that keeps life flowing for the folks that don’t drive Corollas. They may well drive several hours each day to and from their workplace, and they are often the primary or sole providers for their children.
These women are practical and thrifty, and they absolutely need the most reliable and economical transportation that exists. And they found it, starting back in the 1980s, in the form of the Corolla, like this first generation FWD version.
Of course working women of a different sort had already discovered the Corolla in the 70s and early 80s, like my administrative assistant at the TV station in LA. She had been driving an early 70s Nova coupe, which was actually a pretty tough and relatively reliable car for her. But its V8 sucked gas, and it was aging quickly from the daily freeway grind. In 1984, she ditched the old Chevy and bought a Corolla sedan just like this one, the first year with FWD.
Now given all the horrible disasters that GM had with its big switch to FWD with their 1980 X cars, and the various degrees of fragility and lack of proper development the new FWD cars from Ford (Escort, Tempo) and Chrysler (K-Cars) had in their first year or two, one might well have given pause to buying a first year all-new FWD Corolla. But no worries, it’s a Corolla. These were every bit as good on day one as their RWD predecessors had been after 20 years in production. Nobody but Toyota could pull that off.
Patti drove that Corolla for quite a few years, and her commute got drastically longer after we started the new station out in Glendale. But her Corolla was absolutely flawless for some ten years, and then she sold it to one of the Latino cleaning women at KVEA, who drove it for another ten years. And she let the other hundreds of thousands of Latino women in Southern California in on her secret. And now they all drive Corollas.
And where do they buy their Corollas? At Longo Toyota, by far the world’s largest Toyota dealer every year since 1967, and owned by Penske since 1985. It’s a giant 21 acre campus with 650 employees. They sell some 3,000 cars per month, and they have the highest percentage of Corolla sales of any Toyota dealer. Why bring this up? Unless one understands the priorities of So. Cal. car buyers, and the vastness of the place, and the priorities of its drivers, it’s not always easy to understand how Toyota became so big, so fast in this country, starting right here in LA. Toyota’s focus on ultra-reliable and economical transportation devices was the perfect fit for Southern California. And like everything that first starts in California, the rest of the country discovered Toyota too, with a few exceptions.
And it’s not just Corollas and working women; the same applies to the Camry, except that its demographic was a bit more upscale; it became the freeway warrior’s car of choice for the folks whose cleaning woman arrived in a Corolla. Of course in recent years things have gotten a bit fuzzier with those folks, in terms of their car buying preferences. But in the 80s and 90s and into the aughts, the Camry (and Accord) were the cars of choice for office/cubicle workers, again due to their unbeatable reliability, as well as guaranteed high resale value due to the demand for them from the other demographic. Yes, used Camrys and Accords are also coveted by the working women in LA, even if they already have several hundred thousand miles on them. The mild climate and freeway driving means that they’re still in the prime of life.
This vintage Corolla is of course too old now for the daily freeway grind, but here it is living out its later years in Eugene, like so may of us California transplants. Now we too have a more leisurely life, live close to the center of town, walk and ride our bikes more here, and we mostly clean our own houses.
And now the old Corolla only gets used when need be. Although this vintage is getting a bit scarce, it undoubtedly has another decade or so of Eugene living ahead of it.
Corolla: the car of choice for hard-working, hard-driving women in LA and leisurely/part-time/barely/not-at-all working hardly-ever-driving Eugenians. A car of many talents, for those that absolutely need to drive and those that would rather not drive at all.
No, we don’t have a Corolla, but we’ve known lots of people who do. We’re among the Camry converts. We bought our 2009 Camry Hybrid in July 2012, with about 38,000 miles on it. It’s at 103,000 now. We replaced the water pump a few years ago; other than that, it’s been nothing but routine scheduled maintenance (mostly oil and filter changes), wiper blades, and tires. Its most recent service was a couple of days ago: oil and filter, of course; rear brakes (finally!)–new pads and turning the rotors; and changing the coolant. The car just plain works–day in, day out, reliably, quietly, smoothly. Exciting? No. Pleasant transportation? Very much so, and with 32-34 MPG in city driving, 36 or so on the freeway. The reliability beats any car we have ever had.
Brake shoe material has changed, post asbestos, to a substance so hard that it seems never to wear out. My ’88 Civic kept the rear brake shoes on so long that, when the brakes finally needed service, it was the drums that had to be replaced !
My favorite Corolla body is the E70, the last RWD model, made from 1979 to 1987.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-HXBrsYJALXE/UlQQ19iTSWI/AAAAAAAAP_M/MDgDl6vXfMU/s1600/1981-Toyota-Corolla-Wagon.+-+03.jpg
http://www.toyotaoldies.de/neue%20bilder/E7-7.jpg
Would the current Corolla look as good as the one featured.
Other than that, for all the Corolla bashing on the internet, boring and reliable have a charm and character of their own.
Exactly. I’m still steamed over the hatchet job Automobile magazine inflicted on the Corolla a while back; a snippy, dismissive little piece that completely ignored why most people buy these. “Will my car start today?” isn’t the kind of “No Boring Cars” philosophy I need, personally.
Glad someone else read that sneering piece in Automobile and disliked it. Talk about punching down. Yet some of the readers probably drove simple and reliable transportation but aspired to owning something more upscale one day.
“Other than that, for all the Corolla bashing on the internet, boring and reliable have a charm and character of their own.”
And in that one sentence, you’ve just explained it all. Corollas (and Prii, and Camry’s) are transportation appliances; built to appeal to the driver who will never read a car magazine, never reply to an auto blog, never set foot in a car museum.
You know, the majority of drivers. The drivers who actually matter to the manufacturers. The drivers who could care less about a car, as long as it’s reliable, comfortable, and affordable (both at purchase and trade-in time).
And this is why the hatred. Because the car crazy writers in the magazines and websites, the car fanatics (who only buy used), are constantly reminded that, in the grand scheme of the automobile business, they really don’t matter.
Every other manufacturer strived to copy Toyota’s formula and put out boring cars, devoid of the personality, style and performance they were previously known for, but without actually matching that substance and dependability of a Corolla. The lack of variety from following the leader is probably the bigger source of the hate, few people whining about Toyota would buy a Toyota anyway.
I see the point you are constantly harping, but by the same token a tiny group of crazy car fanatics whining on the internet will have ZERO effect on the business anyway, so why incessantly punch down? It certainly seems there is no shortage of crazy Toyota fanatics who will look down on anyone who buys something else, so there’s plenty of hatred on the internet for everybody to indulge in.
Every other manufacturer strived to copy Toyota’s formula and put out boring cars, devoid of the personality, style and performance they were previously known for
I don’t really have the time to get in another debate with you Matt, but there’s a whole lot of wishful thinking in that statement. Could you please back it up with some examples.
PS: don’t forget that Toyota also put out some of the best performance cars too, including Corolla-based ones. Think AE86, FX16, and XRS, among others. That era is over (for everyone), but for decades, T built some real gems. Any sweeping statement that is predicated on the assumption that T only built dull but dead-reliable appliance-mobiles is dead wrong and a stereotype that cannot be backed up with facts.
What are your facts to back up your assertion?
Take a deep breath, Paul, that was not what I meant by that statement. Reread it and read past that sentence and you’d see I was referring to OTHER automakers putting out boring cars, because that’s what the product planners of other makes perceived Toyota cars as, and that that trait was a factor key to Toyota’s rising and dominant marketshare that they were so desperate to stifle. They put out not only as bad of products as ever, but without any of the traits that gave them a unique identity that they once had.
Oh and the GM DS series is full of facts to back up THAT assertion 🙂
That’s even more off-base than what I first thought you said.
Many/most of the GM Deadly Sin cars weren’t necessarily boring; just badly built. In fact, you’ve basically got it all backwards. GM was convinced the solution was to keep creating “exciting” cars (think Northstar, Quad 4, 3.4 DOHC, Eurosports, Fiero, Gen3 F Bodies,Z24, J2000GT, blah, blah, blah.). But they were all junk. (of course the unexciting versions were too). That’s precisely how they killed themselves.
If they had just executed their bread and butter cars to a Toyota level, and stopped trying to be “exciting” (as in every Pontiac from 1985 on was trying so hard to be), they might have had a chance.
You’re forever stuck in the myth that most folks want exciting cars. You may, some may, but a huge percent of the market wants good, solid, reliable, adequately-performing nice-but-safe-looking cars that will have good resale value. That’s what a ’65 Impala was; that’s what a Camry/Rav4 is. You think a ’65 Impala 283/PG/drum brakes was “exciting”.
The planners didn’t think Toyota’s success was based on being boring. The truth is, Detroit and everyone else “knew” what the secret was, but they just couldn’t deliver. I’s easier said than done. remember Ford’s “Quality is Job #1” and other campaigns like that. Why do you think GM did NUMMI? To try to learn how Toyota did it. And they mostly figured out, but a bit too late.
No planner/company ever deliberately set out to build boring cars. Anyway, “boring” exists as a concept/perception only to those that seek “excitement”. It doesn’t exist except that way; nobody thinks of cars as “boring” except for a certain species of enthusiast, like you. It’s merely the absence of “exciting”, and “exciting” is difficult to pin down. There’s no doubt that you and I would probably never agree on what cars are “exciting” to each of us. And that applies to a lot of enthusiasts.
It all boils down to the brown, diesel, stick shift, wagon meme. Somebody thinks that’s exciting. But it has nothing to do with success in the car business whatsoever.
Toyota figured out what it takes to be successful; GM didn’t. And excitement had extremely little to do with it. Just all-round competency, no matter what the car was; Corolla or Supra Turbo.
And there’s the assumption in your statement that many more American cars were once “exciting”. Really? Sure , it was a lot easier to get folks excited about a 6 cylinder Mustang in 1965, but it doesn’t mean it was an exciting car. I think you’re looking at the past with excitingly-rose colored glasses.
And there’s the assumption in your statement that many more American cars were once “exciting”. Really? Sure , it was a lot easier to get folks excited about a 6 cylinder Mustang in 1965, but it doesn’t mean it was an exciting car. I think you’re looking at the past with excitingly-rose colored glasses.
Well, you answered your own question using the Mustang as an example, in which case, yes. A cheapish sporty looking car with a ton of options, yet based on a ho-hum Econobox was one of the greatest automotive hits to date. It certainly seems as though many buyers of them were excited, and at the end of the day, to this day, more people seem to get excited about superficial elements than anylitical ones, I mean even the 65 Impala was a product of annual styling changes to generate some buzz. An exciting car and exciting car to drive can be mutually exclusive, which actually plays right into the slow car fast meme.
I actually agree with most of what else you said.
The other cockroach of high mileage is that 4.3 Blazer in the background.
You regularly see abused RWD versions with over 250,000 miles. (The 4WD versions were a bit troublesome)
Sure the interior was full of plastastic rattles, but they just keep running while the check engine light keeps glowing.
Also, the electronics were finicky.
In my part of the country Toyota products seem to be the favorite transportation of new immigrants to Canada. In part I’m sure to Toyota’s reputation in other parts of the world. For a new person or family starting out in a low paying job buying a reliable Japanese car makes sense.
My mother, who isn’t able to drive anymore, was/is the type of woman you described almost to a tee. She raised my three siblings and I here in Los Angeles on a string of older Toyotas like these, including 4 second generation Cressidas and a first/second generation Camry.
At the time, prices of the 92-96 Camry and 89-92 Cressidas were still in the $3-4,000 range and hopelessly out of our range. Growing up with an interest in cars, these cars were aspirational for me, and probably the reason why my tastes have always hovered around early 90’s Japanese cars. Today I drive a 1995 Camry wagon…
Last year I bought a base model 1993 Camry sedan stick shift ( I could never find a wagon stick shift) for $1,200 dollars with 231,000 Miles. Right now it has 243, 700, still going strong, and KBB estimates the car is worth $700. For being almost 25 years old I am amazed how well the car has held up, how quiet the interior is (except during a cross breeze), and I get about 32-33 MPG.
In 1993 the Camry wagon was automatic only in the USA. So I bought a Corolla wagon with a 5-speed. It is still serving me well after 24 years and 156,000 miles.
I decided to avoid a Corolla Wagon since I assumed my lanky frame would not fit in one and I was unsure how tinny it was compared to a Camry.
You and me both. Our ’93 Corolla wagon 5 speed was the first of five Toyotas in our family, not counting the Starlet my wife had (and sold) before we met. Like you, we checked out the Camry, no 5 speed, and if Honda had offered a 5 speed Accord wagon at the time, we probably would have bought one instead. But that wasn’t available, at least in California, till the next gen Accord. By the way, our Corolla was mostly dead-reliable for the 100K or so miles we kept it, except for the requisite Toyota water pump, fortunately while still under warranty.
It seems the manual was never offered in the wagon. Mine is a V6 LE with the third row. I bought it for $600 with some minor front end damage that I fixed myself about 6 months ago, and have driven it from 153k to 168k. It was maintained diligently by one family and is one of the easiest cars to live with that I’ve ever owned.
Looks sharp Dino! Happy motoring.
Camry wagon was definitely sold with the manual on the 4 cylinder engine, at least in Canada. I worked at a Toyota dealer in Calgary in 1993, and sold one to a young couple who were initially looking at a Corolla wagon. They were the rare folks willing to wait for their ordered vehicle to be delivered in a couple months.
This was the first generation of Corolla to be built at NUMMI, correct? So Toyota really pulled off two feats — switching to FWD without a hitch, and proving that unionized American workers can build cars that are just as good as the ones coming from Japan. And this makes me realize, your admin could have gotten another Nova and gotten pretty much the same car as the Corolla.
And speaking of LA freeways, I would imagine any CCer who’s seen “La La Land” noticed the orange late 1970s Corolla prominently shown in the traffic jam in the opening scene. I’m positive the director selected that car on purpose, likely as an example of the rust-free old cars one can find in California.
Yes, starting in 1986. But not all of them came from NUMMI.
I think the Nova sedan and Nova/Corolla 5 door liftbacks were built at NUMMI, while the Corolla sedan and RWD coupe/hatchback was imported from Japan, along with the FWD Corolla FX hatchback.
I think the FXs were also a NUMMI product, if memory serves. I sure loved mine, whoever made it.
My 87 FX is a NUMMI car.
And despite that, the Novas knew how to rust just as much as Japan-built E80s and earlier Corollas. The next generation was a huge improvement, and the one after equally so over that.
i remember commenting to someone in the eighties that gm was really getting their act together. the nova i had just rented was just like a toyota. they laughed and said that’s because it is a toyota built in california.
that’s how i learned about nummi. it’s a real shame that it didn’t become the template for domestic auto manufacturing.
WildaBeast, I had the same thought about Patti, her old Nova, and the NUMMI Novas. Funny!…
Older Corollas are rare here, probably both in part to Midwestern buying habits and Midwestern winters. But I would certainly like to drive one of these with a 5-speed. Even compared to a small car like my Mini I bet it would feel quite light and nimble.
I hope you get the chance; as you say, these were surprisingly fun little cars. My old FX16 was especially enjoyable, and I have yet to own a vehicle with a slicker-shifting manual.
I used to have a 1984 that was made in September of 1983. I got it in 1997 when the owner traded it for a new Corolla and kept it until 2005. Then I gave it to a friend who kept it for two years, I got it back from him and gave it to my uncle that drove it until November of 2010.
And this car’s original owner was an immigrant from Spain who worked hard all his life but managed to do well financially but he didn’t care much (or at all!) about cars. He sold his last car (a 1997 Corolla SD) to my mother when he and his wife moved back to Spain in 2010 and it had only 27,000 Kilometers on it. My mother still drives it and it will get to 100,000 Kilometers very soon. Still low mileage for a 20 years old car. Just like the 1984, it’s a very basic car with no a/c, 3 speed automatic and not even a driver side airbag! I did upgrade it with a newer bluetooth radio and rear speakers from a 1994 Corolla LE and I also bought cheap aluminum wheels from a Paseo for the summer tires (we are required to have winter tires for winter here and the original owner used winter tires all year round as he spent most of the summer in Spain). The car still has the original summer tires mounted on those aluminum wheels.
It is funny that despite how common these are, I’m not sure I have ever been in one or known anyone with one. Civics are another story – it seems that Civics are all over both sides of my extended family and my neighborhood. Perhaps it is a regional thing. Or maybe perception bias.
I agree that most folks who just need to get to work every day and who aren’t into cars get the best appliance for the job they can get. And the Corolla and Civic have both been very good for that purpose.
It took Toyota a VERY long time to get a handle on the right combination of metal and rustproofing necessary to make a Corolla last more than half-a-dozen years in the rust/salt belt.
Combined with a Sloan-ian ladder that GM could only dream about, Toyota conquered the American garage in the way that they truly deserved.
Around here, retirees love the Corolla as well. I think when many frugal older people retire, or approach retirement, they seem to buy one, new or used. They want cheap, economical and reliable transportation , even if they don’t plan to drive very much.
I’ve found this pattern has held true for decades. Before the Corrola, it was stripper base-model domestic cars that got the nod. I’m always on the lookout for old, low mileage wheels. Almost always such cars were owned by older people who cared for their cars but didn’t drive much because their commuter days were behind them.
Inevitably such cars were low-option base models.
The most extreme example I saw was a 1967 AMC Rebel with a 232 straight -six, 3-on-the-tree, vinyl seats and rubber floor mats. Zero options of any kind, with only 17,000 miles on the clock, after 30 years of ownership. A friend picked it up from the family, and offered it to me for $500. Foolishly I passed on it, because it was too basic for me at the time.
You should have bought the Rebel. Bullet proof engine and with it’s new open drive line it was much easier to change a clutch than in the older cars closed drive line.
I had a ’69 Corolla that I owned for 4 years. Loved the car even though it was underpowered(1100cc-60Hp 4spd) but would cruise all day on the freeway at 65-70mph providing there weren’t many hills. And would rev to 65-7000rpm without a whimper(I installed a tach), Parking was a breeze and it could fit on sidewalk in Portland, Ore with room to spare. And never got under 28 mpg no matter how hard I floged it and up to 39mpg if I drove it decently. Never did any repairs to it other than normal maintenance and a pair of snow tires. The Dodge Colt that replaced the Corolla was a money pit
Why you ask why I never bought another one? Life changes and getting married and having kids changed the car priorities to low cost and lots of space which the 3 Caprices I owned did a good job of, not to mention lower income due to my employer whom I had worked for 14 years(started when I was just barely 23)shut down.
Corollas became the default choice in Ireland at the start of the 70s, because if you bought a new one you didn’t have to keep going back to the dealer, to get the faults put right. These days you still see a few 90’s models, but nothing older. Getting insurance on a 90’s car isn’t easy, so their days are numbered. The only 80’s Corollas around are the mega-expensive AE 86 coupes.
Sadly in the present day it is very hard to buy any new Japanese Toyota.
Is Toyota having trouble with the European competition, or is it a tariff/exchange rate issue that makes a new one hard to find in Ireland? My knowledge of the current car market in Europe is a little rusty.
These days the Corolla comes from Turkey, the Yaris from France, the Auris ( Corolla hatch) from England etc.All have a lot of local content.Who needs Turkish/French/British electrics ?
I owned one of these very briefly. Mine was also an 1987 model. I bought it for $80, fixed a few things but hated driving so quickly so it on. Always started and ran great though.
Thank you for casting a light on this often overlooked car driving demographic. When workers must punch the clock at a certain time every day and are compensated on an hourly basis, downtime and costs arising from breakdowns are things they cannot afford. I think this is a good occasion on the eve of Thanksgiving to give thanks to those who work to enable our lives. I imagine public transit has improved somewhat for working people in LA with the advent of the Metro Rail that is connected to an extensive bus system.
+1
Thanx Yoshi .
-Nate
This generation is getting a bit scarce now in my neck of the woods, but its replacement (the 1987-91 AE91 generation) is all over the place – in fact if ten Corollas pass you on the road, at least two of them will be AE91s, either modified, well worn like this one, and everything in between.
Had an ’86, most miserable excuse for a car I’ve ever owned. The only thing it had going for it was reliability, otherwise it was dreadful. Rode hard, had awful seats, got lousy mileage (couldn’t crack 30 mpg), painfully slow, and pinged even when run on 93 octane (dealer told me that was “normal”). The ’89 Topaz that followed it was world’s better than that turd…
My brother drives my parents old 03 corolla in Maine, my grandma also had a 99 which we sold to my aunt and uncle down the road as a spare car when she stopped driving. Still looks good except for a little spot of rust.
My stepmother bought a 1984 fastback. It was an ex-dealer’s demo car, so well-equipped by Canadian standards, with an automatic, sunroof and a/c.
The only drama it ever provided was when it was about a year old and I used it to take a friend home. A couple of blocks out of the driveway, we noticed a smoky smell, so I turned around. As we got out of the car, she pointed out in a very calm voice that there were small flames coming out of the corner of the hood. I ran indoors, got the kitchen fire extinguisher and came back and put it out. The dealership said they’d never heard of it before, and replaced part of the wiring harness.
It then ran happily for another ten years. The first half of its life was in Toronto, so it did get some noticeable corrosion – but after they retired to the West Coast it more or less stopped aging. I used to drive it when I was visiting them, and it felt like a new car. Eventually I think they gave it away as it had been a second car for several years and was almost never used.
When you said the “only drama it ever provided” I thought for sure it’s be squeaky brakes or such.
Instead it was an engine fire.
That pegs the drama meter. None of the horde of POS cars I’ve owned have ever caught fire. (Would that some had) If you hadn’t been there who knows how it would have turned out.
That’s a pretty shocking screw-up for a Toyota.
While I am an avid Honda (2 and 4 wheel) FAN; one time in mid-late 80s I returned to LA on a bizness trip and rented a Corolla of the vintage shown. That was before my first Civic (1988), but compared to the Ford sub compact we had….even the rental Corolla felt/drove gr8 with excellent mpg in LA traffic.
They may be “plain vanilla”, but were excellent little “appliances” with 4 wheels. 🙂 DFO
Earlier that decade, a rented E70 Corolla made my Escort look bad.
Longo Toyota is impossible to overlook driving towards L.A. on I-10. I drove by many times in order to see my future wife, who lived only a couple miles west of it. She has larger taste in appliance cars, starting with a 1986 (V10) Camry. For her, “fahrvergnügen” means a car that doesn’t eat one’s wallet.
I wonder if I would be comfortable in these Corollas? Even though I am only six feet tall I think I had the seat all the way back in my 86 Camry and in my 93 the seat is almost all the way back.
I like the vintage plates this Corolla has, those too are getting rare on the roads of Oregon.
I learned on one of these along with one from the generation prior at the driving school I attended. Perfect cars for getting around in.
This was the car that Jeff Goldblum drove in “Into The Night”, a great John Landis film also starring Michelle Pfeiffer, Landis himself in a cameo, as well as David Bowie of all people. It’s the perfect car for Goldblum’s character and an enjoyable film overall.
Speak of the devil. I just got home and on the last leg of my trip this was the exact car in front of me right down to the color as I drove behind it in my 91 Mazda 626. I noticed it and said to myself look at that as you don’t see many of them around.
In high school, I remember these cars being driven by a certain sort of blue-collar daddy’s girl. You know the type of guy: “My princess ain’t driving no unreliable used car!” and he then went and bought her the cheapest stripper Corolla he could find.
The one I had was a 1985 LE 4dr. sedan just like the one in the pic below but mine had no sunroof. Drove it all over western North America for 213,000 + miles, and drove like new when I sold it. Just routine maintenance, but needed a new carburator.
Great car. 28 mpg town, 41 mpg highway. I don’t know why because it wasn’t supposed to do that well on the highway, but it did, on long trips, 85 mph cruise, every time!
My bride had one of these when we met, an ’85 or so, a three-pedal hand-me-down from her parents. It was fine utilitarian, economical transportation, except for the curious sloshing sound I would hear turning a corner. A brief investigation revealed the rust around the rear window was funneling rain from the drip rails into the trunk, resulting in several gallons back there, as well as enough trunk rust to start worrying about crashworthiness. As soon as we were married, I bought her a new Volvo.
One of my old high school classmates had one in same colour as in the first photo. The only difference was automatic gearbox rather than manual.
When she started to drive, she was given a four-door 1970 Chevrolet Nova. With that, she often phoned me, asking me to rescue the ‘damsel in distress’ almost every week. Many issues were due to the deferred maintenance since her father was so mechanically inept and couldn’t do anything. They eventually paid me to do the maintenance work because they trusted me and my brother the most.
After one idiot wrecked her Nova, she graduated to the 1968 Jeep Grand Wagoneer. Same routine as before. Unfortunately, the Jeep was too much for her to handle with its wandering ways (poor alignment, worn out bushing, lame brakes, prodigious appetite for petrol, etc.).
Her father had enough of mechanical issues and was worried about his deaf daughter being left alone on the side of the road too often. He bought a brand new Corolla for her. Then, the frequent automotive drama ceased to end for me…phew.
Longo Toyota was amazing. We bought the ’84 4×4 pickup there and the ’05 Tundra as well. In ’84, there was no “showroom” to speak of, just sales desks filling the whole space and Bank of America branch on-site for financing. Since the truck we wanted was still on the ship from Japan, all the papers were signed and it was delivered to us in Redondo Beach.
In 2005, all negotiations were completed on the phone in a few minutes for an in-stock pickup. Appointment was made for a Wednesday afternoon. The delivery area up front was full, on a Wednesday! I gave my check to the salesman. He came back from the cashier a few minutes later and showed me the commission check he got on the spot. P&I department was a sea of cubicles. She was a true professional and sized me up immediately, all cash buyer of a “fleet” trim white pickup, and wasted none of my time or hers trying to sell me any extras.
I remember seeing photos of salespeople at Longo Toyota ferrying customers on golf carts to the cars they want to see because the lot is so big.
There’s still quite a few around here in the SF Bay Area, given our mild climate. I live 30 minutes from the NUMMI plant (now Tesla’s assembly plant) that produced so many of them.
I’d never heard tell of Longo, Paul, and figured I’d better educate myself. Sure enough, they show up in the SoCal papers starting in ’67:
Thanx George ! .
Back then Longo was an awful place, very few satisfied Customers .
I love those old Crowns and occasionally peruse craigslist for ’69 / ’60’s but they’re usually hammered and over priced .
-Nate
I well remember seeing the vast majority of Toyota’s with Longo license frames when I lived in SoCal 20 years ago, that dealership is a huge automotive warehouse.
Found a ’96 Tercel 4 speed stick stripper for a family member with about 170k miles on it about 3 years ago, only problems have been starter replacement, a little rubber pad on the brake pedal for the stop light switch, and I bypassed the clutch switch to avoid a fifty dollar replacement part. Now it’s at 210k miles and still runs great.
Found a ’95 Prizm about 2 years ago, the Craigslist ad had no picture and just said car needs work, but since it was priced at $750 (199k miles) and only 4 miles away we took a look. Body straight, paint good, interior nice, 3 speed auto with ice cold AC. Wouldn’t start, needed 2 front tires. The seller owned it for 10 years and bought it at 100k miles. I decided to take a chance and tow it home, the next day tried one more time before attaching the rope and it started right up, it ran and drove great. It had an aftermarket (Chinese) distributor, I could see cracks on the coil, a $40.00 u pull genuine Toyota replacement cured the problem. It’s been trouble free, front pads, rotors, and tires were replaced at the same time and it’s been problem free since. People were asking 2k for 260k miles+ Corollas, Prizm’s were priced much lower.
“Great car. 28 mpg town, 41 mpg highway. I don’t know why because it wasn’t supposed to do that well on the highway, but it did, on long trips, 85 mph cruise, every time!” Interesting; I had the same experience with my new ’88 Civic. I wonder what accounts for that; isn’t mileage supposed to suffer at higher speeds ?
Different people have different passions, and some people are passionate about a car that will always get you there reliably and economically. Ours was an 84 cream over brown-like the one in Into the Night, but with a tight manual that willlingly gave you what power it had. 70 series Michelins and tight steering made it a very fun runabout. And it fit me perfectly. On my “if only…” list I would still have this car, but with sway bars and the twincam motor from the AE86. Then it would be perfect.
My ’87? was in LE trim, light goldish-bronze with brown velour interior, 5 speed and steel sunroof. That thing burned oil like crazy and knocked and pinged to beat the band on anything but high-octane gas. It gobbled up tires, but the Gillette Golden Bear radials were something like $29 a piece so it didn’t matter.
It was a great little beater in the early 90s when I had a new wife and a baby and didn’t have 2 nickels to rub together.
I’ll paint another picture of a Corolla owner. In affluent Marin County, for some reason in the 1970s and ’80s we were all either Datsun, VW or Volvo families. But Margaret, a recent divorcee (of many in the ERA era of Northern California), with kids named Muffy, Buffy, Tory and Chipper- bought a Corolla. For her first job after divorcing and going out on her own, with her stiff Connecticut jaw and old-money upbringing, this was her liberation from the Country Squire her husband bought her. She proceeded to commute 75 miles each way, each day to one of the most prestigous wineries in Healdsburg for aeons. In a Corolla. I think that thing had 350k on it when I lost touch, and hell if I didn’t notice that it needed a lot less attention than our Volvo or Datsun. Go Margaret. Go ERA and go Corolla.
I can see why Toyota has become the default car brand for people who aren’t into cars like we are. It’s a safe, no-drama choice. Nobody will ask you what made you buy that. A car you don’t have to make apologies for. Fortunately for those folk who think Toyotas are boring, there are other brands with similarly anvil-like reliability, many of them Japanese.
I’ve always found it peculiar that coming from a country with the dreaded Shaken inspection and costs to drive old cars off the road (and often into a second life down here), Japanese cars last so long in other countries – way beyond what they need for the Japanese market. I guess it’s a matter of honour and corporate ‘face’ to build such a long-lasting product. Better than it needs to be, in that way at least.
I have had recent Corollas as rental cars multiple times, and each time, I was struck by how completely satisfactory it was to drive. Not luxurious, or super quiet, but completely competent. I don’t think I would want one for my only, everyday car, but that’s just a matter of taste. Every time I see one in traffic (which is often), I think “there’s a person with some sense”.
I either don’t see that many of them or they don’t hit my radar. What I see, vaguely in that vein is lots of old, either beat or horribly beat up Accords with 3 or 4 farmworkers in it on the way to the vineyards in the morning.
My personal experience with Corollas is from rentals where I thought they were absolute s***boxes. Gutless with significantly less real HP than rated HP. Terrible transmissions, or at least transmission programming where the slightest hill would produce endless up and downshifting with the engine winding up, then dragging down and on and on. Goofy controls in odd places, bad ergonomics, like the cruise control at the bottom of the steering wheel, a rudimentary trip computer accessed thru the steering wheel, unless you have one more wrist on your left arm than I do, and it pivots in the other direction. Mileage was good at 33, but not great and it was pretty much all highway driving.
Now I can be critical and none of the above may matter to the cleaning ladies as long as it starts and stops every day and doesn’t get terrible mileage, and there is a place for those cars and cheap bulletproof cars in general even if I don’t like them. But I thought with just a little more effort it could have been a much nicer car. More attention to driving details than bells and whistles.
I love Corollas. You know you’re going to get a 15-20 year automotive cockroach. They and the Camry are my recommended “go-to” for people who want safe, reliable transportation.
I’m a simple guy who gets a small thrill out of competence. Reviews of my Outback are peppered with “appliance” references. So what. It handles like a maniac in inclement weather and otherwise quietly, competently gets the job done. Its comfort and killer stereo are bonuses.
In May the Outback was getting some work done so I rented an Elantra for travel to my daughter’s graduation. I was very impressed with it as well, comfortable for my tall, lanky frame, decent stereo and tech, and 40+ mpgs at 80 mph. Not too shabby for a $22k car these days. Like I said, I’m a simple guy.
This was an absolutely terrific car. One of those honest cars, like the Falcon and Fairmont before it. Deceptively common looking with a severely functional look. Easy exit and entry, front and rear. A car that seemed to have been designed from the inside out. Spacious and small, strong, but light. This era Corolla really set a standard for small cars for years to come.
It wasn’t as boring to pilot as one would imagine. The engine was the right amount of power, using a manual transmission. Yet Americans, wanted an automatic, so one was offered. The best set up was manual, however.
You sat upright. Yes, it felt like a box, but within a few weeks, you lost that feeling. Toyota was still selling their old rear drive Toyotas, and folks who wanted style over purposeful design, could still get that. However the boxy front wheel drive was the future, and the old rear wheel drive days faded, to never return.
The fact that these are seen as a beater today is unfair.
I bought an ’87 Corolla sedan, navy blue with 5- speed manual. Apparently a DLX, not an LE. Thus it came with a plethora of options- ranging from power steering to A/C to trim rings to floor mats. Price came to$9,928, well above the $8,178 base. It was to be my last stick shift. My next car- a ’90 NUMMI Prizm sedan- came with a preferred equipment package that included a smooth automatic. The redesigned bucket seats were superb. It was a well built tight little car, basically a Corolla at a very discounted price.