The first generation Toyota Soarer (1981-85) was a true milestone in Toyota’s history. It was the first step towards Lexus and the Japanese assault on the higher end of the market – a crucial component in Toyota’s ascension to becoming the top global carmaker. The whole plan took decades to unfold, but Toyota were playing the long game.
The most important ingredient factoring in Toyota’s success has been, more than anything, a sense of timing. This may be coming to a halt now, given how they bet against EVs, but for a solid fifty years, Toyota hardly put a foot wrong.
We have to start the story back in the ‘60s, when Toyota were already much doing it all: city cars (Publica), popular compacts (Corolla, Corona), “large” family cars (Mark II, Crown), executive cars (Crown V8, Century), 4x4s (Land Cruiser) and sports cars (S800, 2000GT). As far as executive cars and sports cars went, the world wasn’t ready, though. Toyota knew it and kept the Century for domestic consumption only and did not push the 2000GT too hard. It was always going to be a trial balloon, a placeholder. Everyone admired it at the time, but virtually nobody bought one, because that was not the point.
Crowned hardtops-of-the-line, clockwise from top left: S50 (1967-71), S70 (1971-74), S90 (1974-79), S110 (1979-83)
The point was to use the unreachable 2000GT’s halo to ensnare the well-heeled customer into something far more vanilla. In the ‘70s, the role of lofty and luxurious 6-cyl. two-door Toyota was entrusted to the Crown. But that took all the sporting element out of the equation, given the Crown’s rather pedestrian underpinnings.
That is because the home market wasn’t yet ready for a proper Toyota GT. But Toyota knew it soon would be. It was no big secret, by the way: Nissan had come to the same conclusion and aced Toyota by launching their F30 Leopard in late 1980, a few months before the new Toyota coupé.
Toyota showed their hand in October 1980 by exhibiting a mysterious “EX-8” car at the Osaka Motor Show, just to give the faithful a reason not to rush and buy a Nissan Leopard. In February 1981, the Soarer hit the showrooms, along with a massive PR campaign highlighting the top-of-the-line DOHC 2800GT (an interesting mix of 2000GT and S800, in some ways) by using the tagline “Super Gran Turismo,” just to make the Soarer appear more exotic and exciting. It worked.
It worked because the super sophisticated (and 2800GT was a the top of the range, but underneath it, there were a lot of lesser Soarers using a pair of more modest 2-litre straight-6 – the new G-series engine, eventually joined by an identically-sized turbocharged M-series – that were affordable and looked almost identical to the genuinely big Soarer.
That’s what today’s feature car is, actually – a Soarer VX, i.e. the higher trim of the smaller-engined models. Power from the 1988cc G-series 6-cyl. was only a modest 125hp to haul a 1300kg’s worth of gadgetry and velour, so this Soarer was definitely not a Supra, despite their similar underpinnings – hence why the two models existed separately.
This might also explain why Toyota kept this one for the JDM only, as few markets outside Japan would have welcomed a Toyota with Mercedes-Benz pretensions like this. The world just wasn’t ready yet. It would take another decade (and a clever marketing ploy) to conquer that summit.
But let’s not pretend like the Soarer’s proportions and certain styling traits, particularly this rear window treatment, isn’t taken straight from the C107. It’s pretty blatant. The main difference is that Toyota didn’t have a mass-production V8 engine to pair with their version of the SL. But they did have other things.
They had a weird but very distinctive griffin logo, chrome in the right places, a 5-speed manual or 4-speed auto and a very fine all-independent suspension (Macpherson up front, trailing arms in the back) for the whole range. Depending on trim levels, one could get all or some of the following: digital dash display, touchscreen electronic HVAC controls, cruise control, ABS, ventilated discs all around, voice warnings (in Japanese), TEMS electronic suspension, speed-sensitive power steering, miniature TV set… Toyota turned the Soarer into a rolling display of their most advanced technological prowess.
You could even get leather seats, though of course very few people did. And cramped rear seats, but that’s par for the course. Nobody ever bought a car like this to sit in the back.
The key thing was timing. While Oil Shocks 1 and 2 had terrible effects on the economies of North America and Europe from 1973 onwards, Japan still had massive growth throughout the ‘70s, which only accelerated over the next decade. Toyota could have produced something pretty similar to the Soarer ten years prior, but the domestic customer base would have been too small. By 1980, Toyota could count on selling thousands of these per year, if they designed and made them well enough.
As far as the design was concerned, industry observers agreed that Toyota hit it out of the park. A group of 37 automotive media organizations known as the Japan Car of the Year Committee awarded that prize to the Soarer in 1981. And when time came to unveil the second generation cars in January 1986, the overall design had been tweaked a bit, but no big changes were envisaged. The design ended up lasting a full decade, just like the SL or the BMW 6-Series that were its inspiration.
What the early Soarers lacked was actual “Gran Turismo” performance. The DOHC 2.8 litre engine was dropped in 1985 in favour of a SOHC 190hp 3-litre – the first generation’s absolute peak, displacement and power-wise. But the second generation, a year later, put a DOHC head on that motor and coaxed 230hp out of it, keeping the Soarer in the game, at least as far as its JDM rivals were concerned.
The sales performance was what made the Soarer into one of Toyota’s greatest hits. The first gen didn’t quite make it to 90,000 units, but that was still an unqualified success. Nissan sold about 15,000 fewer of their Leopards, but the two cars are not were not 100% comparable: base models Leopards had a 4-cyl. 1.8 and were available as 4-door hardtops, not just coupés. The second generation Soarer positively buried its Leopard equivalent, which this time was strictly a two-door car.
Toyota played their hand very well with the Soarer. They started carving out a niche at the top of their domestic range between the Crown and the Century that eventually grew to include the Celsior, the Windom, the Majesta and the Aristo – all very lucrative and (nearly all) exportable, as the Soarer eventually was with its third generation, under the Lexus marque. That kept Toyota firmly in the black in the ‘90s, even as domestic demand slowed down and Nissan, Mitsubishi and Mazda struggled to stay alive. And ultimately, it lead to Toyota’s ascension to the global top spot in the 2010s. Soarer indeed!
Related posts:
Curbside Classic: 1987 Toyota Soarer (Z20) 2.0 GT Twin Turbo – Proto-Lexus PLC, by T87
CC Twofer: 1992 & 1999 Toyota Soarer (Z30) – The Difficult Third Opus, by T87
The missing link, so far as the Soarer’s evolution is concerned, was the Celica XX (a.k.a. Celica Supra). Export buyers sort of sniffed and scowled at the Supra, since it wasn’t really a serious sports coupe, but the JDM version was pitched as a personal luxury car. (The sporty car set could have the hotter DOHC four-cylinder Celica grades, which were quicker if less fancy.) I gather it went over respectably well in Japan, which was probably part of why Toyota decided to develop the Soarer while taking the Supra in a sportier direction.
The Toyota Electro-Multivision TV/onboard computer setup was fascinating. Basically a toy more than a useful feature, but it has a kind of retro-future appeal now.
I heard a lot how good this vehicle is, never saw one in person. But I have to say in pictures this car has a weird rear window treatment, and has the same Toyota budget car look. By contrast, the shared chassis Supra then looks much better in my view. It is no way to match BMW 6, Mercedes S and E coupe in mid-80s. I wonder how its drivability and vehicle dynamics are, more like Supra which is just decent but not great, or matching up the W124 E coupe.
LJK Setright unapologetically proclaimed the following evolutionary generation to this car upon its fall 1987 debut “blissfully competent” and “It may rank among the best cars I have ever driven; it probably ranks as the best of current production that I have driven”. Yes, they were and are that good.
The Z10 (which had struts in front and semi-trailing arms in back rather than the Z20’s double wishbones) was more like the A60 Supra — contemporary testers said it was generally pretty good, a bit under-damped by German standards, and the tail could get snappish (the semi-trailing arms again). As Tatra87 notes, the normally aspirated 2-liter models were fairly sluggish (0-100 km/h in 13.6 seconds with manual), with the turbo splitting the difference (0-100 km/h in 11 seconds with automatic).
The Z20 was better sorted dynamically, with a much more sophisticated suspension. The car Setright drove had the air suspension with TEMS, but even base cars had double wishbones all around.
Agree with all of this, and as with practically all Japanese home market cars at the time it could be highly trim grade dependent as you rightfully point out. I mention Setright’s drive in the refresh Z20 3.0GT-Limited to give insight in relation to the W124 as Tygerle proposed; the Z20 was in full swing when that Mercedes arrived, Setright most certainly had exposure to the German prior to his test in the Soarer, and I think the comment “the best of current production I have driven” answers that question more than satisfactorily as to how it compares to not only the Benz, but anything. Setright was not known to be a particularly forgiving observer, either.
He definitely was not, and what’s interesting about his impressions of the Soarer is that in the same article, he’s NOT very complimentary of the A70 Supra, which he said became noisy and harsh at higher speeds, with mediocre crosswind stability, where the Soarer was “uncannily smooth in every way and at all times.”
I think why the Soarer Setright tested was so good was because it had the electronic controlled air ssuspension, it lowered itself at high speeds, which helped reduce the turbulent air going under the car. The supra had no such ability even with TEMS.
That was probably a factor, but he also said the Supra became mechanically harsh at higher speeds, which suggests to me that the Soarer may also have benefited from a different selection of bushings, engine mounts, and the like, and probably more insulation and sound deadening than the Supra.
Since I own a z20, I could say for sure that the bushing and engine mounts are actually the same parts between A70 and Z20, there are no differences, I suspect amount of sound Insulation is a bit more on the soarer owing to its longer wheelbase of about 3″ extra, which I think may be the other big factor of it’s stability and smoothness.
Anyone have experience with those “fender mounted mirrors”? Are they curved? Seems like they’d be in need of adjusting “all the time”. Also wouldn’t the headlights (of other cars) be reflected into the drivers face?
Here’s an old 1/20 scale LS model of the Soarer, from back then it was a new car.