This style of early seventies Toyota Hilux (or HiLux or Hi-Lux) pickup is getting rare enough on the ground that it warranted a few pictures when I saw it recently. As I thought about it, I realized that this was a hugely significant vehicle for Toyota here in the US, a tipping point if you will. Maybe not in sales numbers, but in helping create an image and market that Toyota dominates today.
It’s been covered here before of course, in particular with both a sighting and some historical background by Dave Skinner here. I won’t repeat most of what he wrote; rather I’ll add my own memories of when these first appeared and especially their last few years. The first Toyota pickup sold in the US was the Stout (the red one above was photographed just a few blocks from where I saw the green HiLux), and it didn’t sell in huge numbers.
By contrast the smaller Datsun (as Nissan was branded here until the Eighties) Pickup, first the 320, and then especially the 520/521, really took off both as a light-duty work truck, but especially as a “lifestyle” truck. Commute during the week, haul garden supplies on Saturday, carry surfboards or dirt bikes on Sunday. Despite the fact that the Datsun was really only offered in one basic form – perhaps with some dealer-added stripe package – it seemed to gain a sporty image by association with the activities one could do with it, despite its mundane mechanicals. Though an OHC engine did seem pretty radical for a truck in the Sixties.
The Stout and early HiLux, by contrast, seemed to be just work trucks, and not big or particularly useful ones (mostly by perception, not reality). Coronas and Corollas were selling like hotcakes, but the first Celica showed that Toyota could also do sporty.
Then, between 1973 and 1975, Toyota started changing the HiLux, culminating in dropping that name for the US market and branding it as the Toyota Truck. Most significant, to me, was the introduction of the SR5 version. With a 5-speed, more upscale trim and sporty stripes, suddenly Toyota had Datsun – even with the updated 620- in its crosshairs and seemed to pass it quickly in appeal … though I’m not sure about sales yet.
For the 1979 model year, Toyota redesigned the truck again, to my eyes less attractive than the final years of the previous generation, though it has grown on me over the decades. But in addition to the two-wheel drive SR5s, there were 4 wheel-drive versions for the first time, borrowing from the Land Cruiser’s solid front axle with Birfield CV joints and leaf spring design. Although at the time I wasn’t particularly interested in pickups, let alone 4WD, it seemed to me that Toyota was now serious about their trucks. They had created a whole new category of 4WD mini truck as a lifestyle and work vehicle, that is still going strong, though not quite “mini” anymore. Toyota still dominates this category in sales in the US, despite strong offerings from Nissan, and all three domestic brands. A year later Datsun started offering 4WD on the new 720 series, with independent front suspension (my interest in trucks changed, and I now own a Tacoma, immortalized by Google StreetView) but the Datsun was far less capable and rugged off-road than the Toyota and has been a perpetual runner-up or worse in sales.
Is this HiLux a work truck or a play truck? Not sure. I suspect the rack and the PVC pipes are for lumber/piping and garden tools, respectively… but maybe also for fishing poles and surfboards. It was parked less than a mile from the ocean. By the way, I didn’t even notice until uploading this photo that the HiLux’s modern successor, a 3rd Generation Tacoma, was photobombing my shot. If I’d noticed it then I’d have been more careful with my composition, but these Taco’s are so common I rarely notice them.
Further reading:
Curbside Classic: First Generation Toyota Hilux – Building Block
Excellent find, and background. Maybe a couple decades, since I’ve seen one of these. From a styling-crazy little kid’s perspective at the time, never understood why the mini pickup makers didn’t make the base of the bed exterior sheet metal, and the cab rocker panel base line up. I knew they were practical utility vehicles, made for work. But the six-year-old styling junkie in me, wanted to perhaps at least see some flat black paint spotted on the rocker panels, to lend the illusion of cleaner alignment.
Notice that they did exactly that on the ’79, which IIRC was an early Calty project handed off to them because the market for trucks like this was still strictly utilitarian in Japan so they might as well let the market where it was a lifestyle item lead the way on styling.
As a small child, my POV wasn’t really affected by domestic or foreign styling cues. Rather, just cleaner design. Where simple elements usually lined up.
One of the early 1970’s vehicles that Toyota built their “street creed” In America with.
The strange fender top indicator lights seemed like they were there as an afterthought. I spent a fair bit of wheel time with an early Datsun and was quite impressed with it, especially the family resemblance to the 510.
“but the Datsun was far less capable and rugged off-road than the Toyota ”
Everything built at the time was less rugged than the Toyota! Maybe everything built now is less rugged than the Toyota. But I’m biased. That Yellow one needs to ditch the canopy and come to my house.
Can’t take a photo here without a Tacoma photobombing it. Very popular truck for outdoorsmen. Yours looks good with those wheels.
Nice picture of the early Ford Courier “FORD’S NEW 1800CC IMPORT” said the backlight sticker .
I lusted after a Stout for many years, they retained their sales value / price so I never could afford one .
the Datsun 520/521 was _the_ cracker box pickup for dirt bikers in the early 1970’s, when the 620 came along kids loved them slammed then and cut off the mufflers etc. for a few decades .
My ’78 (?) 620 was a long bed with automatic and I had come troubles with it, always looked sharp though . “LITTLE HUSTLER” sticker on the tin foil rear bumper from new .
-Nate
Hustler was the 4×4 brand name here, no doubt borrowed from Chrysler Australia who had a Hillman Hunter Hustler already on the market, survival rates for 70s Japanese vehicles is low here and even lower for working models, they were popular new.,
The featured Hi luxc has a Stout cab, Toyota used both badges on similar picxkups untill the 80s the Stout was the heavy duty work version.
Nice catch; these have become quite rare. i finally caught one in Eugene a few years back.
I wish I had ready access to the sales numbers of Datsun and Toyota pickups to find out just when Toyota first beat Datsun, which had a huge lead in the ’60s and well into the ’70s.
Although Toyota’s rep was earned the hard way, I would be reluctant to say that the Datsun/Nissan pickups in the ’70s and into the ’80s were really less tough. I see plenty of old ones around here, along with Toyotas, but obviously the rep of Toyota pickups has become sacrosanct.
I think some of the Datsun specs were actually stronger than the Toyotas. Don’t remember Datsuns breaking leaf springs in the rear for instance. The cab was bigger as well. At first they seemed just as common as the Toyota’s up here. Datsun stuck with the 2:00 to 1 low range where Toyota had the 2:28. Putting big tires on the Toyota was a lot easier as was lifting them. Once the aftermarket picked a favorite that was it, no matter the reality. The Hardbody seemed to be plenty tough, but it only had to compete against IFS Toyotas.
I do remember Pick Up Van and 4WD magazine taking a new 80 Toyota and an 80 Datsun on a 1000 mile run down the Baja. They complained that the Datsun needed repairs after the trip while the Toyota just needed a wash. Of course, that’s just a magazine article but they did good tests back in the day.
I was driving a NAPZ 720 King Cab 4×4 sometimes at the same time I drove the old 521. Pleasant but gutless and thirsty.
The less tough thing may have been perception, though my own 721 4wd 1981 Datsun needed a head gasket and a new (5 speed manual) transmission in less than 100k miles. I think a contemporary Toyota would have done better. Plus the IFS 4wd seemed to combine a poor ride and poor offroad articulation. The solid axle Toyota had the former but seemed to keep wheels on the ground better. But I still see a lot of the 2wd Nissans in use by landscapers and tradesmen almost every day.
80s/90s Nissans and Toyota pickups survive in huge numbers here local new sales were bolstered by ship loads of used imports have ensured they will both be around a long time to come
_AND_ you get the cool right hand drive ones…..
There are still lots of Toyotas here in So. Cal. but they’re diminishing fast because they’re just daily work beaters, no one care to keep the clean, tuned up ! VALVE ADJUSTMENTS !), oil changed etc., etc. so they clatter along until $omething break$ and at that moment their future is decided : scrap or fix ? .
I never did get a Toyota, I know the Datsun 620’s sheet metal was -so- thin it dented if you looked hard at it .
-Nate
Contemporary Datsun pickups suffered early transmission failure.
For many years in VT, I acquired my ‘winter beater’ as a Datsun pickup with a failed transmission.
Once I put a junked transmission in, I was set for the winter.
I bought my 1972 Hilux in 1986. Picked it up in Wichita. I paid $2000. I had it until 1990 when a collector promised more restoration on it, and it was time for me to part with it. My dad and I kept it together with lots of sheet metal, pop rivets and underliner spray. It used bamboo strips as a seal around the windsheild, between metal and rubber. Same engine as in the Celica. 4-speed. Engine was strong, but the rest of the truck was very rusted. The rubber floor mats covered huge pieces of missing floor.
The cab was really small. I had to push into the black vinyl driver’s bench to squeeze out the extra inches lacking in leg room, so that I could fit my 6’3″ length. It ran great.
No A/C, commuting in Chicago meant that I drove shirtless and finished dressing upon arrival during summers. Rode like a truck, but still rode well. Round gauges, illuminated well, simple dash, that worked.
The turn signals were mounted on each fender and were the same units found on the Toyota 4X4 Rover for that generation. I hand painted the truck in white, with dove gray along rocker panels, bed trim and the unusual hood design. The striped it in Navy. It looked very nice.
Never saw another truck like it until I came across a pair of them for a Kona Coffee Farm south on the western shore of Hawaii. They were restore and looked sharp. I just see photos posted here
My truck was originally sold in Grand Island Nebraska for $2222 in 1972.
Mine looked like this…
Speaking of Toyota’s 4 wheel drive ’79 models, I liked the fact that Toyota used Birfield constant velocity U-joints on the front axle ends. KInd of a pet peave of mine is the common use of Spicer type cross and roller U-joints on the axle ends of most 4 wheel drive vehicles that still use a straight front axle. That type of U-joint really does not work well beyond about a 3 degree angle and one can only imagine what is going on in the differntial when 4 wheel drive is engaged while turning. Driveline bind is bad on vehicle so equipped and I remember a lot of front differential failures back in the ‘full time 4 wheel drive’ days of the late 70’s. Interestingly, a look at most of the early four wheel drive trucks from the 50’s back to the WWII days show that most all of them had Birfield or Rzeppa joints on their front axles. 4 wheel drive trucks and SUV’s with IFS and constant velocity axle joints have a lot less driveline bind with the front axle engaged.