Fine prospects for new Corollas

Press, 22 January 1988, Page 25

Fine prospects for new Corollas

Toyota New Zealand, Ltd, hopes to sell 8500 Corollas this year, and most will probably be the 1.3 LX 4-door hatchback, the cheapest car in a comprehensive range. That is 10 per cent of New Zealand’s projected new car market for 1988 and it represents a lot of business. Frankly, after having spent some time with a selection of the new Corollas, which should reach dealers’ showrooms within weeks, I believe Jack Wills, Toyota New Zealand’s sales and marketing manager, was not overly optimistic when he talked about Corolla 1988 sales prospects at the Waitangi motoring press conference before Christmas. First generation front-wheel-drive Coronas with their Chris Amon-tuned suspension were good, but the second generation models are so much better that there is really no ground for comparison. The range has been attractively rebodied and is marginally longer, wider and lower, although the wheelbase is unchanged. To Western eyes, the body changes have produced a conservativelystyled European car, and when this image is supplemented by the interior, the Corolla feels the most European of Japanese cars. Apart from rebodying the complete Corolla range — a project that even the largest and most profitable European manufacturer would have contemplated hesitantly before shelving the idea — Toyota has set about creating a car that the Western world with all its fancies and foibles will accept without questioning its origins. Toyota has carried the European image a stage further and encompassed the engineering. The Amon-tuned sus-

pension is not markedly different from that of the older Corollas. MacPherson struts with widerspaced L-shaped arms at the front and tubular rather than pressed parallel transverse links at the rear are employed for better wheel control. There are anti-roll bars front and rear, the front bar being unique to New Zealand and furnishing tangible evidence of Amon’s influence in the production of locally assembled Corollas. But the main feature of the Corolla’s suspension arrangements is that they are mounted on subframes rather than directly attached to the monocoque bodyshell, as was the case in the first generation models.

The subframes contribute towards the production of a much more rigid and taut car, and also one in which the occupants are insulated from mechanical and road noise. Although provision of a much more rigid bodyshell has contributed to an average weight increase of about 75kg over first generation front-wheel-drive Corollas, by far the larger part is

attributable to the suspension subframes. In fact, bodyshell and subframes have materially improved the chassis dynamics of the Corollas. Generally, Japanese saloons lack the solid feel of a European car and convey an impression of lightness, often associated with an impression that the front end is floating at higher speeds. This impression is sometimes underscored by the rear end which fails to telegraph to the driver pointed messages about what it is doing. All Corollas feel heavier than their predecessors and their unassisted rack and pinion steering consolidate that impression. Although by no means intractable, the steering is rock-steady, irrespective of all but the strongest cross-wind, in straight line running. Such stability is more common in cars of European origin and, in fact, it is a feature of the Corolla in any situation. Like the other four 1.3litre Corollas, which include sedans, liftbacks and a station wagon, the XL hatch is powered by Toyota’s single overhead

BEHIND the WHEEL with

Peter Greenslade

camshaft three valves per cylinder 2E four-cylinder engine. It develops 57 kW at 6200 rpm and a not too lusty 106 Nm of maximum torque at 4200 rpm. This engine is tolerably quiet until approaching the higher levels of its rev range when, in marked contrast to the four valves per cylinder double overhead camshaft engine employed in the 1.6-litre versions of the Corolla, it becomes somewhat raucous.

Nevertheless it is quite

refined, revs freely and would even be considered exceptionally smooth by people more conversant with cars of limited production quality. Because peak torque is not developed until high engine speeds are attained, in the normal course of events one must have recourse to the gearbox to maintain smooth progress. The five-speed manual is very smooth and it is because of the ease of swapping ratios that one tends to muff changes as one tends to approach the operation too casually. In the course of a holiday trip through the Mackenzie Country to Wanaka, I came to the conclusion that a tail wind and a long, slightly downhill incline would be needed to achieve the magic 160km/h. Whether this is so is, in reality, of little importance because it is a surprisingly effective point-to-point hatchback The journey was accomplished in little more time than it would take in one of the better 2-litre cars, and in much the' same standard of comfort. The real bonus came in petrol consumption, the average being 8.56 litres per 100 km, using leadfree fuel. Considering the time the round-trip took, consumption was far better than could possibly be accomplished with a more powerful 2-litre car. Although rear seat passengers felt the car was a little unstable and tended to sway on twisty sections of the road, it felt good under these somewhat extreme conditions in the front’seats and I guess if

an additional half-hour had been spent on the journey, rear seat passengers would have had no grounds for complaint. The 1.3 LX hatchback is the type of car that most New Zealand families use for their motoring and I believe that anyone who bought it would not be disappointed. This particular Corolla has the limitations overall size and limited power output impose. Otherwise, it goes about its business in an extremely competent manner. Of course, price is likely to be a determinant when making a buying decision, and I believe that in this day and age, when local assemblers and importers are scrambling with almost unseemly haste to retain or build their market shares with price cuts or other buying incentives, the retail figure of $19,695 is by no means out of the way. In fact, viewed in the light of the revised prices of competitive cars, the tag on this Corolla makes good reading. It seems to me that in its new Corolla, Toyota, the world’s third largest , car-maker after General Motors and Ford, has found exactly the right ingredients for a universally acceptable recipe. The General and Henry will have to look to their laurels if they are to stay at the top of the tree and I’ve no doubt that some of the established European car-makers will be casting around quite desperately in an effort to retain their loyal customers who, from now on, will be offered a most satisfactory small car alternative by Toyota.