Remembering Japanese cars from the past

Tag: levin ae85

Is this AE86 heaven or hell? – Japanese Rustoseums

Seeing a rusty AE86 is always sad, but seeing five makes me wonder whether this place in Japan is AE86 heaven or hell. Welcome to another Japanese Rustoseum post!

Wrecked zenki panda three-door Sprinter Trueno GT Apex AE86
Wrecked zenki panda three-door Sprinter Trueno GT Apex AE86

Let’s start with the first one. This is a presumably late-1984 or early-1985 white panda zenki Trueno GT Apex 3-door that has suffered from some accident damage. The front has been caved in, which means it’s probably a write-off. I think it’s a GT Apex as it does feature the bucket sports seats, and panda paint and doesn’t seem to have an areal on the right fender.

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Pre-production Corolla Levin SE AE85 – Friday Video

One of the highlights of this year was a WhatsApp call from Daniel ‘O Grady out of the blue about an early Corolla Levin SE AE85 he found. I was doing my usual Saturday groceries and just parked my car in a parking garage. Daniel was very agitated about this car as it had such a low frame number.

6600 kilometer Toyota Corolla Levin SE AE85
6600 kilometer Toyota Corolla Levin SE AE85

During the call, it dawned on me that such a low frame number meant it was actually a pre-production run. Last year I created an overview of the AE86 and AE85 frame numbers and a lookup function. One of the things that surprised me was that the AE85 production in May 1983 started at 180, while AE86 production started at 1. There are no records of the pre-180 frame numbers in the EPC either. This means these cars have been assembled in pre-production.

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