Cars - Toyota Land Cruiser

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	Cars - Toyota Land Cruiser

The Toyota Land Cruiser (now known as Toyota Land Cruiser Prado) is a series of popular four wheel drive automobiles from the Toyota Motor Corporation of Japan. Originally, they were strictly utility vehicles, but they now are available as SUVs. The Land Cruiser is widely used around the world in areas which require durability, reliability and off road performance. For 2007, it will become the only Japanese-built fullsize SUV for the United States, since the Lexus LX (the Land Cruiser's twin) and Mitsubishi Montero are being discontinued for the North American market.

Its widespread use as the transport of choice for militia units and irregular forces in the third world have served as a testament to their reliability and toughness.

Created as a competitor to other off-road vehicles such as the Land Rover and the Jeep, in many places the Land Cruiser is ubiquitous and has almost eliminated other all wheel drive vehicles from the market.

Design of the Land Cruiser began in 1950, and production began in 1953. The Land Cruiser has been produced in a number of different versions, including successful flat bed pickup trucks predominantly used as technicals.

In many places, the term Land Cruiser has almost become a generic term for an off-road vehicle.

Toyota designer Kazuo Morohoshi interviewed in the South African Car magazine explained the background to the birth of the Land Cruiser. "Growing up after the war, I was really impressed by the US Army personnel's Jeeps... and how they could climb up and over obstacles. We have many classic shrines with stairs leading up to them, and these cars simply climbed up those steps. I decided that one day I would make a similar kind of 'mobile', something more like an animal or insect than a car, which could do even better".

Chronology

1940-1949

1941 - The Japanese government tasked Toyota to produce a light truck for their military campaign. Toyota developed a prototype, the 2-ton AK10 in 1942. It was not a success and the production run went to Nissan instead. There are no known surviving photographs of the AK10. The only known pictorial representations are some rough sketches. The truck featured an upright front grille, flat front wheel arches that angled down and back like the later FJ40, and headlights that were mounted above the wheel arches on either side of the radiator. It had a folding windscreen. The US Army Jeep
arrived in the Pacific in May 1943, so allegations of the later BJ being copied from the Jeep are open to question.

1950-1959

1950 - The Korean War created demand for a military light utility vehicle, an updated Jeep, on Japan's doorstep. The U.S. put out a request to tender for 100 vehicles - the exact requirement spec is unknown. Toyota did not respond to this tender.

1950 - In the second half of the year, Toyota got an opportunity to tender for a contract for a Jeep-type vehicle to be procured by the Japanese National Police Reserve Force.

1951 - The BJ prototype is born in January 1951 called the 'Toyota Jeep'. Like the British Landrover Series 1 that appeared in 1949, it has a strong resemblance to the American World War II Willys Jeep. The BJ was somewhat bigger than the Jeep, and considerably more powerful thanks to its 2.2 L four-cylinder L-head engine generating 61 kW at 3000 rpm and 215 N·m at 1600 rpm. The BJ had a part-time four wheel drive system like the Jeep. Unlike the Jeep however, the BJ had no low-range transfer case, making do with an extra-low first gear with a 5.53:1 ratio.

1951 - Toyota loses a National Police Reserve Force tender, but Toyota had the confidence and tenacity to continue development of the prototype with a view to export markets which was part of the vision and strategy of Kiichiro Toyoda, Toyota's founder.

1951 - In July 1951, Toyota's test driver Ichiro Taira drove the next incarnation of the BJ prototype up to checkpoint 6 of Mt. Fuji, the first vehicle to get this far. The test was overseen by the National Police Agency. Suitably impressed by the feat, the NPA promptly placed an order for 289 units, adopting the BJ as their official patrol car. This acts as a catalyst for subsequent orders from the Forestry and Agricultural Agencies, together with several Japanese electrical power utilities.

1953 - Full-volume production of the BJ began with assembly undertaken at the Toyota Automatic Loom Works Ltd, and painting done at Arakawa Bankin Kogyo KK, later to be known as ARACO, which is now an affiliate of TMC.

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Cars - Toyota Land Cruiser

Chronology

1940-1949

1950-1959

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