1968 Toyota Corolla Sprinter – Archived Instrumented Test – Car Hutt Reviews

TESTED

Can you imagine a Japanese trying to say “Corolla”? Not in a million years. Oriental tongues just won’t move in that direction. Which is to say the name alone should sound a red alert to BLMH and VW because it makes pretty obvious Toyota’s aspirations for something larger than the home market.

United Kingdom and German early warning systems aside, there’s yet another consideration: notice our Corolla’s last name—Sprinter? Instead of following the accepted automotive practice of using the verb sprint, Toyota has very correctly chosen the noun form as the name for its diminutive fastback. Could it be that the Corolla is aimed directly at English speak­ing countries—specifically the 10% im­ported car market in the U.S. of which VW is now enjoying the lion’s share? May­be. Maybe even a good strong MAYBE. Especially since Toyota seems to feel—and we agree—that the Corolla has a lot of good stuff going for it.

Before we go any further we’d better make it clear that all Corollas are not Corolla Sprinters—which should be good news to potential buyers over six feet tall. Toyota, in its well-intentioned zeal to pro­vide a sporty, low-priced fastback for the masses, got carried away and chopped the top of the Corolla 2-door sedan 1.3 inches. It looks great on the outside but the interior is suitable only for children under 12 and headless horsemen—neither a market segment of overwhelming proportion.

Mechanically, the sedan and Sprinter are identical. We tested both and found them comparable in every area except for head­room and the seats.

The result of all our pinching and squeezing, our measuring and lunging, is our conviction that the Corolla is in every way a real automobile—and yet because of its size it has a wholly different personality from its big brothers. You don’t get into it; you put it on. Eagle, and Botany, and the men’s department at Marshall Fields would call the Sprinter about a 38 Short—but the sedan seems a bit bigger. Maybe a 39 Regular. It has everything that’s nor­mally found on a real car but it just doesn’t take up much space. Externally it’s 2.5 inches narrower and almost six inches shorter than a VW with 4.5 inches less wheelbase. At 1666 lbs. it’s lighter than a VW too—by 250 lbs. All of this allows you to do almost impossible things, like park in half-size spaces and maneuver through maze-like shopping centers with incredible ease. Suddenly roads seem twice as wide and you hardly have to slow down for corners. You can play road racer and drive a line in every corner but never get out of your own lane. Familiar roads be­come totally new territory, and you find yourself diving for apexes that would be a ridiculous waste of time in most full-size American cars.

This sort of maniacal conduct is en­couraged by the Corolla’s delightful han­dling. It understeers—but only a little—so none of the engine’s power is wasted in trying to push the front wheels sideways. As you corner faster and faster the body roll increases but you can still maintain direction by steering rather than relying on power to get the tail out. This is particularly important in low powered cars, and we’d say the Corolla’s handling characteristics are exactly suited to its power supply. On dry pavement the Corolla signals its limit by gently lifting its inside rear wheel so you won’t be able to go any faster but chances are you’ll chicken out before you get that far anyway.

The Corolla’s suspension with a Mac­Pherson strut in front and semi-elliptic leaf springs in the rear is not at all uncommon in small cars, but the front is unique in that it uses both coil springs and a trans­verse leaf spring. When designing a Mac­Pherson system the chief problem is trying to position a coil spring of adequate size in the space under the fender without hit­ting the tire. Toyota sidestepped the issue by using a leaf spring as a helper.

We’ve always been in favor of light weight in automobiles because of the ob­vious improvements in performance and economy, but when you reach the extreme lightness of the Corolla other problems—the direct consequence of the very lightness you’ve achieved—tend to intrude themselves. Even though the test car carried almost 57% of its weight on the front wheels (which is normally advantageous for wind stability), it didn’t fare very well in cross winds simply because the wind doesn’t have to push very hard to move it sideways. It’s no worse than a VW, but then the VW isn’t very good. Not only that but it likes to nibble, too. Crossing a longitudinal groove in the road at a very small angle is sometimes enough to launch the car sideways for a distance that feels like half its track width—which admittedly isn’t very far. The whole proceeding has all the fun elements of a carnival thrill ride and the highway patrol doesn’t even consider it a moving violation.