[laser2707]

For someone who has lived & worked in the Middle East, the LC Wagon was as commonplace as Shawarma. They were just part of the landscape, period. Since one saw them everywhere it was easy to forget that it is the most reliable, durable & failsafe vehicle to run on those roads.

I had the opportunity to drive all variants of LC. The most difficult was the LC70 Pickup in an unladen condition. The massive 4.5 ltr engine generates more than 300 Nm of torque. It's like riding a frisky horse. The empty cargo bay can fishtail behind you if you are not careful.

In comparison, the LC100 Wagons are imperious Kings of the Road. Other cars deferred to the LC100 & let it pass when they saw one in their rear-view mirrors.

There are many examples of LC's running over half a million km without any problems. Countless LC anecdotes circulate, about how in the most hazardous operating conditions, deep in the desert, the fine line between survival & mortality was determined by who drove an LC & who did not.

As times change, the LC Wagon will come to be viewed as an indulgence rather than the failsafe utility vehicle it really is.

[sandeepmohan]

Spotted these over the weekend.

The white one is a new 70 series Land Cruiser LX with a tray, powered by a 4.5 liter, 32 valve, quad cam, V8 diesel engine.

The other two are owned by my neighbor. The brown one is an old 60 series (possibly) and the black one is a Prado. Both are V8 petrol's. The brown one has dual exhaust pipes sticking out on each side. Makes quite a noise too.

[Nitrous Power]

Originally Posted by GTO

But I sure wish they'd update the generations more often. The current-gen Landcruiser is now 13 years old! That is ridiculous for such an expensive SUV. Just to put things in perspective, in this same time, we've seen THREE new generations of the S-Class!

As Gthang mentioned in his post, LCs have 25 years of optimum performance shelf life on parts. Hence, the owners are tend to keep LCs for a much longer time compared to other vehicles. Also, most LC owners are repeat customers. In this case, shorter life span doesn’t help much to LCs sale performance.

Originally Posted by gthang

Dunno the veracity of the claim, but I have heard that LC's are made with at least 25years lifespan for every component from the design stage itself. Goes against the keep up with the trend idea.
Personal vehicle volume of the LC's are very low compared to institution sales. Hardly an oilfield in the Middle East that is not littered with them, not to mention all the UN/NGOs.
Long hard life and reliability are the demands of the core consumer, not keeping up with the trend. And remote base mechanics and store keepers are thankful for it.

Cheers

[bmw_lover]

Toyota Land Speed Cruiser - World's fastest SUV

video

“We thought, ‘why don’t we take a Land Cruiser, make it ultra-powerful, and just see how fast we can make it can go?” says the manager of Toyota’s Motorsport Technical Centre, Chuck Wade. It hit 230.02mph on a North American runway, stealing honors from Brabus, whose Bi-Turbo V12 GLK claims 211mph.

But how do you make a near three-tonne SUV faster than a LaFerrari? Top Gear went behind the scenes, in Toyota’s Los Angeles-based skunkworks department, to see the Land Speed Cruiser take shape…

Now, the Brabus’s route to going quickly was simple. Take the smallest, lightest Mercedes SUV and put a twin-turbo V12 in it. Simple. Toyota’s route, however, is a little less obvious. As standard, the Land Cruiser weighs 2.6 tonnes and has the aerodynamic profile of an outhouse. Short of gutting the V10 from a spare Lexus LFA – if there is such a thing – there’s no oversized engine in its locker for a transplant.

So Chuck’s team have set about fiddling with the Land Cruiser’s standard engine. In the US, that means a 375bhp 5.7-litre V8 powered by petrol, a liquid it drinks at a rate of around 15mpg. More importantly, though, that V8 yields a 142mph top speed.

Some way short of 211mph, then. So Chuck and his engineers were looking for power. Much more power. “Calculations show us 1900bhp will get us to the speeds we’d like to attain,” he tells us. “And the engine – as in the block and everything except the head gasket – is built to go to around 4000bhp. But with everything we’ve got built into it now, we’re probably going to be limited to about 3000bhp. Which is still good power. It can get you to work on time!”

Anything that is limited to 3000bhp is good. The biggest change to the engine is its new turbos, which sit behind those gaping intakes sitting below each headlight. Described by the team as ‘volleyball-sized’, they’re ball-bearing turbos made by Garrett, able to provide up to 55psi of pressure. Note their wire mesh housing, so they can gulp in lots of cool air but stay unclogged by unfortunate rabbits.

The Land Cruiser’s standard automatic gearbox has gone, replaced by a drag-minded three-speed gearbox with an overdrive. It’s built to handle 3000bhp. Chuck has fitted a Weissman Locker differential – “a bitchin’ diff”, he affirms – while the suspension is from Toyota’s aftermarket TRD team. It’s been revalved and resprung, while the car, you’ve no doubt noticed, sits around five inches lower than standard. Peer beneath and the exhaust setup is practically a work of art, though for the high-speed runs, there’s a clean underbelly panel fitted to aid aerodynamics.

You might have guessed the aero would need some work, but it’s also the area with some of the quickest gains. There are cameras rather than wing mirrors – “we don’t want elephant ears on the side of the car,” says Chuck – while the rear spoiler incorporates an adjustable Gurney flap. Getting the Land Speed Cruiser’s centre of gravity as far back as possible has been key, because the front driveshafts have gone. This Land Cruiser may have eight times as much power as standard, but it’s rear-wheel drive only. Yikes.

It doesn’t weigh any less, mind, even though the interior’s been trimmed down and the back seats removed. “It’s a 6000lb vehicle still. We didn’t save weight. We didn’t make a race vehicle. It’s 5960lb (2.7 tonnes) full of fuel oil and driver. That’s good for traction. The real neat thing about its tyres (Michelin Pilot Supersports) is that in their normal application, they’re run under a lot of downforce, so they’re built for weight.

“Ferraris and Lamborghinis and things… huge downforce. I looked at the tyres for the Bugatti Veyron at first, and the guys said ‘don’t even think about it’, because they’re hugely expensive. We got these Michelins totally off the shelf, I bought this one from Tire Rack. They asked how long we want to sustain high speed, and I said ‘just long enough to do the high speed’. These tyres have got over 300mph in them.”

Chuck can’t wait any longer. He’s desperate to show what it’s all resulted in. Given the relatively subtle bodykit, he’s suggested the Land Speed Cruiser is a sleeper. When he starts up that V8 – the warehouse practically falls down around when all eight cylinders fully kick into life.

Fast forward a couple of months and Chuck’s pride and joy is at Mojave Air and Space port. Because when you need a length of tarmac large enough to get a 6000lb car the edgy side of 200mph, you need somewhere designed for space travel…The runway is 2.5 miles long.

“The first time I drove it was all-wheel drive and super stable. Then it was turning to rear-wheel drive and I was thinking ‘how’s this going to work? Is the back end going to step out with all that power, will the back just want to pass the front?’

“Then at our proving ground it was hitting almost 190mph! I could steer it and change lanes; 6000lb with a bit of aero, and it didn’t do anything funny or strange or out of character. And once you get onto the straightway at 190mph you have a head start.”

A good confidence booster for topping 211mph at Mojave, then. “Our objective is 220mph. I’m thinking with a couple of mods we can go 230, 240. I’m just worried about the other end, knowing we’ve got enough space to slow down!”

The record run’s stunt pilot – recently retired NASCAR driver Carl Edwards, spookily sets 211mph on his first run, with barely an inch left for slowing the big Toyota from any higher speed. Which is where having a power figure so short of the engine’s limits suddenly seems a very good idea. With the boost pressure of the turbos raised, power can edge up from 1900bhp and Carl can hit a higher speed earlier. And he does exactly that, recording 230.02mph with braking room still to spare. It’s a script worthy of Hollywood.

Save for the slightly imperfect ending, because there’s no actual place in the record books awaiting Toyota. “Initially the team wanted to set a world record for the fastest SUV on planet earth,” says Dan Gardner, a Toyota spokesperson. “Guinness had some different ideas about definitions of the word SUV around the world, though, and they weren’t willing to recognise the category.” It’s also worth pointing out that while you can buy a 211mph Brabus, you can’t buy a Land Speed Cruiser. “But we thought ‘let’s still do it by ourselves and record the data’, we still want to say that this is the fastest.

Chuck and his team really did do it, though. The final word must go to the man behind the wheel at the exact moment they did, racing retiree Carl Edwards. “At 225mph, the thing was wandering a little bit. All I could think was that Craig said, ‘No matter what, just keep your foot in it,’ and we got 230mph.” What a way to fill his newfound free time, eh?










Source: TGear

[benbsb29]

Originally Posted by landcruiser123

The car evokes the romanticism with overland adventures through remote regions far away from urban civilization. I dream of driving one of those 70 series LCs across Australia and South Africa through the remote parts of the country. Would love to rent the diesel manual with the single turbo 1VD-FTV. Most of the cars customized for overlanding adventures have two spare wheels and two fuel tanks with 130 liters of diesel.

Since you mentioned this, here are a couple of Landcruiser pics I had clicked during my drive to the Australian outback. One is a 70 series, and the other a 200 series.






As you keep moving inland, its almost only Toyotas that dot the landscape.


For those interested, my travelogue from my trip to the Australian out back : https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/trave...n-outback.html (Our venture at exploring the Australian Outback)