The JDM Toyota Sedan That Hid A 2JZ Behind Boring Bodywork
You’ve watched the Fast and the Furious on DVD, you dug out the Ja Rule album downloaded from Limewire, and the tank top still fits (just). All you need is a suitable JDM ride. But, searching through the classifieds online, you almost drop your Pepsi Blue. All of those dirt-cheap, rear-drive drift machines that used to go for a few bucks now cost more than a high-end peer-to-peer (P2P) willful infringement fine. Everyone had the same idea, and now all those JZ- and KA-engined legends are way out of reach. But wait. Before you put the wraparound glasses back in the closet, there is a solution. Everyone forgot about one JZ-powered, rear-drive Toyota—and it’s a lot cheaper than you think.
Toyota Wanted To Take On The Germans In The 2000s
Japanese carmakers were going from strength to strength in the ’80s and ’90s. Brands like Toyota had captured the public’s imagination even earlier than that, making Mustang clones that upset your local gas station owner, and generally making cars that blended reliability, practicality, and a bit of excitement into an affordable package. By the time Nissan disassembled a Porsche 959 to make the R32 Nissan GT-R, a coupe that you could take to the Nürburgring and the supermarket in one day, everyone knew that JDM cars had a certain special sauce.
One Market Was Proving Difficult To Crack For Japanese Carmakers
But while the Japanese were perfectly cornering almost every apex of the market, including even reinventing the supercar for the rest of time, there was one market that was tricky to crack. German sedans ruled the world around the 2000s, a time we call pre-SUV, with the BMW 3-Series and Mercedes C-Class nailing that blend of upmarket appeal and attainability, selling millions of units in the process. The Japanese didn’t quite have the products and cachet to compete, even if Lexus was doing a good job of taking over the luxury part of things. But Toyota, in Japan at least, had a new weapon to take on the 3-Series. It was called the Brevis. And no, there wasn’t a Butt-Head model to go with it.
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The Brevis Is A JDM Hero That Escaped The ‘Drift Tax’
Firstly, what the heck is the “drift tax”? To put it simply, any JDM cars that have the ability to drift—that includes pretty much anything from the ’80s onwards with rear-drive and a reasonably capable engine—are in high demand. This in turn means high prices for anything associated with drifting, and the jump in value is called “drift tax.” If you want a car that will drift, you have to have deep pockets. But there is one model that has avoided this market inflation. The Brevis was, as we touched on earlier, an attempt by Toyota to take on the 3-Series and C-Class in the Japanese market.
Introduced in June 2001, the Brevis was derived from the Progrès, and shared its platform with the Lexus IS. Unlike the odd-looking Progrès, the Brevis was aimed at younger customers, with Toyota positioning it to compete directly with imports like the BMW 3-Series and Mercedes C-Class. The thing with the Brevis is that it is unassuming to the point of invisibility. You could still see a well-preserved W203 or E46 and do a double take—the Brevis you would almost certainly walk straight past. And that’s a good thing, because everyone seems to have forgotten it on the used market.
The Brevis Is A JZ-powered Sleeper That Everyone Forgot
What is important about the Brevis is that underneath that Haneda Airport-run skin lurks one of the all-time great JDM engines. Driving either all four corners via i-Four full-time four-wheel drive (4WD), or, importantly, just the rear wheels, are JZ units. The base rear-drive Brevis has a naturally aspirated 1JZ-FSE 2.5-liter inline-six engine that is good for 200 horsepower. Or you could opt for the 2JZ-FSE version, which packs a 3.0-liter naturally aspirated inline-six engine produced by Toyota from 1991 to 2007.
The transmission for the RWD model was the 5 Super ECT featuring the Navi AI-Shift (tech that could automatically shift gears based on the car navigation system’s map data), and the 4WD model came fitted with a 4-speed automatic transmission. There may not have been a manual option, but as the Brevis shares a lot of parts with other Toyota models, swaps for R154 or W58 manuals seem to be fairly common.
The Brevis Matches JZ Power With A Near Lexus Finish
The Brevis was designed to be an upmarket alternative to the small BMWs and Mercedes of this world, and it is specced for the job. The interior is well appointed, with a leather-wrapped steering wheel, high-grade fabric seats (with leather seats optional), a power rear sunshade, woodgrain panels, LCD monitor, and even an MD playback, with seven speakers on the top spec models. The Personal Driving Position System was the most advanced of its kind regardless of vehicle class, says Toyota, and could be tailored (and memorized) to give the driver the optimum positions of the seat, steering wheel, and pedals. In December 2005, the Brevis came with a navigation system compatible with the G-Book telematics service as standard, a telematics subscription service that linked your car to your cellphone.
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The Brevis Could Be One Of The Cheapest Ways Into JZ Ownership
Buying a drift hero JDM car is usually expensive. A Nissan Silvia Spec R from around the 2000s will cost between $30,000 and $4,000, for example, while a 1995 Toyota Supra Mk IV Turbo has a good condition price of $88,000. Where does this leave the Brevis? Used examples are highly affordable in Japan, making the Brevis a budget-friendly alternative to heavily drift-taxed JDM sports cars. Prices range on Goo-net-exchange.com from $3,800 for early models to around $7,000. We found some elsewhere for as little as $2,800 with relatively low mileages.
The Toyota Brevis Can Now Be Imported Into The USA Under The 25-Year-Rule
Under the 25-year-rule on imports, the Brevis is now eligible for import to the USA. The typical cost to ship a car from Japan to the USA ranges from $1,200 to $4,200 per vehicle, says West Coast Shipping, although we recommend doing your homework on cars for sale, regulations and costs beforehand. The cool thing about the Brevis is that it shares parts with other Toyotas and Lexus models, so there are plenty of easy tuning options, with even a chip tune promising an extra 26 hp. If you think the JDM JZ ship has sailed, maybe it’s time to check out a Brevis.
Sources: Wcshipping.com
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