The return of the LHD BJ74 tale (1 Viewer)

[flx]

Following the discussion we had a few months ago on the Red Rocket Troopy thread to not pollute more @theglobb thread: Builds - The "Red Rocket" Troopy - https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/the-red-rocket-troopy.1205247/page-18#post-13866639


A LHD BJ74 just showed up for sale in France, it's one that was prepared for racing by André Koro (famous for preparing a lot of vehicles and proto for the early Dakar and participating to numerous rallye-raid).

Seems it participated to numerous rallyes back in the day and today is participating to all the historical rallyes.

Numerous other photos in action of this vehicle can be found easily on the Internet:

I asked the seller about it, he confirms the frame is stamped BJ74 and he can't see any sign of a conversion RHD->LHD.
He also provided me with the VIN, I will not post it publicly but if a few want to check it I can provide it.

The VIN has the same structure than the one from this classified: Sale BJ74 LHD in France - https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/sale-bj74-lhd-in-france.793880/
jt1vobj7400005***

I ran it in toyodiy and it returns "No records found", same on any vin decoder/identifier website.


Checking with other BJ74 vin that have been posted on ih8mud it seems that the Australian BJ74 (Australian 70 Series owners... - https://forum.ih8mud.com/threads/australian-70-series-owners.1219136/#post-13240788) have quite a few differences:
JT721BJ7409000***

JT1VO versus JT721, not sure what it means/changes??
Australian vin also has a 9 in the 11th digit, isn't it indicating a CKD model?


Debate is open...

 

[OGBeno]

Lots of possibilities here. Arakawa was doing lots of weird 1-off production models during this time period.

The 1980’s was when Toyota released most manufacturing controls of LC production to Arakawa as a “black box” supplier.

They were doing lots of weird testing and prototyping for advanced manufacturing processes during this time period.

They knew that the 80 series was coming and had to test a lot of capabilities between 1985-1989 to make sure 80 series production launch was flawless.

 

[clintnz]

Crikey! Racing a leaf sprung 13BT BJ74 would be a fairly slow bumpy experience Cool bit of history though!

I think I'd prefer my friend's BJ73 based racer better - coilovers, bypass shocks & a supercharged LS1!

Cheers
Clint

 

[WarDamnEagle]

For some reason 23k euros doesn't strike me as too much for that vehicle; especially since it's immediately importable to the US. Of course it's hard to tell the condition from photos.

 

[flx]

Crikey! Racing a leaf sprung 13BT BJ74 would be a fairly slow bumpy experience Cool bit of history though!

I had the occasion to see and discuss with the owner of one of the very few FJ73 imported for racing (before the BJ74 I think) and with a similar race preparation than this BJ74.
They have double shocks on all 4-wheels and have been very precisely tuned for racing (I would believe with very light leafs and letting hightech shocks do the job). If you try to drive them at road speed their are like a piece of wood but if you go through a bump at full race speed they are very stable and can take a lot.
This one specifies it has 8 shocks from Fournales, which is a French company specialized in doing shocks for offroad racing : Concept technique – Fournales Suspension - https://www.fournales.fr/concept-technique/

For some reason 23k euros doesn't strike me as too much for that vehicle; especially since it's immediately importable to the US. Of course it's hard to tell the condition from photos.

Things is, it is so transformed for racing that if you want to use it for any other usage (travel, daily or candy) it would be a lot of work to transform it back.
Expect a lot of fiber parts and the back entirely filled by the rollbar, 2 sparewheels and 1 big fuel cell.

 

[roscoFJ73]

I asked the seller about it, he confirms the frame is stamped BJ74 and he can't see any sign of a conversion RHD->LHD.
He also provided me with the VIN, I will not post it publicly but if a few want to check it I can provide it.

After BJ74 on the body plaque, a LHD model would have "LV". RHD have nothing to denote RH

 

[flx]

Finally got a picture from the manufacturer plate of a BJ74LV !

The output of Toyodiy on the serial number :

BJ74*V-MRX is a complete model type that I don't find listed in the EPC so definitely an oddity.

 

[bj70bc]

is 045 toyota desert zebra

 

[flx]

is 045 toyota desert zebra

It's white but note that this picture plaque is from a different vehicle than the one in the first post.
Actually they have completely different style of serial number as the first one had a full 17 characters VIN while the last one has a 11 characters serial number which will mean they were not originally intended for the same market.

 

[FJBen]

It's white but note that this picture plaque is from a different vehicle than the one in the first post.
Actually they have completely different style of serial number as the first one had a full 17 characters VIN while the last one has a 11 characters serial number which will mean they were not originally intended for the same market.

I will say that one VIN is mine, and from all the research and questions answered on here, my 88 BJ74 seems to be the first Cruiser built for Australia with the new 17 digit VIN requirements in 1988.


We know Japan is still RHD so it’s a general market cruiser. I’m not sure when France and those areas went to 17digit VINs but thats probably the reason for the short VIN there.