We’ve seen this time and time again – people driving cars recklessly on the roads and wrecking the things. We were shown these photos of a totalled Toyota AE86 and reminded of this very fact.
This incident supposedly took place some years ago, when the owner of the vehicle went for a drive after a few drinks.
In fact, you can still see the can of Asahi beer on the floor on the driver’s side of the vehicle floor in the bottom left corner of the above photo.
What’s also very apparent is just how useful the roll cage was in this instance. The driver apparently walked away from the incident unscathed after the Toyota AE86 dived off a cliff and landed on a tree near the bottom of a valley.
Of course, this recollection of events comes without a shred of proof, but we’ll just have to take their story for what it is.
But what’s undeniable is that reckless driving (whether due to drunk driving, street racing or both) leads to the loss of rare classics, injury and the loss of life. Think hard and make sensible decisions. Fight stupid impulses when you have the responsibility of life and classic cars in your hands. That is all. Sekian. Terima Kasih.
Now a word about the AE86 to make up the word count on this article.
The Toyota AE86 was a 3-door hatchback famed for combining rear-wheel drive, low weight, and relatively high power from a 1.6-litre rev-happy 4A-GE engine. The AE86 had between 118-128bhp and 143-149Nm of torque, could be fitted with an optional LSD, ventilated disc brakes and had fully independent suspension. Many cars featured a 5-speed manual gearbox, but an automatic gearbox was also available. American markets did not have access to the TRUENO model that was made famous by the INITIAL D series.
The AE86 SR5 (4A-C equipped) had an optional automatic transmission, though the GT-S model (with the 4A-GE DOHC engine) only came with a standard 5-speed manual gearbox.
One of the staff who was behind the car’s engineering work was Nobuaki Katayama, who would later head the company’s motorsport department and who would become chief engineer of the Altezza project a decade later.[citation needed] He has a photo of an AE86 hung in his office.[7]
