Off-road trucks and SUVs are all the rage right now, with seemingly everyone offering something with knobby tires and a rugged look. Missing out on the fun is the Toyota FJ Cruiser, which died before it could shine. When we asked you what car went from cool to uncool and then back to cool the fastest, Rippstik makes a great case for the FJ Cruiser as a machine that swung through the cool-uncool-cool spectrum:
Toyota FJ Cruiser, for sure. Sold really well at first, then the demand dropped enough for Toyota to discontinue the model. Now, they’re pretty sought after.
Indeed. FJ Cruiser prices remain nutty, with asking prices high even for ones with lots of miles. Ones with lower miles? Check this out:
This morning, Jason wrote a Cold Start featuring a strange truck illustration (not the one below, which is very nice but not very strange. Slide down into the comments and you’ll discover some things you might not have known. Squirrelmaster gets us started:
My memory is hazy, but growing up riding in those trucks, I know some of them had pressure vents in the bottom of the doors that vented into the interior of the doors where the window track and latch mechanisms were. I think in later years, and certainly in the GMT400 and onward, the vents were moved to the back of the cab, but the older ones had it in the doors.
Mike B replied:
I had a 73, it had vents in the doors. It also had them in the kick panels; you’d operate them via a pull knob to let air in at your feet. That was actually a nice feature, I’m surprised it’s not shown on the illustration.
Now read this from UnseenCat:
The vents in the kick panels were for passenger comfort; lots of cars used to have them, especially when air conditioning was a high-end luxury feature.
The others were part of a mandated passive fresh-air ventilation system which used negative pressure generated at the rearmost exit vents to pull fresh air through the cabin as the vehicle moved. The object was to prevent carbon monoxide from building up in the moving vehicle. It doesn’t really do anything for interior comfort — it’s just supposed to ensure a minimum amount of outside air gets in. Not enough to even help clear cigarette smoke out of the cabin.
Foreign cars usually had visible small vents behind trim at the B- or C-pillars, or sometimes above or below the backlight glass. Early GM designs often had the exit vent as louvers cut into the trunk lid just behind the backlight. (Noticeable on 1960’s Toronados and Rivieras, mainly. The Vega had them too.)
They switched fairly quickly to putting them in the back edge of the doors (rear doors on 4-door cars. From there, they got more creative as standards demanded more effectiveness to the system. The exit vents started to get hidden behind larger overlaps of the rear doors on some front-drive cars, and in places around the trunk lid or rear hatch, or behind trim on the rear quarter somewhere. Nowadays, the exit is often behind on overlap of the plastic rear bumper cladding. Pickups have them on the back of the cab, down below the rear window and in front of the bed pretty much universally now.
Finally, Jason took a swipe at that weird rebadged AI van, and you took a second chance to laugh at it. Idle Sentiment:
Howdy doodly do! How’s it going? I’m Talkie, Talkie Toaster, your chirpy breakfast companion! Talkie’s the name, toasting’s the game. Anyone like any toast?
Matt Gasper:
Such a brave little toaster you are.
Idle Sentiment:
Would you like some toast? I could toast you muffins, teacakes, buns, baps, baguettes or bagels, croissants, crumpets, pancakes, potato cakes, hot-cross buns or some flapjacks?
Dumb Car Aficionado:
AH! so you’re a waffle man!
Idle Sentiment:
Given that God is infinite, and that the universe is also infinite, would you like a toasted tea-cake?
Perfect, have a great weekend, everyone!
Top graphic image: Toyota
Call me crazy but when I see a good condition FJ Cruiser driving around it looks fresh and new to me. Its retro but GOOD retro.
I really wish they would bring them back… with a V8!
The fact that a 13-year-old non-luxury SUV is selling for more than a brand-new Civic is just… so insane.
For the FJ to sell now (as a new vehicle) the mommy market would demand 3rd row seating for 8 with triple zone HVAC and 360 cameras so they don’t keep backing into those parking poles at Target.
A turbo 4cyl with a CVT would be the obvious choice to power it, and a FWD option for those who want the look without any capability to back it up.
(yea, I’m still just a bitter old man that remembers when not every vehicle had to be a crappy minivan replacement)
The top two selling vehicles in the US and top selling vehicle for Ford and GM are full size body on frame rear wheel drive pickup trucks. And at the other end of the spectrum we have the Miata and Toyaburu, both still available with manual.
I feel you may be living in an alternate universe. If we do lose vehicle choice it will be from moronic tariffs.
Elements are trending upwards at a slower but equally stupid rate as FJs.
Toyota has three BOF SUVs in its lineup, including a retro Land Cruiser, and two BOF pickups.
Who is really missing out on the American resurgence of somewhat rugged BOF vehicles is Isuzu and Suzuki.
I would take a Samurai or an Amigo over a 4Runner in an ugly costume any day. And looking at the prices for really beat to hell Samurais I am not alone.
I bought a brand new one one in 2007 and while I absolutely loved it, I had to marry it off.
Despite the assumption, it’s not a great off-roader because its insane weight. For a small footprint as it has, 5500lbs means you’re never going to mud or rock crawl this thing safely. I almost slid down a mild, wet grass hill once – with the first gravity reprieve 1000ft down in a river bed. Brown pants moments despite knobby tires, low range and ample power from the 4.0l.
Road tripping? A joke: a 19 gallon tank, the aforementioned weight, the necessary offroad tires, overall brick shape and the 4.0 powerplant will get you about 250miles between refills. Ridiculous.
I still loved it but it was a pure show (off) car.
They’re only 4,250 lbs at the heaviest (unless you mod it up) but it was never, ever intended to be a rock crawler anyway. Mud, I don’t know about but I imagine that’d be a challenge too. I take mine out onto trails all the time and it’s performed more than fine.
But yeah, the MPG is brutal haha That said, on longer trips, I can get more than 250 out it before I get to ¼ tank but I don’t floor it and I’m not weighed down by anything more than myself and my gear inside. It’s do wish it was better on that though, it really adds up.
A buddy of mine had an FJ for about a year. He loved driving it but he sold it for one reason: the fuel economy was abysmal. He just could not justify the cost to fuel it up. It had Hummer or monster truck like fuel consumption with a comparitively small interior.
Yeah, I’ll be honest, I probably only have mine still because I work from home full-time and don’t have to drive. If I were going into an office multiple times a week, I’d probably feel much differently about it all.
I found it best at blasting through dirt roads at high speed- like a mild taste rally truck and it was lots of fun. That short wheel base somehow worked perfectly.
This is, hands down, one of the ugliest cars in existence, ever. It should have never existed in the first place. Everyone involved in the design of this abomination should be in jail for a long time, that is how bad it is.
Just crush every one of them still in existence, and delete all the pictures. Let’s rid the world of any trace of this — thing.
Live in your wrongness, sir.
I actually think they pulled off one of the most difficult things in automotive design: they made it timeless. I still look at them on the road and doesn’t look at all like a 20-yr old design. Flamboyant? Maybe, but still fresh. Those taillights are awesome.
It looks like it was designed by a five-year old. And five-year old’s ideas don’t evolve that fast. 🙂
Yeah? Well that’s just, like, your opinion, man.
The FJ Cruiser is alive and called simply the Land Cruiser in the US. Look at the take rates on the two-door Bronco and Wrangler for why Toyota did not consider a two-door version.
You’re sadly not wrong. The FJC evolved to suit the modern market it the absolute worst way imaginable – a bloated 4-cylinder hybrid luxury SUV. I mourn the death of the simple 2-door car – we were all better off when everyone drove a Sunfire coupe to get to the mall and a TJ Wrangler to get to the trail.
Yay! Thank you.
My uncle had an FJ about 10 years ago when he moved to Costa Rica to retire. He figure it was a pretty tough truck and could handle their endless dirt, gravel, and mud roads outside of the bigger cities.
The locals took one look at it and said “Nobody would drive something that nice on these roads. Crime is low here, but that will probably stolen within a week”
So he did the correct, local thing — he sold it and bought a 1990s Samurai, then lived off the remaining proceeds for over a year.
Cool truck, but probably the worst of all the LC Prado versions just for sheer impracticality.
Cousin had one of these back in college 20 years ago. The back is absolutely HORRID to ride in, and the view from the drivers seat around the car is shit as well. It’s basically a coup off-roader.
That said, they seem to have a solid, if small, following, and I do see some really nice examples around. I was working a road crew last week and a tourist kept going back and forth with a really nice example that looked new off the lot. I am sure they are just right for some people, but I think the appeal is more nostalgia than actual “awesome vehicle gone too soon”
I was going to say the same thing. We (3 of us) got stuck at a marina on a boat about 3 hours from home (by road, it was going to be 2 days by boat) during a Easter Day Nor’easter in NC about a decade ago, and got a friend to come pick us up so we could sleep comfortably at home until it blew over. They came in an FJ Cruiser and I (6’3″) had to ride in the back. It was like a cave back there – dark and crowded.
Does anyone want a cheap FJ Cruiser? Fun fact: Toyota kept making them for United Arab Emirates…UNITL DECEMBER 2022. They are extremely popular here in Dubai. I’d love to bring one back to the USA, but of course these are all GCC spec.
Torrēre, ergo sum.
Those toaster quotes remind me of Agimus. “Well, you know, I could have fixed your replicator. Right now you could have been enjoying a cheeseburger or blueberry muffins or …guacamole.”
FJ Cruiser prices have been insane for a long time. But I think the new land cruiser is going to bring them down to earth. It does what the FJ Cruiser did, but better. But I’ve never understood Toyota people and their pricing, so ????
Toyota might do well with an actual FJ successor. A competitor to the Wrangler and Bronco.
Two and four doors, removable top, off-road chops. But with the Toyota quality reputation instead of Chrysler’s poor build quality and reliability reputation or the quality problems that have plagued the Bronco.
They probably would have if it weren’t for those pesky consumers making the watered down RAV-4 one of the best selling cars of all time. They do own a 5% stake in Suzuki so maybe they could do a slightly upsized Jimny?
Toyota has an issue already with too many cars in this segment, all on the same frame and offering little to distinguish them. While I like your idea, they need to get rid of the fake land cruiser they are selling now to make it work. Otherwise you have 3 suv’s that are “badass off roaders” for 40-70k being sold by them.
This is true. When they revealed the new three it was pretty clear that they know their three audiences and tailored a version of the same truck for each one. The distinction between the three seems to be purely a marketing distinction. As a marketer, I get it, but as a car guy, eh.
But none of the versions go toe to toe with the Wrangler or the Bronco. Primarily because of the fact that you can’t remove the top or the doors.
I’m a big Suzuki guy, so I do love your idea of an upsized Jimny. I’d buy that.
Yeah I have a 2013 Trail Teams FJ I got back in early 2018 and I paid 25k for it with about 70k miles on it back then. So seeing them hold their value after all these years is not to surprising. Especially with how expensive new 4runners have gotten.