After market seems to forget 1st gen??!

I'm Jealous! Do you ever wish you had them again?? I'm sure everyone at some point has had a car/truck they wish they had kept or parked in a sealed vacuum. For me it was my Red, 5 Speed, 1980 Toyota Celica ST 20R 4cyl.
My friend growing up had a 5 speed, 1982 Celica GT with the 22RE (fuel injection). I was so jealous.
Those engines were bullet proof!!

 

That shit is some kind of black magic I don't fully understand. @foxrcing07 can explain it better than I can.

 

my HS buddies dad had a mid-80s black GT-S convertible but he never let me drive it. His son did not know how to drive MT but I did so I was bummed
something like this one

 

As a 1st gen owner myself and the owner of a manufacturing facility that caters to Toyota off road enthusiasts let see if the market is there.

Create a thread, Post it in here, Group buy feeler or however you like. We want to know what do the 1st gen owners really want? If there is a market for said product we will make it. A small handful of people is not going to be enough to support R&D, Design, Prototyping a new product. So most likely a group buy of 25 to 30 people would have to be done to make it feasible and get the new product off the ground. We tried it with skids and that didn't happen maybe this thread will have enough reach to get more 1st gen owners on board.

Now is your chance, You want to see new products hit the market for the 1st gen Tacoma lets make it happen prove me wrong.

And if you don't know who we are and need an example I have a little experience building things on 1st gens.
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/jlees-build.114345/

 

As a vendor who started his business with the 1st gen Tacoma I can offer some insight.

Bottom line is money and expectations of what that money buys you. When we started there was very little 1st gen stuff, that's why we started a very popular Toyota truck and SUV rock crawler parts supplier was quoted on forums like this saying (the tacoma is a camry with 31in tall tires no one will off road that) there were a few shops that said, (hold my coil over strut, watch this) But even when we were doing 80% 1st gen Tacoma's the numbers didn't compare to today's numbers. Small batches of sliders, custom one off bumpers is all that market allowed for us to do at the time. We did rear bumper batches in 5-10 range and sliders were 10-20 at a time. The FJC was the first production Toyota that allowed us to go into full blown production. Every toyota since then has allowed us to do the same. along with the hobby gaining people faster than we could produce new products.

There are very little margins in even the new stuff that we make, asking someone with a truck with a net value of 5-7k if they wanna spend 1-2k on a bumper is out of reach for most. I use to make this comparison for long travel set ups. You would see hard working kids spending 5-7k on a long travel set up for their 2-5k trucks. It was almost cheaper to find a truck with long travel on it already and buy it for the parts.

I'm not saying we won't go back and do 1st gen Tacoma parts but to keep our product to the standard that customers have come to expect it would be a 1000+ front bumper and 2000+rear bumper with swing out. We've actually already made a front and rear bumper for the 1st gen the front we never put into production and the rear the price of material got to expensive for how we were building it and we only sold a couple a year.

Unfortunately the older vehicles will fall into the hands of cheaper quality bumper manufactures that source their designs from small companies like ours and mass produce them in china. But it is possible that in the future we will start doing custom one off products again for those that want something unique and having one off is more important than cost of something.

 

I don't know why folks have a hard time grasping this, or maybe they grasp it but don't believe it? Companies/Businesses aren't just gonna intentionally leave money on the table. If market was there, the product would be there to fulfill the demand. Economics 101 it would seem to be in my book.

 

The1970 240z was my favorite, it had a serial number of 2021

Was the lightest of all of them and best quality.
The newer 280z with T top was the worsts.

Emissions was holding it back, interior was padded vinyl that ripped and got sunburned easily.

Was more of a cruiser then the 240z and didn’t handle anywhere close to the 240z

 

If you mean double cab, a small minority of us can......by swapping in a manual....

 

How is this any different than just lifting off the brake with an auto?

 

It moves slower. I even drop it into 2 low if I'm in bad traffic.

 

the 'potential' to stall or jerk it i cannot say i have ever stalled an AT when I have the opportunity to drive one
but the real crawl control on the newer Tacomas I don't know how they operate exactly

 

there must be a market for interior parts on these old trucks?

i know of some that would like bezels, consoles, seats, what else? dashboards, carpet, steering wheels and probably assorted this and that plastic trim pieces due to age or the accidents that can happen

 

Yeah... $100 for a damn piece of seat plastic

 

For plastics, set up costs are the issue (making a mold for injection molding) So, there needs to be enough market to justify.
Once made, reissues are easy & relatively cheap, which is why plastic model manufacturers keep re-releasing kits from the 1950s through 80s over & over (it keeps them in business).
Toyota owns the original molds, IF they still have them. They could sell them off to another to use, or remake the OEM parts.

Now, 3D printing might change things completely!

 

perhaps,perhaps! maybe they are getting word these old trucks are getting to become 'classic cult-like' and may never stop running!

i hear the molds specs are probably on one of these

 

It's rough that the first gen rear shock relocation kit just wasn't profitable. After actually wheeling my truck I was upset to learn that any full flexing of my suspension will destroy my passenger side rear shock. The only way I'd be able to do the relocation job with my current skillset is to buy a kit and have a friend help me weld it on.

 

I just sold my 83 280z Turbo last year. Tan with red velour interior. Everything still work except for the AC (leaked out of the back of the compressor). I missed the talking lady.

 

I had one of those without T-tops. Loved it but needed more room eventually.

 

Amazes me how big the AC compressors were back in what I can remember the late 70's & 80's. About the size of a push lawn mower engine.

 

Vendors response is exactly how I feel about this.