The Fortuner: Toyota’s worst-kept secret

Okay, so we finally lift the lid on Manila’s worst kept motoring secret: the arrival of the Toyota Fortuner. Considering the fact that the Philippines is Asia’s largest market for SUVs, second only to Thailand, I feel bound by the journalistic pact that was signed into effect during the first full moon on the third Wednesday of the leap year of the new millennium — while sacrificing a pig and serving it with sweet liver sauce — to spill the beans to our loyal STAR readers.

But as dramatic as the build up to Toyota’s new SUV has been, its significance is something even more exciting — it marks Toyota’s first stab at the heart of its adversaries and signals the beginnings of something huge. Watch this space. As of this writing, there’s no known launch date, (we suspect early May) so officially speaking, this article shouldn’t even exist, but Toyota cannot keep dodging my emails and breathing through their noses forever — someone is bound to open their mouth at some point.

Its all a little bit cruel if you ask me. I mean, they fly 52 motoring writers, including around ten from the Philippines, to try out the smashing new Fortuner in Darlington Park raceway and the surrounding bushland of the world famous Gold Coast, and then ask us not to talk about it. That would be like me bringing Sponge Bob home for dinner and telling my five year old he’s not allowed to tell his friends about it. But these clever folk at Toyota had every angle covered. They said, "This exercise is about understanding more about Toyota’s IMV program, and how all the products — no matter where they are built, designed or manufactured — still have the raging Toyota heart beating furiously under the hoods. The consistency of quality remains inbred." Or words to that effect. That’s all fine and dandy, but it’s a classic case of evading the hot topic. It reminded me slightly of Mike Tyson’s first press conference after biting...err...fighting Hollyfield and his PR manager saying, "Ok, can we not talk about the ear thing..."

Regular readers of The STAR will have already caught Dong Magsajo’s piece on the whole IMV thing a couple of weeks ago; so for the sake of clarity, and the fact that I don’t get paid extra per column inch, I’ll assume you’ve read it. I will focus instead on the forbidden fruit: the Fortuner.

On the surface you can pretty much sum it up by saying: The Fortuner is to the Hilux what the Everest is to the Ranger. Toyota won’t like that, but it gives you perspective. Having said that, the parallel ends there. Because, as usual, Toyota is like that really annoying kid in birthday parties who will only play if he’s guaranteed to win. The Fortuner is no exception. It has not come in to make friends and swing the odd sale away from Honda, Ford, Mitsu etc. It has come to dominate, humiliate and intimidate any one that dares to stand in between themselves and their global vision of being the No 1 manufacturer in the world by 2010.

Lofty goals, you may say? Yes, so was trying to enter the sacred, traditionally European paddocks of Formula One with ‘One Aim’. They bided their time and battled their way through the Nippon Clip on jokes and are now sitting at the sharp end of the grid wearing that trademarked smirk that their Asian competitors know only too well. Currently they are second in the constructors championship, well ahead of Ferrari. But I digress. It does, however, serve as a snapshot of the corporate culture that your dealing with, and why near enough is not good enough for Toyota.

Back to the car. It all comes down to pricing. If Toyota can nail this, then it could well be the deadly blow in this fight. There’s no doubt that Toyota has a fabulous product, but they really want to price it so that it doesn’t have to continually punch above its weight and compete with the more established premium SUVs. My guess is they’ll go straight for the Pajero/Trooper’s jugular. The Fortuner picks up (no pun intended) on where the Hilux leaves off and raises the bar considerably. It uses a body on frame design from the Hilux, but at 4.7 metres long and 1.85 metres high, its quite big and the third row of seats can accommodate two adults comfortably. Unlike the Hilux, however, gone is the twitchiness at the rear thanks to coil springs taking over the duty from leaf springs.

Inside, it is very Hiluxy. This could very well change, and to be honest, I hope it does. Less Hilux, more Camry should be about right for this market. Fit and finish is typical Toyota — great workmanship, good quality materials, and well thought out. It is very comfortable, but spartan. There’s a chrome edge on the instrument bezels, and the speedo and tachometer have the same blacked out effect of the 1.8 Altis. There are a few steering wheel mounted buttons to control the audio and on board information. Asides from that, it is pretty plain.

For this event, Toyota had chartered out a challenging course for us as wide and varied as their own IMV product line up. There were medium and easy off road courses as well as a hard core, nail biting trail that could put hairs on your chest. The Fortuner’s reasonably short overhangs gave it a better approach angle for tackling the steep hills, while the low range transfer case made light work of the punishing terrain. Hard to imagine that these city slickers could be so capable, considering their passenger car levels of comfort on the road, which, realistically, is where it will really count considering that they’re most likely never going to encounter anything more rugged than a shopping mall’s parking lot.

And that is where things really start to come alive. Underneath that beefy chest, the 3.0 liter diesel snarls when you tap the throttle and it lunges forward with so much enthusiasm, you really end up questioning the need for gasoline engines. On the road, it cruises effortlessly and quietly, only running out of breath at the opposite side of the speed limits. There’s plenty of torque to get you off the line and the four wheel drive system will get you the rest of the way. On and off the road, the 4 speed automatic transmission worked seamlessly with the engine speed and challenging terrain. It drives, well, like a Toyota. And it feels bulletproof.

Cruising in high gear on the Darlington Park Raceway, we were hard pressed to know we were driving a diesel. Gone is that traditional diesel clatter that sounds like ball bearings in a blender, instead, it purred effortlessly even at 150 km/h. Seriously. The levels of refinement are, perhaps, what will impress you the most. It has good low and mid-range torque, and holds the road very confidently. High speed corners, however, are still best taken with restraint. Lap in and lap out, the Fortuner showed no signs of fatigue. I can’t imagine a situation in real world conditions where you would subject a car like this to this much stress, but the mere fact that it was still alive after suffering under the inexperienced heavy hands of some very brutal journalists (not our local guys), is quite commendable.

Equally impressive was the fact that, given the chance to drive each member of the IMV line up back-to-back, (the Sequoia, Innova, Fortuner, Alphard etc) the family resemblance feels deeply rooted into the overall feel of each model. And that’s the whole point. Considering that, technically speaking, these models are the automotive equivalent of a second family.

But, realistically, all this means nothing if you haven’t got the looks to match — and this is certainly not the motoring equivalent of your mom’s friend’s daughter who everyone says, ‘has a nice personality’. Far from it. It commands respect from every angle and you won’t feel like the poor relation at your country club driveway. It has Prado-like wheel arches and a C-pillar window echoing an RX300. It’s lines are clean and flowing, yet masculine. It’s an extremely capable SUV that will fit right at home over here among the urban cowboys, even if it never sees the muddy foothills of Pinatubo. But its still nice to know it could.

The release of the Fortuner could very well be the motoring equivalent of Pearl Harbor. And it’s just the beginning. Toyota, being the control freaks that they are, took a huge risk when they relinquished control of design and development from their home base in Japan. But, look at them now. As they say: no pain, no gain. It may take great strength to hold on, but as Toyota have shown, great things can happen when you let go.