Old Cars in Fremont

The Fremont neighborhood in Seattle has long since ceased to be affordable for ordinary human beings, but it retains some of its quirky character in the form of a lot of old cars and trucks.

This 1949 Ford F-1 has been nicely restored. That's a pretty nice chrome grill for a working pickup from this era.

 

 

The mid-80s Chevy El Camino, still a fairly common sight on the west coast.

 

This 1976 Datsun 280Z was the first car in the series with fuel-injection. It was way ahead of the dinosaurs Detroit was offering at the time.

 

1987 Dodge Ram. Far less common that the old Ford and Chevy trucks you see on every block here.

 

1980 Toyota Celica. One of the few cars from that era that is hard to kill.

 

And finally, right in front of the Ford F-1, quite a contrast: A 1990 Mercedes 560 SEC. This car cost around $85,000 new. That would be over $200,000 in 2024 dollars.

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1969 Toyota FJ55 Land Cruiser

There are a lot of old Land Cruisers on the west coast. Almost all of them are the looks-like-an-old-Jeep 40 series. In 1967 Toyota astutely observed that there was a market for a Land Cruiser that was more of a family vehicle. Thus the FJ55, which was the same 4X4 with a new skin. Toyota was was ahead of the curve on the future of the SUV market.

 

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13 Old Cars on a 6 Mile Drive

Here's an exercise to demonstrate just how many old vehicles one can see just a few minutes driving around Seattle. I spotted all of these vintage vehicles (and more I didn't stop to photograph) driving along Elliott Bay through Ballard.

Chrysler was still working on its formula for sporty cars when it built this 1965 Dodge Dart GT. It was only a year later that the company would build some of the most legendary muscle cars of all time, such as the Plymouth Satellite and Dodge Charger. I believe this Dart pioneered the vinyl roof.

This 1965 Dodge A100 van belongs to Mean Sandwich. They make a pretty mean sandwich.

Someone is trying to restore this 1961 Thunderbird. They have a long way to go.

This 1983 Mercedes 240D is pretty much impossible to kill.

 

 

Here are 3 of the many older Ford pickups I saw on this drive. There's a 20 to 80 year old truck on every block in Seattle; Fords predominate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Through 1976, the Chevy Blazer was a full "convertible" with the roof removed, this is the slightly later model with the roof only removable from the bed.

 

If you think old VW vans are everywhere out here, you are correct.

 

 

Toyota SR5 pickup, circa 1982. Another vehicle hard to kill.

 

I hadn't seen a single Datsun in years before I moved to Seattle. These B210s from the late 70s turn up from time to time.

 

And finally, another microbus, this one crazily converted to a water-cooled engine, and another Blazer.

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1985 Toyota Supra

There's an old joke among car enthusiasts that the shortest book in the world is "The Book of Collectable Japanese Cars." That isn't true any more, if it ever was. This Supra is a fun, easily-maintained classic. And it looks brand new; someone has been taking great care with it for the past 35 years.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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1974 Toyota Corolla

1974 was the year the Corolla became the best-selling car in the world. Although little known in the US at that time, a series of gas crises combined with the inability (and just plain lack of interest) of American car makers to build a quality compact car would mean we'd be seeing a lot more of this car. Here's an even older Corolla I spotted in Queen Anne.

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1984 Toyota Van - There's so many of these in Seattle, I can photograph 'em two at a time

When I was a kid in the midwest, I think I saw one of these, ever. But apparently the Toyota LiteAce Van sold in big numbers on the west coast because I see them all the time.

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1990 Toyota HiAce Super GL

There are so many made-for-Japan, right-hand drive vehicles in Seattle that I see one or two every day.

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1973 Toyota Corona Mark 2 pickup

Another right-hand drive import.

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1971 Toyota Crown Custom Wagon

Known in Japan as "the Whale" this Crown Custom Wagon was spotted down at the SoDo importer of Japanese cars designed for use in Japan. Most of their vehicles are from early 90s, as cars that don't meet American standards for smog and safety are eligible for import when 25 years old.

* Love the double-grill look and the way-up-front side mirrors.
* This car has a manual transmission of course, so if you've ever had a hankering to drive a left-handed three-speed column shifter, here's your chance.

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1984 Toyota Camry - I Come to Bury Detroit, Not to Praise It

Look around on any busy city street. How many Toyota Camrys do you see? Half a dozen maybe? More? Some of them twenty and even thirty years old? I can remember when seeing a thirty-five year old car in the city was a strange occurrence. Toyota, Honda and Nissan changed that. Probably the only Camry I don't see every day is the very first model, pictured below. Camry has been the best-selling car in America for fifteen years running and no end in sight. Back in the day, Ford tried frantically to move enough Tauruses to keep that title; now they no longer care. Toyota may have sold 178,000 Camrys in the first half of 2018, but Ford sold 451,000 F-150 pickups.

* This Camry is a small, very basic economy car. Funny how every car model seems to get bigger and more luxurious the longer it remains in production. The original owner opted for an automatic transmission, but this is the base model and it does not have the nice rims and two-tone paint job seen on the Camry LE.
* Say, what the heck is a "camry"? According to Toyota, "Camry" comes from the Japanese word kanmuri for "Crown". OK then. I mean, Toyota, already has a model called Crown.

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1987 Toyota Crown Super Salon

If you're into right-hand drive, you probably could not buy a more indestructible car than the Toyota Crown. The Crown has been Toyota's signature big (well big by Japanese standards) rear-wheel drive car since 1955, unavailable in the US since the mid-70s. It is however legal to import vehicles not designed to US standards once they're 25 years old, and here on the west coast I occasionally see right-hand cars and trucks from Japan.

Observations:
* Love all the little crown logos unique to this model.
* This Crown is powered by the turbocharged "Diesel Ceramics Power" engine. It will probably run forever.

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1983 Toyota Starlet drift car

Somebody is rebuilding this Toyota Starlet from the ground up, and the reason seems clear: with its tiny wheelbase and rear-wheel drive, the Starlet is the perfect drift car. And despite being Toyota's cheapest model, its reliability is legendary.

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1968 Toyota Corolla

Imagine the owner of a 19-foot-long, 375 hp Cadillac pulling up next to this car in 1968. Was the Caddy driver's reaction, "Wow, Toyota will conquer the automotive world" ? Probably not.

Observations:
* You have to stand next to this car to appreciate how truly tiny it is.
* Speaking of Cadillacs, the engine in the 1968 Sedan deVille was fully seven times as large as the 1.1 liter inline-4 in this Corolla.
* This particular Corolla lacks the optional side mirrors. Trying to change lanes on an expressway in this car must be terrifying.

   

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