Toyota's new RAV4 fulfills promise

Not quite truck, not exactly car, but it's a blast

BY: ALAN VONDERHAAR
The Cincinnati Enquirer

It was love at first sight. I first spotted Toyota's RAV4 at the 1995 edition of the Detroit Auto Show, a year ago. It was perched demurely out of reach on a raised platform, painted an eye-catching red and reflecting the multitude of overhead spotlights like newly fallen snow.

Wow, sez I to myself, that's gonna be a smash.

I had to wait a year to actually sit one, a year filled with anticipation and the fear of dashed hopes. Was it worth the wait?

Definitely.

Is it going to be a smash?

Well . . .

I wonder if price isn't going to be the show-stopper. The one Toyota lent me, though definitely in the topmost quadrant, was by no means maxxed out, and it still came in at $21K-plus. To be sure, you can spend that on a Jeep Wrangler with a hard top, but I would hope most kids would find that price range elusive.

And this is definitely a youth-oriented vehicle, although Toyota sales officials I talked to predict a surprising number will go to us old folks, too. I think they're right - this little cutie has broad appeal.

Though it may look like a sport-utility that was left in the dryer too long, it's really more car than truck, making liberal use of the home-market Camry parts. While this may not commend it for running the Rubicon Trail, it makes it a lot more livable in the kind of service the vast majority of buyers will put it to.

The suspension is independent, coil spring with rear trailing arms. This endows it with a ride quality that is surprising, given its diminutive size. The four-door version of the RAV4 sits on a 94.9-inch wheelbase, which makes it among the tidiest vehicles on the road. Its two-door brother, however, has a mere 86.6 inches between axles.

Overall length of both makes them definitely vest-pocket machines: 162 and 145.9 inches, respectively. An intermediate like a Ford Taurus, for example, is close to 200 inches.

It's surprising how well Toyota's engineers managed the space. Not only did I have a (bare) sufficiency of room behind the wheel, I could sit in the back agreeably enough, and there was still a very useful 26.8 cubic feet of space behind the second row of seats. Nice legerdemain.

It's relatively high (65.4 inches) for its size, so headroom is plentiful. That would come in handy if you opted for the twin sunroof package, available unfortunately only on the two-door.

A short wheelbase implies a pitchy ride, but Toyota circumvented that particular law of nature, at least on the four-door I tested. Ride quality overall was fair to good, which is plenty good enough for the class. There's a bit more harshness than you'd find in, say, Toyota's little Tercel, but the RAV4 is tougher by design.

Oh, yes, the name. Not an area where Japanese companies shine. It's supposed to mean Recreational Active Vehicle 4-wheel drive. The logic breaks down when you consider that a two-wheel-drive RAV4 is available, but what's in a name?

You could get a two-door, front-wheel-drive machine for thousands less than the one I tested, but I don't see the point, unless you're buying strictly for the funky looks. A Tercel/Paseo would be a much more pleasant runabout.

The RAV4 shines as an all-wheel-drive machine. The only driver interaction the drivetrain ever demands is the locking center differential, invoked only in the most parlous circumstances by merely pushing a switch on the dash. A torque-sensing differential is optional, and highly recommended.

February in Cincinnati is a good time to try out a vehicle of this type. During the trial, we had rain, snow and a mix of both, and the RAV4 was a champ. Its 215/70 tires are wrapped around huge (for its size) 16-inch wheels. The tires were grippy in all conditions, and the all-wheel-drive mechanism functioned flawlessly, its machinations noticeable only if one was looking for them. My notoriously steep and slippery driveway stopped a two-wheel-drive vehicle one snowy morning, but the RAV4 shot up it as if it were July.

All RAV4s have the same engine, a 2-liter, 16-valve number that supplies 120 hp and 125 foot-pounds of torque. I didn't have enough dry pavement to time it, but from the weight:power ratio would infer a time to 60 of about 11 seconds. That doesn't sound particularly snappy, but in field trials, the little guy seemed quite perky and I had no problem merging onto freeways.

The engine's sound is unappealing, and there's a lot of it. Both intake and exhaust noises have an irritating raspy, boomy quality that pervades the cabin at both high revs and high road speeds.

My RAV4 had the standard five-speed transmission, which shifted well. A four-speed automatic is available and wouldn't be a bad choice if you're willing to give up some acceleration. I like the smooth flow of power an automatic gives in an all-wheel-drive machine.

The interior of the dark green tester was grey plastic, pretty boring, but relieved by a snappy-looking fabric treatment on seats and doors. Ergonomics overall were quite good, except for the radio, which had too-small concentric controls.

The radio was the ''deluxe'' four-speaker upgrade and it was pretty mediocre. Tuner sensitivity was good, but tonality was poor. Aftermarket, I hear you calling.

Dual airbags are provided across the line, and antilock brakes are available on all series. I found stopping distances acceptably low on a patch of dry pavement. The RAV4 has big discs front, drums rear.

With a green engine and a lot of foul-weather work, I logged 22.7 mpg, using regular unleaded.

RAV4 should be a smash hit, if parental pockets are deep enough or if Toyota does a good enough job of trumpeting its virtues to an older crowd. It's a shoo-in for my Top 10 list.

Base price on the all-wheel-drive, four-door RAV4 is $17,048. The tester had the all-weather package, a steal at $70. It comprises a heavy-duty battery, starter and windshield washer tank, heavy-duty front heater and rear seat heater duct. The sample also had air conditioning, $985; alloy wheels $685; cruise control, $290; and a package consisting of tilt wheel, power windows, locks and mirrors, deluxe radio and digital clock. Total, with freight, was $21,128. Take some extra loot, because there's a long list of dealer-added functional and appearance accessories which might be hard to resist.

CP:Funky-looking as the four door is, the two-door RAV4, with its shorter wheelbase, is even more distinctive.

Originally published Feb. 17, 1996