Little RED monster: 1998 Toyota Levin XZ
I'll admit. I have a soft spot. I love red shiny cars. But then again, who doesn't? Sure it's no fire-breathing Ferrari, but it is one of the finest cars to roll off the Toyota factories. Us folk here at Shift love our Levins. We previously featured the Ae91 Levin GT, and today's issue is its very own nephew, the AE 111 platform Levin XZ.
Let's rewind and shed some light on the history of this car. Toyota started production of this line of cars back in 1972. Two door lightweight coupes sold well; everyone wanted them, and thanks to brilliant cost-effective Japanese engineering, people all over could afford them. A lot of them made a perilous journey overseas and made it to our land of red and green.
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel. What you see here today is a Levin XZ, with a near-complete Levin BZR transformation. That is what makes it all that more interesting. Now the difference between those two models lies in the engineering, and the modeling. The XZ has a boring exterior, while the BZR came with a facelift and sleek front bumpers and sides. The engines too, are worlds apart. The XZ comes with your daily driver 4A-FE, while the BZR has a beefier 4A-GE Black Top, with a Limited Slip Differential and uprated suspension.
The car came in as a factory stock Levin XZ, the boring one. But Rafael Mahbub wasn't happy with that. He went to every length to transform his car into a BZR-XZ cross breed.
Let me walk you through the whole make-over.
Exterior
The owner ripped out the boring XZ front bumper and replaced them witha factory BZR front end and put in the grill and head light, all procured from a BZR half-cut. An OEM front lip was installed, with side skirts and an impressive rear kit, the car gleaming in its Milano-Red paint. He installed Advan Racing light weight 17" rims with 205/40/R17 tyres, good for almost all kinds of weather. He even has the rare BZR tail lights to complete the look.
Interior
Open the doors and you have a proper race-car cockpit. Recaro bucket seats hold you in place when you take corners at blistering speeds. It has after market gauges for battery voltage, vacuum pressure and water temperature. The gauge cluster from a BZR was installed, with a 9000RPM redline. A TRD Shift knob (6-speed) completes it. You have a 12" sub in the boot if you want to crank up the music real loud.
Performance
Motor and Drive Train: 4A-GE 20V Black Top with C160 (6 speed) LSD transmission with complete wring, complemented with an ECU and other sensors all of which were gratefully donated by a Levin BZR half cut. The drive axles and shafts are stock as these are the same in XZs and BZRs. The Levin has a K&N Cold air intake, Ultra Racing 3-point front strut bar for better handling coupled with Eibach Pro-Kit 1.5 inch drop lowering springs. The suspension items are genuine Toyota, again, ransacked from a BZR. The exhaust system comprises stock blacktop headers, a 2.25 inch free flow pipe, catalytic converter removed, and Revolution aftermarket 2.25 inch in/out end box.
The only thing left on Rafael Mahbub's bucket list is the rear disc-brake conversion, and after that he's done.
Anybody with the right amount of cash can tune a car, and make it go fast. But only a handful of enthusiasts will go to these lengths to build a timeless coupe. At times not even the cash helps. You have to wait months to find the right parts, and you might not be find most of them. This car wasn't born over night. Months of mod-hours went into it. At the very end this proud owner has a one of a kind monster.
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