Toyota SA has been exporting South African-built road vehicles for many years, but last week, for the first time, the company air-freighted an off-road racing Hilux Double-Cab bakkie to its new owner, the Belgian team Overdrive.
The lightweight V8-engined 4x4 Hilux has been built to the latest Dakar Rally specifications and will compete in the 33rd edition of this marathon off-road race, to be held in Argentina, Chile and Peru from January 1-14, 2012, in the hands of top Argentine Rally Raid driver Orlando Terranova.
It's been built by Toyota Motorsport director Glyn Hall at his Hallspeed workshop in Johannesburg Hall runs Toyota SA's motor sport programme, which includes the domestic off-road and rally championships, and previously built nearly two dozen Nissan Navara bakkies to Dakar specifications.
The 2012 Dakar will see four locally-built Hilux Double Cabs competing in the premier class T1. In addition to the Terranova entry, a second customer vehicle is under construction at Hallspeed for Argentinian driver Lucio Alvarez and will be shipped to Argentina in November).
Hallspeed's locally-built Racing Hilux V8 bakkies have already proved themselves; the first two have been competing in this year's domestic off-road series in the hands of Duncan Vos and Anthony Taylor. After the final round of the series, the Magalies 400, in mid-November, they'll be prepared for shipment to Argentina for the Dakar, where they'll make up the Imperial Toyota South Africa Team, with 2009 Dakar winner Giniel de Villers (who'll be competing in his 10th Dakar) and navigator Dirk von Zitzewitz in one and Duncan Vos (with navigator Rob Howie) in the other.
Hall said: "We'll have to re-build the Hiluxes and fit a lot of specific parts and equipment for the Dakar, such as the onboard hydraulic jacks - which, like most of the vehicle, was designed and built in South Africa
"We're very proud of the mostly South African content of our racing Hilux. Apart from the Group N engine, which is a standard production 4.6-litre all-aluminium V8 made by Toyota in Japan and fitted with a 35 mm restrictor to meet Dakar regulations, and the French-built Sadev six-speed sequential gearbox, almost everything else has been built in South Africa.
"A new feature on the Terranova car is a rear-mounted radiator which we made up from two production Land Cruiser cores. The braking system was specially made for us by Power Brake and has 320 x 32mm ventilated discs all round and six-piston callipers front and rear," Hall added.
The double cab passenger body is made of South African steel in the Toyota plant in Durban, while the front and rear panels and bonnet are locally made from lightweight composite materials. The specially designed exhaust system is handmade.
The two export bakkies are left-hand drive to conform with Belgian and Argentine requirements. Reiger shock absorbers from Holland give it the regulation 250mm of wheel travel in front and 300mm at the rear, but the suspension and live axle were designed and specially made in South Africa.
Ground clearance is 300mm and the Hilux conforms to the 1937kg weight class with two spare wheels fitted at the back, running on special Rally Raid competition tyres from BF Goodrich.
The Dakar Rally will start in the Argentine seaside resort of Mar del Plata on the Atlantic coast of South America and will finish almost 9000km later in the Peruvian capital Lima on the Pacific coast on January 15.
In between there will be five racing special stages in Argentina, a crossing of the Andes Mountains, five stages in Chile including a crossing of the Atacama Desert before a rest day on January 8 in the Chilean town of Copiapo. Then, for the first time, the rally will cross into Peru for four stages and a ceremonial finish.