DAIHATSU  COMPAGNO  SPIDER
(1966 Model)

The Compagno was available in a 2 door sedan, a wagon, a pick-up and the very attractive convertible Spider. It had a 797cc 41hp engine and a 958cc 55hp engine. The Spider was a 4 seater, with 2 reasonable sized seats in the back. It had a very neat soft top mechanism that folded down into it's own compartment behind the back seats. The car features a vary attractive dashboard that is similar in style to a 1965 Fairlady.
The trend in the 1960s in Japan was to hire a European designer to work on the styling of the car. Prince had used Michelotti in the past, who was now at work designing the second generation Hino Contessa, and Nissan had also employed Count Albrect Goertz to work on the Silvia, who would later go on to design the Toyota 2000GT and be involved in the Datsun 240Z project. Not to be outdone, Daihatsu made the phone call to Italy and secured the services of Vignale to design the Compagno. 

TOYOTA  SPORTS  800
(1965 Model)

This is a wonderful looking little car. The Sports 800 used the engine and mechanicals based on the Toyota Publica 700. It had an air cooled 2 cyl. 790cc engine. It also featured a removable targa roof. Sadly only 3131 were ever built.

SUBARU  MAIA
(1966 Model)

The Subaru Maia is a far cry from the high performance Subaru WRXs of today. The Maia was fitted with a 2 cyl. 2 stroke air cooled 356cc 16hp engine. The later cars were fitted with a 422cc engine producing a ground shaking 22hp. They were made from an extremely thin gauge sheet metal, and as a result of that most have long since rusted away.

DAIHATSU  MIDGET
(1959 Model)

Before moving into 'normal' car production Daihatsu specialised in producing 3 wheelers like the Midget.

MITSUBISHI  DEBONAIR
(1967 Model)

Mitsubishi's answer to the Nissan Cedric and Toyota Crown was the Debonair. This car entered production in 1964 and the last one was built in 1987. (not a typo error, this thing was still in production in 1987) During that time it had only 3 updates, which were little more than a change to the tail light design. It was powered by a 2000cc 6cyl. engine and later by the 2600cc 4cyl. Saturn engine.

HINO  CONTESSA  COUPE
(1966 Model)

The Contessa Coupe had a 1251cc 55hp engine, and a mechanical design based on a 1960s Renault. An Australian motoring journalist, when asked to name his list of the 10 worst cars of all time, included the Hino Contessa 1300 in his list. His only comment was "The bastard thing tried to kill me, twice!". 

HONDA  S800
(1966 Model)

Initially available in Japan as the S360 and S500, with 360cc and 500cc engines, by the time exports began it had grown to 606cc, and was later enlarged to 791cc in the S800. Technically it was a very interesting car. Honda were a well established motorcycle manufacturer before the decided to move into car production, the S series sports cars were their first attempt at building cars, and their motorcycle heritage was evident everywhere you looked on the car. The S600's engine was an all alloy, wet sleeve, twin cam 4 cylinder engine with needle roller crankshaft bearings. It had 4 motorcycle carburettors that were fed by an electric fuel pump that was electrically regulated by a set of points driven off one camshaft. It developed 57hp at 8500rpm and would rev well past 10000rpm. It had four wheel independent suspension. At the front it had fairly conventional torsion bars, but at the back it was a whole different story. Final drive was by oil bath chains to the rear wheels, with coil-over-shock absorbers attached to the rear of each chain case. The chain final drive utilized aluminum swing arms which served double duty as chain cases, and also acted as trailing arms for independent rear suspension. This setup worked so well that when it came time to make the S800 model they dropped it and fitted a live rear end. The S series Hondas were very successful, selling nearly 25000 cars from 1962 to 1970. 

ISUZU  BELLETT  GT
(1966 Model)

The Bellett sedan looks better but this one goes better, and it's quite rare. The Bellett GT has a 1600cc 95hp engine with twin carbs. She had disc brakes up front, 4 speed close ratio gearbox, full instrumentation and all the "go fast" extras you'd expect. Considerably more expensive than the Fairlady, MGB, Triumph, Etc., which probably explains why they sold so few of these great little cars.

HONDA  T500
(1966 Model)

The Honda T500 is probably the only truck ever built that was based on the mechanicals of a sports car. When it came time to add a truck to it's range Honda fitted the dinky little T500 with the twin cam, all alloy, wet sleeve, quad carburettor, 4 cylinder engine straight out of the S500 sports car. This made it possibly the only truck in history that would rev well past 10000rpm. Truly mad!

MAZDA  R360
(1960 Model)

Mazda's kei car from the early 1960s, the R-360 had a 360cc air cooled V2 engine.

TOYATA  PUBLICA  CONVERTIBLE
(1964 Model)

Toyota's first soft top of the 1960s was the Publica Convertible, which was an open air version of the Publica sedan. It was powered by a 698cc air cooled 2 cylinder engine that produced a 28hp at 4400rpm. It took the best part of a minute to get to 100kph on it's way to a top speed of 110kph. 

ISUZU BELLEL
(1965 Model)

The big brother to the Isuzu Bellett, the Bellel had a 1791cc 4cyl. engine.

MAZDA  COSMO
(1967 Model)

The Cosmo was Mazda's, and Japan's, first Wankel Rotary powered car. The early Mazda rotary engine exhibited all the problems that eventually lead to the collapse of the first company to use a rotary, NSU. The main problem was the extremely rapid wear of the rotor seals, which are the ratary's equivalent of piston rings in a piston engine. This often meant an engine rebuild was needed as soon as 40000 miles. The Cosmo featured a unique and very stylish body.

MITSUBISHI  COLT
(1966 Model)

The mid-sized Colt had an 800cc engine, and later a 1000cc. It was available as a sedan or 3 door hatchback.

FUJI  CABIN
(1955 Model)

The Fuji Cabin was built by Fuji Heavy Industries, the company that would later build Subaru car. The car has a polyester body covering the mechanicals from a scooter. It was powered by a one cylinder 121cc engine developing 5hp. Only 85 were built.

TOYOTA  CROWN
(1965 Model)

The Crown was the Toyota equivalent to the Nissan Cedric. The '65 model was powered by a 2000cc inline 6cyl. engine. This model has a seperate chassis, the chassis and engine of this model has been used as the basis of a couple of Australian made AC Cobra replica kit cars. The Crown became the car of choice of the retired-aged / bowls club set. I have to watch what I say here because my parents used to own one.

HINO 4CV
(1953 Model)

In 1951 Hino started building Renaults under licence, in a deal similar to the Nissan/Austin venture. This car is the Hino version of the Renault 4CV, which was powered by a 750cc 4cyl. engine.

MIKASA
(1966 Model)

Mikasa built cars from 1957 to 1961. They all had air cooled 2 cyl. 20hp engines. They built a sedan, a station wagon and this rather pretty convertible.

TOYOTA  TOYOPET  700
(1964 Model)

It was powered by a 698cc air cooled 2 cylinder engine that produced a 28hp at 4400rpm. Also available with a 2 speed automatic which made the car incredibly slow, giving a 0-100kph time of just under a minute.

KUROGANE  NOVA
(1961 Model)

Kurogane dated right back to before the Second World War, but the company folded in the early 1960s. They were most well known for their 3 wheel trucks from the 1950s, but they also built some larger commercial vehicles such as the Nova.

HOPESTAR  SY
(1958 Model)

The streets of Japan in the 1950s were full of these odd little 3 wheel trucks like the HopeStar, There were many small 3 wheel truck manufacturers at the time such as Mizushima, Tokusan, Mizushima, Giant, NewEra, Cony and Kuragane, as well as major manufacturers such as Daihatsu and Mazda.

OHTA
(1953 Model)

I don't know much about Otha except they built this car, and it had a 903cc 4 cyl. 23hp engine. They seem to have disappeared in the late 1950s.

TOYOTA  2000GT
(1967 Model)

The most desirable Toyota ever built, and probably the rarest, with only 337 ever built. The engine was the same block as the 2 litre Toyota Crown 6cyl. unit, but was fitted with a Yamaha designed double overhead camshaft cylinder head and three two-barrel Solex 40 PHH carbs to produce 150hp. Due partly to the fact that James Bond drove one in You Only Live Twice, it was destined to become a collectors item, a 2000GT that cost about US$6800 new in 1967 will fetch in excess of US$100,000 today for a near perfect example.

SUBARU  SAMBAR
(1964 Model)

A small cab-forward truck powered by a 660cc 4cyl. engine.

TOYOTA  CROWN  PICK-UP
(1967 Model)

Nissan had been basing it's smaller pick-ups on it's small sedans since the 1930s, and Toyota were doing the same in the early 1960s with pick-up versions of the Publica, Tiara and Corona. But Toyota took it one step further and built a pick-up based on it's top of the range luxury model, the Crown. It had all the Crown's luxury features, and also it's 2 litre 6 engine.

MITSUBISHI  500  A10
(1961 Model)

Mitsubishi is one of Japan's oldest car makers dating back to 1917.  The 500 was their early kei car, with a 493cc 21hp 2cyl. engine.

HINO  BRISKA  PICK-UP
(1964 Model)

Hino are well known today for their large trucks. In the late 1960s Toyota took control of Hino and killed off it's car making division and kept the Hino brand as Toyota's large truck division. The Briska was a conventional (unlike the rear engined Contessa sedans they were building at the time) mid-sized pick-up range that also died after the Toyota takeover.

TOYOPET  CROWN
(1956 Model)

The Crown range dates back to the 1950s and has always been Toyota's large size car. For a while the cars were being sold as Toyopets rather than Toyotas. In the 1960s the Toyopet name was used for it's smaller cars, and by the mid-1960s the name had totally disappeared.

SUZUKI  SUZULIGHT
(1966 Model)

Suzuki built only 43 examples of the Suzulight, their first car.  It has a 2 stroke 360cc air cooled 2 cyl. engine.

HINO  CONTESSA
(1966 Model)

Hino was established in 1942 and started building cars in 1953. Many Japanese car makers had technical agreements with European car makers organized by the Allied Forces after the war to help rebuild the Japanese industrial sector. (Nissan had an agreement with Austin) Unfortunately for Hino rather than being allied with a decent car company, they were stuck with Renault. In 1953 they started building Renault 4CVs under licence. When they started building their own cars they used Renault technology (!) , which meant engines slung way over the back wheels giving them a less than ideal weight distribution. Early Contessas had an 893cc 35hp engine. 

SUZUKI  FRONTE
(1967 Model)

The Suzuki Fronte was a small front engine, rear wheel drive car powered by a 660cc engine.

CUTIE FACT - The origins of some Japanese names Subaru is the Japanese astronomical name for the star cluster called Pleiades M45, which is what all those stars are in the Subaru logo. In Greek mythology Pleiades is refered to as the "Seven Sisters", refering to the 7 daughters of Atlas and Pleiade (one daughter is called Maia), but the Germans refered to the star cluster as the "Hen with Chicks". Ahura Mazda is the name of the Zoroastrian god of light, which makes the name Mazda a very fitting name when you consider the company was originally set up to manufacture light bulbs. The Toyota Motor Co. began as the Toyoda Loom Works, founded by Sakachi Toyoda. When the company built it's first car they changed the name from "Toyoda" to "Toyota."  The reason given for this was that the name change made the Japanese lettering more streamlined and was also chosen because the number of strokes to write Toyota in Japanese (eight) was thought to bring luck and prosperity.  The sound of the word "Toyota" was also deemed more appealing.