Sometimes you’ll see a car for sale and it will literally take your breath away with its aching beauty or rarity or just how the whole price-to-car ratio just makes it such a stunning deal. This is one of those cases. This is one of those times when a car that should be the literal dictionary entry for boring – a 1996 Toyota Camry – somehow exceeds all possible expectations and becomes something far, far beyond what you ever thought it could be. This car is available in Sydney, Australia, for the minuscule sum of $845 Australian dollerydoos, or a mere $574.40 in American Screaming Eagle dollars. As you can see by these pictures, this car has been improved not by something added to it, but by a brilliant act of editing.
Look at this thing! It’s been bisected right at the B-pillar, and all that cumbersome bullshit that we call a “back half of the car” has been wisely replaced with some square-section steel tubing mounting what looks like a colossal shopping cart wheel. I think it pivots, like a caster?
There’s also a pair of angled braces, because this is not some hack job, and what looks kind of like a drink cooler that has been re-purposed into a fuel tank? Is that right? That’s brilliant, as it will keep your hot gas hot and you cold gas cold.
There’s not a whole lot of other information in the add – not that any rational person needs any more information – save for the mileage (quite low, for a Camry!) and that it’s an automatic (oh well, nothing is perfect) and then the one bit of absolute deep-fried, cheese-slathered gold that is the Seller’s Description:
Not only do I have no notes here, I have nothing but boundless respect for these absolutely glorious five words, which, together, should receive the Nobel Prize for Understatement or Chemistry, whichever gives the bigger prize.
Just imagine what owning this thing would be like! If that rear wheel pivots, what must this be like to whip around! Think about the tightness of the donuts you could do! Think how maneuverable this thing would be! It’d be like driving a fast forklift, kind of?
Plus, even better, the looks on the faces of the people you encounter with this car, after you tell them you just drive an old Camry, have to be absolutely priceless. Imagine picking up someone on a first date in this thing, after telling them to keep an eye out for the silver Toyota Camry approaching them. That pause as their mind tries to process exactly what the hell it is they’re looking at, before tentatively opening the door and sitting down, a mix of excitement and fear and confusion pulsating throughout their body!
You can’t get as good a reaction from a car even if you rolled up in a fucking Bentley. This three-wheeled half-Camry, this is it. Whatever your questions are, this is the answer.
Godspeed, friend.
UPDATE: It’s a Camry. Not a Corolla, as the ad suggests. A commenter reminded me, but I’m kicking myself because I looked at the front and registered Camry and just went with Corolla, anyway, because, let’s be honest, I was rushing. I have a lot of growing up to do. Also, is this really in Sydney?
(Thanks to our favorite Australian, Laurence, for showing us the light about this!)
You, @JasonTorchinsky, are one of the most engaging writers on the whole of the internets!
With a swivel wheel in the back, pretty sure this is all but impossible to drive in anything other than a tight donut… That said, give me a crash helmet and an empty parking lot and sign me up!
p.s. New racing series anyone?
This abomination was at one time located in Corning, NY. These pictures were taken in the parking lot of a former grocery store in town. I’ve actually seen this thing in action and it looks both awesome and very scary. I haven’t seen it in at least a year so I don’t know what has become of it.
In action??
C’mon, now, you can’t leave us hanging: what happens when the driver steps on it? I assume one side pulls a bit harder than the other, right?
So, does it go straight when you give it some-or what?
I was driving by when the dude was ripping donuts in the parking lot. Being front wheel drive and having a single pivot wheel in the rear the thing was whipping in tight circles even though he didn’t appear to be hammering on the throttle too hard.
I thought all of the grocery stores in town became former shortly after Wegmans came to town. That must have been late eighties early nineties. I grew up there and make it back up every couple of years. Where is this former grocery store located?
Park Ave in South Corning. Was a Jubilee when I first moved here in 2007 but has been closed for ages now.
I vaguely remember seeing a Jubilee over there but didn’t think of it as a grocery store, more of a quick stop with a larger selection.
Living in Corning myself (and having driven by it a bunch) i had to do a double-take when i was scrolling and saw this thing show up and thought i was living in some bizarro universe where TWO of these existed.
That’s a fix for the Toyota dent.