Toyota's coupe joint effort with Subaru

Toyota has unveiled its vision for a sports coupe being jointly developed with Subaru.

The Toyota-badged car, dubbed the FT-86 Concept, which was shown at the Tokyo motor show, is compact and lightweight and has a low centre of gravity. While it is fitted with a 2-litre boxer engine from Subaru, the overall design was created by Toyota's ED2 styling studio in France.

Even the blue-red metallic paint was specially developed by Toyota.

"Sports cars have to be red, but we wanted a new red," said chief engineer Tetsuya Tada. "So we came up with shoujyouhi red, the traditional red colour of a Japanese monkey's backside."

Toyota and Subaru parent Fuji Heavy Industries plan to start producing the car in late 2011.

Toyota will be responsible for most of the engineering. Fuji Heavy will supply the horizontally opposed engine and manufacture the car at a Subaru plant.

The car clearly underscores new Toyota President Akio Toyoda's push for more muscular, fun-to-drive models.

Tada said Toyota wants the FT-86's sticker price to be in the US$20,000 range. "The price has to appeal to regular customers."

The car seats four and has a front-engine, rear-drive layout. The boxer engine allows for a lower hood. Key to the design was maximising fuel efficiency by reducing weight and creating a compact design, Tada said.

Tada also said it gets a dedicated chassis, noting that "enthusiasts don't want a shared platform".

- AP