Doomed 1979 Corolla Wagon Would Fit In Current Corolla's Cup Holder
The tiny rear-wheel-drive station wagon, killed by hatchbacks, minivans, and 64-ounce sodas, is no longer with us. Here’s a reminder of an era in which such vehicles were relevant.
The 2T-C engine in this car displaced 1,588cc and made 88 horsepower. That doesn’t sound like much, but keep in mind that this car scaled in at a mere 2,280 pounds.
Yes, it was noisy and crude and would leave nothing but a grim memory in the responding paramedics’ minds after tangling with an Excursion, but I’m still saddened to see another subcompact wagon get crushed.
Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.
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If that were a proper sized station wagon that could hold more than 4 midgets I would be sad to see it get crushed. But a crude RWD underpowered rust to oblivion Toyota from this time period. All I can think of is not being able to make it up the slight ramp to get to the very first McDonalds drive thru during Winter with one of these owned by my friend at the time. It would barely make it up normal hills in the Summer either and passing on a two lane highway was scary. I think he only had it that one Winter and Summer when he lost his job and had to make due with a beater. Haven't seen one of these in about 20 years- no joke! His replacement 1986 Celebrity wagon felt like a race car in comparion with the 130 HP FI 2.8 and there was considerably more room and comfort to that car.
Well, I'm taking my 78 Toyota Corolla out of retirement. I have a carburetor related problem. When the car warms up the idle heaves back and forth. I was advised it's an idle air control valve. What part is that exactly? Can anybody advise where I can find a picture of one? The car passes smog at normal driving speed but not when idling. Also, I found a lot of carbon build up in the EGR valve, is it possible the interior of the engine as the build up as well? What type of instrument do I use to clean inside via the ports?