Toyota's LFA Works Now Home To Mirai FCV Production
Remember when Herr Schmitt took us for a TTAC exclusive into the workshop that made the Lexus LFA? It’s now the home of the Toyota Mirai.
Automotive News reports Toyota gave its FCV to the LFA Works — located behind the Motomachi plant in Toyota City, Japan — because the facility’s attention to detail and better tools (i.e., hands) than any of the more “ultra-efficient,” machine-powered factories under the automaker’s watch.
Because of the Mirai’s hand-built nature — the powertrain and other components are assembled in Toyota’s Honsha plant, then brought over to the LFA Works for final assembly — executive vice president for domestic sales Masamoto Maekawa warns supplies will be limited, with only 700 planned for the first year, 200 of which are already on-order:
Each unit is carefully built with utmost care. So therefore, the production volume might be limited. During the initial stages, delivery time might be delayed. The 200 orders are mostly from government and corporate fleets.
Prior to the Mirai, the small workshop made limited-edition models, including a $10,000, 100-unit run of carbon fiber bicycles marketed to well-off Lexus owners, a carbon-fiber roof for special performance variant of the Toyota Mark X, and of course, the 500 LFAs assembled between 2010 and 2012.
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To my eye, Toyota has made many ugly vehicles and very few beautiful ones, but this mess of a design I can think of no explanation for. Shame, the fuel cell technology is amazing and finally in mass production, but this vehicle I'd be embarrassed to seen in.
It looks like they were doing an CGI morph from Corolla to some supercar, and stopped the animation in the middle.
Looks like it's got mumps.
That is one whacked looking car! The roofline does indeed look a bit handmade. As in, hand beaten by an apprentice blacksmith.... The hoodscoop is on backwards. And the front looks like it has on, one of those bite prevention thingys people put on aggressive dogs.