sato

handles surprisingly well too, considering all the weight and it being even heavier in front than the standard 2.4 it was built from. have had the traction control kick in once only in 10 years, and it was accelerating while changing into the outside lane, already doing 80, up a hill during a downpour. can't touch your 11.8km/L. i tried resetting the counter in all different conditions, and best i got was 10.5 on a long road trip. even on highways here there's a lot of traffic and braking though which i guess explains it. once a single extra temporary traffic light on my daily commute dropped efficiency by 0.6km/L. very glad to hear i had a part in your decision, thanks! remembered an ongoing problem i've had with it is the driver alert system. it often (once every 2-3 months or so) beeps loudly when it detects a "dangerous" (really just a little close, part of regular driving) situation, which i found really distracting, and dangerous because this loud beep comes right when you're in the process of trying to avoid a situation. mine's a 2007 model so maybe they improved it in your model, maybe you'll never experience it (because you don't live in a country full of asian drivers!) or maybe you'll just eventually get used to it like i sort of have. went off just this morning actually, "shut up car of course i'm not going to hit the giant truck."

2009 with only 30k? that's amazing, nice buy! mine's just gone past 100k. surprised at the your tyre size too, as i'd heard the reason for the larger wheels on the master was because of the larger brakes. i agree the comfort is just great, and my family falls asleep in it quite easily too even on short trips. economy wise best i can get is 9.2km/L but that's japanese traffic for you. quite envy you for where you're able to drive yours! so far haven't had any major problems, the single minor problem is one of the side mirrors doesn't always retract. of course hoping it'll last as long as possible, one of the big reasons being there is just no replacement.

yeah i thought about interference too, though that doesn't make sense because even when i walk away with the key in my pocket the car doesn't lock when it can't find the key. it must've just been unlucky something pressing and holding against the lock button, though i dunno why it's possible for that to happen. you can't possibly lock the car with the door lock while the key is inside, so why can it be done with the key if it's inside? it's like they've realised the problem of being able to lock the key in the car, but then only half fixed it by refusing to accept a lock command from the door locks but not the key itself.

yep i worked out that the car could be opened with the other key and that it wouldn't have happened if it'd been in my pocket. my point is that it hadn't ever happened before in 4 years of not worrying about leaving the key in the car, and from what i can gather it shouldn't have been able to happen even once. do you have any insight into why the car locked itself? it wasn't an autolock situation because i'd opened the doors and hadn't locked it in the first place.

i have a toyota blade with keyless entry and push-button start. tonight i went to the in-laws on the way home to pick up some stuff, when i arrived i parked in the street, turned the engine off, and got out without locking, leaving the key fob in my bag on the passenger seat as i often have for the 4 years i've owned the car. i put some stuff in the passenger footwell, then some more in the back seat footwell, and while i was doing so the car gave a long beep. i'd finished loading anyway so i closed the door to go round to the driver's seat and find out what it was beeping for, and the car immediately locked itself and wouldn't open. the only explanation i can think of is perhaps while i was loading i bumped the bag the fob was in causing something to move slightly and push up against the lock button, though i always thought that was impossible (and a sensible safety feature). sometimes when i get out of the car i can't lock it if i'm still standing close enough to the door that it thinks the fob is inside. anyone have any insight?

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hah don't get me started on features we won't see for years to come! did you know that carbon fibre was developed in the 60's? yet half a century later we're still driving steel crates! carmakers try to fob us off with the "it's expensive" line, while making absolutely no effort to find cheaper production methods. australia is especially worse off though because of our taxes. every $1 of added value they add to the car (say in a proper multimedia system instead of a standard cd) ends up being an extra $1.50-$2 to the price of the car on sale in australia. the way around this is the way they take (i think), to ship them with a hole in the centre console and have the dealer add an australian system. this stuffs us up though because australia doesn't manufacture such systems, and really doesn't have the population for it to be viable. the nearest big city where i am is kobe. was planning to drive up to the south-east area this year actually, but the disaster added an uncertainty factor that i don't really wanna risk. i'll probably go when they sort the place out and all the roads are confirmed fixed and the accomodation isn't suffering. so far the most enjoyable drive i've had was 4 days around the north of kyushu. actually another part of the good nav system is VICS, really helps avoid traffic jams, especially when a particular place is shown on TV and everyone in the country decides to go there completely jamming up the roads! once in shikoku there was a 3-hour line to reach a place we wanted to go, the nav sent as round a back way :). not perfect though, sometimes it's out of date and you're stuck on a road that shows green or drive freely down another that shows red.

yeah it is! sorry not much to see with all the plastic covers. the bay looks smaller than it actually is though, because to improve aerodynamics they've sloped the windscreen, but instead of sloping the top in and destroying headroom (like the mazda 3), they've sloped the bottom forwards, so the bonnet is shorter and the dash extends out and up over the bay. 206 apparently. gets it down pretty well too, the traction control doesn't feel the need to kick in on a fast start, though i have had it interfere once or twice trying to put too much power on round a corner (not 'spirited driving', japanese traffic is *heavy* and so a tiny gap is often all you're going to get so you have to take it!). it's not just about the power though, better trans, suspension and brakes, and much more refined interior too. yeah it's pretty cool actually, it's linked to the small lcd display between the dials, and shows when it's detected a car in front. it must properly look left and right too because it 'knows' what the other lanes are so it isn't bothered if the lanes happen to be set up so at some point cars appear to be coming right at you (S-bend, merging onto a curve etc), and it seem to be able to detect curves in the road too so it also does nothing if you're heading towards a solid wall as long as it the side of a curve. when there's a car in front that's going slower it lets off the accelerator, then if that's not enough it'll slow down (not sure if it's applying brakes or just using engine braking tbh) and if that's not enough there's a collision warning beep. don't know if it'll then engage harder braking, haven't been game to test it!

You own a Blade, you can post wherever you want You had me at hello, till I saw the possible $60k price tag,still very very jealous..Welcome and thanks for sharing :) she's gorgeous... thanks i appreciate the support :) mine was a lot less than $60k because it was used. i checked just now to see what they are selling for these days, and on toyota's country-wide (japan-wide) network, there are 138 used blades for sale, and only 5 of them are masters. they're selling for around $25k but that's without any of the fees you always have to pay and aren't included in the price like in aus so basically i'd estimate about AU$30k buying in japan. then if you wanted to import you'd have to pay for the transport, cleaning for customs, you'd lose about 5% on the currency conversion and transfer charge, and after all that you have to worry if they'll live up to the bargain since being japanese your seller won't be subject to australian law! can see why toyota don't sell in aus really, especially as they sell so few even here where there is 5 times the population and customers.

ok i'll take some and add in a few minutes.

me too! it certainly seems to have been designed as a direct competitor to the golf R. would be interested to see how it goes against an RX8 too. the blade is more powerful but heavier...

hiya and thanks for the reply. that's a good question, actually the book for my system is even thicker than the car maintenance manual, and with my japanese being only mid-level i really don't know! i've been thinking about getting a new one anyway though, since the tv is analogue but the country has now gone digital-only. if i had to guess though i'd say no, not without buying a whole new system. things in japan always come as a box set, so if you wanted to buy a bigger hard drive, you'd have to buy the whole thing. it's pretty annoying actually! re the important restrictions, i haven't heard of anything legally blocking the blade from being imported (though i could be wrong?), but selling for over $50,000 new, the master would definitely be subject to luxury tax which adds another 25%, making it basically too expensive to sell in aus, i think.

i'm an aussie living in japan, and i thought i'd share some info about the car i've had for the last year and a half - a toyota blade master. the story first of all about 2 years ago i decided to buy a new car. in particular i wanted something comfortable and nice to drive for some road trips, but nothing too big and unweildy for the japanese roads. this meant my options were the mazda 3, subaru imprezza or toyota blade. i checked out the mazda first, soon discovered it just wouldn't work. i'm 184cm which i don't think is all that tall, but with the seat in a comfortable driving position, the rear legroom was reduced to about 2-3 cm rendering that seat useless, and the slope of the windscreen took it too close to my head. it wasn't making contact but it was annoying and i felt confined. next the subaru. very well engineering i must say, even before driving i was impressed by the car taken in its setup, but for the price it was very under-equipped. very standard interior made it feel more like a tweaked cheap car than a decent motor. that left the toyota blade, either the standard 2.4L or the 3.5L master which had many other upgrades. of course i was keen to get a master but gz the price! on paper it didn't look too bad but with tax (not included in list price in japan) and just a basic satnav i was looking at about AU$60,000. i took a drive in the standard version and it was really good. good power, smooth too thanks to the CVT. the only thing that stopped my signing up for one then and there was the feeling that i might not be able to forget that it was the 2nd best. after thinking about it for a week or so, i jumped on the internet looking for some reviews to compare the standard blade to the master, hoping i could convince myself that the standard model was a good car in itself, and i happened to come across a used car site. there were about 30 blades for sale, and only 1 master (according to a salesman i asked later, even in japan the master isn't common, since it's kind of a niche market). as it happened the one for sale was the colour i wanted, with a number of good options, only 2 years old and 15,000km, for a reasonable price. i called the next day to say i'd take it! feelings after a year and a half of driving power: while the standard balde gave me "hmm yeah this thing's got some power..." feeling, the master is more of a "**** this thing's got some power!". my only complaint is the torque steer. full power off the line takes quite a bit of strength to hold the wheel and keep it from veering to the right. i don't think it has anything to do with tyres since i've put a new set on and it's still there. anyway it's seriously quick! handling: being front-wheel drive and with a 3.5L V6 up front, i thought it'd lurch a bit but i was pleasantly surprised to find how stable it is, under power, braking or cornering. it's not a lamborgini of course but it handles very well, much better than i imagined, and the grip is also very good. interior: it's very comfortable and quality all round. i've heard people equate the blade with the american 'matrix' but here they're just miles apart. i've read reviews of the matrix criticising the plasticky interior but there's none of that here. leather wheel, leather front and back seat, and suede (or possibly moleskin? the japanese description is ambiguous, it says 'skin' but doesn't what kind or even if it's just imitation) door and dash trim. loads of room for passengers in the back too, and a person taller than me could still drive it comfortably. equipment: it has a full-sized screen in the center console for video and navigation (none of that tiny 3-inch rubbish the mazda 3 touts as being 'enough'), the cruise control is radar-assisted so it slows down automatically if the car in front is slower, it has a full complement of airbags including curtains, motorized seats, volume and track controls on the wheel, a pre-collision system that sets you up to be able to stop in a hurry if it detects you might need to (gives a warning beep too). other comments: the media system is very intelligent, if you put a cd in it saves it to a hard disk so you can listen again anytime. the reversing camera is really great, even parallel parking in japan's tiny spaces i can get in in one turn thanks to it. there are phone buttons on the wheel which makes me think it has bluetooth, though i haven't tried it yet. there's a secondary vent on top of the dash that sends air to the back, it's really quite effective, more than i was expecting. at first i was disappointed about there being no sports mode button for the transmission, but it does seem to know what to do. under normal driving it changes smoothly like a normal car, but put your foot down and while the first change then is normal, from that point it changes much more rapidly, making me think it might have some kind of internal switch. up changes are fast if you put the power down from the line too, and while there are paddles on the wheel for shifting, i've never felt the need to use them. the start button is a little annoying. it's to the left of the wheel and will only start the engine with the brake pedal pressed, so you can't start the car without properly getting in and sitting down. the auto-key is really useful. as long as it's somewhere on you, in a pocket or bag, the doors unlock at a touch so no more fumbling or searching for the fob. edit: few other things i forgot to add it sounds a bit like a truck when the engine is cold (maybe that's common to V6's), but it soon changes to a nice 'quiet power'. also when it's pushed the engine note is a nice refined roar. also mine was made late in 2007, the very end of the previous model, which means it has a proper handbrake. the new one has the foot-operated kind which might not bother some people, but the few times i've driven a toyota with that setup i've found it annoying that i couldn't put my left foot where i wanted. noticed that i've put this in the wrong forum, sorry excuse the noob! could a mod move this thread please if they think it appropriate? i think that's all, now the pictures... (taking these i notice it needs a clean!)