2007 Toyota Corolla

The day after purchase

After owning two Cadillac Sevilles, I bought this ‘07 Corolla in the summer of 2008 (July 4th weekend, actually).  From a Cadillac to a Corolla?  As unlikely as it sounds, that’s what happened.  Why?  First off, let me just say that my timing was bad.  Like, sheep baaaaad.  That was the summer where gas seemed to be $4/gallon no matter where you looked.  And nobody was buying large luxury cars.  So I didn’t get the deal on either machine that I could have gotten six months earlier or later.  But anyway…

The Cadillacs were nice cars.  Really nice.  But as complex cars age, they tend to require complex parts.  And my preference in cars was already tending toward smaller, simplier, and nimbler.  The ‘01 STS that I traded for the Corolla was a pretty fair performance machine; 0-60 in the low-6 second range, 1/4 mile in the mid-14s, with a moderate amount of traction.  It did handle pretty well for its size, but because it was so heavy, you really had to hustle it to make it dance.

The day after purchase

I had driven a rental Corolla some years prior, and thought it was a pretty decent car.  And although I wasn’t buying a smaller car for the express purpose of getting better fuel economy than the Cadillac, I figured that it wouldn’t hurt to get as reasonbly good as I could get.  The Corolla and the Honda are at the top of their field, and not really having much affinity for Hondas, I figured the Corolla was worth a peek.  My must-have was a manual transmission, and I was pretty sure that I wanted the then-current generation, the 9th generation (2003-2008).  I figured I’d find an ‘03 or ‘04 with 50k miles or so.

Corollas were relatively hard to come by at the time (see above about bad timing).  Manuals were almost non-existent.  I was looking only at LE models, because they came standard with power everything and cruise control.  I happened upon an ‘07 LE at our local Toyota dealership, Hendrick Toyota, in Fayetteville.  I wouldn’t consider myself a fan of these tan colored cars, but this is the 2nd tan vehicle I’ve owned, so I must like it more than I admit to.  It drove great; it should have, with only 16k miles.  It was a Certified Pre-Owned car, so it has the powertrain warranty out to 100k miles.  The long-term plan is to drive this car for at least a decade, and probably long enough to hand-down to one of our daughters.  I know this car will last at least as long as we need it to, and it’s really one of the most enjoyable cars I’ve ever had.

The day after purchase

Yeah, really.  I enjoy driving this car much more than my old Cadillac.  Again, the Cadillac was a nice car, but just felt artificial.  Its movements weren’t precise, and it lumbered along, with a rather stiff ride for a Caddy.  This Corolla feels natural no matter where I’m driving, or how I’m driving.  It’s much more fun driving this car at 4/10ths than it was the STS at 8/10ths.

Every movement of this Toyota is deliberate and disciplined.  The chassis is very tossable, with rather neutral handling, unless you really push it into a sweeping corner, where understeer will show up.  But there are no chassis shudders, no undamped wheel movements, not a single action that wasn’t designed to occur.  The car itself is extremely simple, with MacPherson struts up front and Chapman struts controlling the rear twist-beam axle.  The 1ZZ-FE engine is a great example of what a small engine should be: light, smooth, quiet, and efficient.  126 horsepower doesn’t sound like much, but the little Corolla only weighs 2500 pounds, so it still moves out smartly.  In fact, with a 0-60 time of around 8 seconds with the manual transmission, it bests most vehicles in this class for acceleration.  It also bests most in economy, with a revised EPA estimate of 28/37 for the manual transmission (26/35 for the automatic).  I average a fraction over 35 MPG in my daily commute.

I’ve owned some rather “neat” cars in the past, from my first, being a pretty pristine ‘84 Oldsmobile Cutlass with the T-Top roof and V-8 engine, to an ’87 Buick Regal into which I shoe-horned a 403-cui. Olds V-8, and then to a pair of Cadillacs with 275-300 hp DOHC Northstar engines.  And believe it or not, this humble little Corolla has been the most enjoyable car I’ve owned.

The day after purchase