A first-generation Toyota Previa, seen at the old Workers’ Stadium in Beijing in 2016. The Previa was in fine shape, painted beige with gray bumpers and darkened windows. The wheel covers are factory original.
Note the enormous windscreen wipers. The wipers move in opposite directions, a configuration that is also used on other MPVs with a large windshield glass surface.
The rear with a single wiper and a cool car-wide light bar. All the windows are enormous. Try that today! All cars seem to have these tiny letterbox-sized windows nowadays.
Blue 京A license plates are not the same as black 京A license plates. The blue ones were issued to the very first batches of privately registered cars in Beijing, as opposed to cars registered to companies or the government. Most blue 京A plates were issued in the early 1990s. This Toyota Previa has a very early blue plate with 京A·A9754.
The Toyota Previa has an interesting history in China. There was unofficial gray market import, semi-legal unofficial production, and there were copies (scroll down).
The interior was a little dirty. The seat covers are not original. And these white examples look very cheap and crappy. The dash itself is made of hard beige plastics and totally intact.
The center stack with a basic heating system, a radio cassette player, and an ashtray. This is a base-spec model. Earlier on we met a high-spec Previa, which had a CD player as well as a cassette player. The gear selector is mounted at the rather long steering wheel column. The column seems almost 50 centimeters long, measured from the dashboard to the steering wheel.
Right-rear wheel cover is lost in time.
The first generation Toyota Previa (XR10) was manufactured from 1990 until 1999. It had a unique front mid-engine, rear-wheel drive layout. The engine is located under the front seats, behind the front axle. This layout was only used for the first generation, the second and subsequent generations had a more conventional front-engine, front-wheel drive layout.
The Previa was available with three engines: a 2.4 petrol, a 2.4 supercharged petrol, and a 2.2 turbocharged diesel. The 2.4 petrol was the most common.
This first-generation Toyota Previa was a sturdy car. Even now, in 2023, you can still see it occasionally on the streets of Beijing. But only in the faraway suburbs, as new emission regulations keep it out of the city center. Too bad, because the Previa’s design is almost timeless. With a little work on details and wheels, it may as well look like a modern car.