Hot on the heels of Toyota’s announcement that it would market a kei truck under a newly revived Scion sub-brand in the US, rumors have also begun swirling that another of the automaker’s pint-sized automobiles could make a comeback. Japanese media outlet Response is reporting that the S-FR concept could actually make it to production – more than a decade after its initial debut.
Initially launched at the 2015 Tokyo Motor Show, the S-FR has long been the subject of speculation, and renewed interest means it’s possible that Toyota will bring another, even cheaper sports car to rival the Mazda Miata.
Toyota Reignites Rumors For Cheap, Cheerful Cars
The relaunched “Scion by Toyota” brand, which will commence sales next year with the KEI-01 mini-truck, marks the return of a marque that formerly sold spunky economy hatchbacks, stylish coupes, and the rear-drive FR-S – the first generation of Toyota’s superb GR86 sports car. Upon its debut in 2015, the S-FR concept was rumored to be a potential addition to the Scion lineup in the US, slotting below the similarly named but largely unrelated FR-S. With a naturally aspirated 1.5-liter four-cylinder providing power to a lightweight, rear-wheel-drive chassis, the Scion S-FR could’ve been a pretty fun little ride. Then, Toyota went silent on the matter.
2015 Toyota S-FR ConceptToyota
Per Response, the S-FR is apparently back on the table, although it’ll reportedly shrink down even further from the concept’s pint-size proportions. Redesigned to comply with kei-car regulations, the rumored Toyota sports coupe could be only 58 inches wide and 133 inches long, down 8.6 and 23 inches, respectively, from the concept car. According to the media outlet, which cited anonymous sources within Toyota, the S-FR’s revival is dependent on the new sports car platform developed by corporate partner Daihatsu, whose K-Open concept car from last year’s Japan Mobility Show has the same proportions.
2015 Toyota S-FR ConceptToyota
Response also says that the reborn S-FR will also feature a kei-class powertrain: a 63-horsepower, 660-cubic-centimeter (0.7-liter) turbocharged three-cylinder engine. If the outlet’s sources are correct, the manual gearbox and rear-wheel drive will carry over into the revived sporty coupe.
2015 Toyota S-FR ConceptToyota
Will Scion Build Sports Cars Once Again?
The revival of the Scion brand and Response‘s reporting – announced just one day apart – seem too interlinked to be a coincidence. Toyota did say upon the debut of the KEI-01 that it would use the reborn Scion brand to evaluate the potential of additional market segments. Still, the mini-truck only complies with federal Low-Speed Vehicle (LSV) standards, meaning it will be limited to a top speed of 25 miles per hour and will only be legal to drive on roads with a speed limit of less than 35 mph. The set of rules is better suited to runabouts like the Fiat Topolino than would-be Miata rivals.
2027 Scion by Toyota KEI-01 ExteriorToyota
Were Toyota to bring the kei-class S-FR to the United States as a Scion, we’d hope the automaker would work to federalize it to a regular passenger car standard – driving a sporty coupe with a top speed of 25 doesn’t sound like much fun to us. But modifying a kei chassis to suit another market isn’t without precedent. The first-generation Daihatsu Copen was sold in Japan as a pint-sized sports car with 63 hp and 81 lb-ft, but its European-market equivalent had 89 hp and 91 lb-ft courtesy of an engine twice the size of its kei sibling.
CarBuzz Insight – Why This Matters:
US interest in Scion by Toyota is sky-high at the moment, and it seems like potential customers are just waiting in the wings for inexpensive new products from the brand. Were those products to include an S-FR, either in the same size as the concept or the downsized (but hopefully federalized) kei car subject of recent rumors, we suspect the reborn Scion brand could be rather successful.
At the very least, a teeny, $20,000 coupe with rear-wheel drive and a manual transmission would ignite interest for a whole new generation of car enthusiasts.
Source: Response
