We often think that a vintage four-wheel drive pickup can only take one form: a Toyota Hilux. Truth be told, this small pickup market was dominated by Toyota’s rugged lineup of pickups, but it wasn’t the only game in town for a compact 4×4 with a bed. The Chevrolet LUV was mostly known for its 2WD variant, which offered pickup utility with a fuel-sipping engine, but it did provide customers with the option to step up to a proper off-road rig. This 1980 LUV listed here on eBay is equipped with 4WD and great colors for $17,950 or best offer.
For some reason, the 4×4 version of the LUV didn’t find many takers, or perhaps it’s more a case of heavy attrition due to weak sheet metal (translation: a lot of them rusted out). The LUV has great proportions, good looks, and a durable Isuzu-derived engine under the hood. When it went head-to-head with the Toyota, it was generally seen as a formidable competitor, even though you see LUVs show up for sale far less frequently than the Hilux. The Toyota has even reached the point of some owners actually lavishing them with a proper restoration because values are so strong.
This LUV has seen some love with a nicely updated interior featuring yellow and black tartan cloth on the seats and door panels. The seller also notes that the dashboard has a custom-fit dash cap; otherwise, it remains in stock condition and incredibly well preserved. In fact, that’s the real beauty of this truck: its high state of preservation, which you simply don’t see in a workhorse rig like this. The stance is spot-on with some classic Outlaw-style wheels with a lower offset to help them poke out of the wheel wells just a bit.
The engine is an Isuzu-sourced 4-cylinder engine that was anemic at best when new (even if it was quite reliable.) It makes around 80 b.h.p. and 90 lb.-ft. of torque paired to a 4-speed manual transmission, and the seller notes that the transfer case works as it should. While $18K is a lot of money for a LUV, it’s still far cheaper than buying a survivor-grade 4WD Hilux, and I suspect the seller knows the final sale price will be a bit lower than the ask here. The question is, which truck is the better choice? The Toyota makes sense for future ROI, but if you can actually use the LUV as intended, doesn’t it make more sense?
I thought we had seen this not too long ago, and some commenters suggested that the black paint (not original to these trucks) could be an attempt to make body work less obvious. I had one of these way back when and rust put an end to it. I think a survivor-grade Hilux would be a better value.
You don’t see but scant few of these any more. In some years the 4WD was called “Mikado”, in other years “Mighty Mike” as I recall. This truck seems nice enough but I wouldn’t shell that asking price for it. At least Isuzu didn’t have to source the hardware for these trucks. They used their own. They were the main hardware supplier for all the other car companies in Japan.