1999 Toyota Land Cruiser 100-Series VX 4.7 V8

This 1999 Toyota Land Cruiser 100-Series VX is finished in white over beige leather and is offered from White River, Mpumalanga by lowveld_uzj, about this seller, its second owner and the keeper of the vehicle for fifteen years. It carries the 4.7 litre 2UZ-FE V8 through the four speed automatic and full time four wheel drive, and shows 214,600km.

The file is continuous from 2014 and unusually specific about the two jobs that decide what a 2UZ is worth. The timing belt, water pump, tensioner and idlers were done at 162,900km in 2018 and again at 214,600km in May this year ahead of the sale, both invoiced. The starter motor, which sits under the intake manifold and is a labour job rather than a part job, was replaced in 2021 with the plugs and coils done while the manifold was off. Front lower ball joints, a documented failure point on this chassis, were replaced on both sides in 2023 with CV boots, wheel bearings and a geometry set.

The vehicle has spent its life towing and crossing borders rather than sitting. The carnet and border paperwork for trips into Botswana, Namibia and Mozambique between 2012 and 2023 is published with the lot, and the underbody was treated in 2023 after those years of gravel. Surface corrosion on the rear cross member and both rear arch lips was wire brushed and coated at that point rather than cut out, and the seller says so.

The flaws the seller states are a rear air conditioning circuit that blows warm and has not been diagnosed, a light torque converter shudder between 60 and 80km/h, a split driver's armrest, front seats recovered rather than original, and the corrosion described above. One question went unanswered: asked what the Active Height Control globes read on a pressure test, the seller declined, saying the test was quoted at R4,000 and he chose not to spend it before selling. The globes are believed original at 214,600km. Bidders should price that accordingly.

The 100-Series replaced the 80 in 1998 and split the model line in two. The 105 kept the solid front axle and the straight six for the markets that still wanted them, and the 100 took independent front suspension and, in UZJ100 form, the 4.7 litre 2UZ-FE V8. Purists called it the moment the Land Cruiser went soft. Everyone who then drove one to Kaokoland and back stopped saying that.

The 2UZ is the reason these are still worth buying. It is a cast iron block, an aluminium head, a timing belt on a 150,000km interval and very little else to go wrong, and it will run past 500,000km on a file like this one. What it will not do is use less than 18 litres per hundred, which is the whole reason a 100-Series V8 has always been cheap to buy in South Africa and never cheap to own.

In this market the 100 became the long distance family and expedition vehicle that people actually kept: Botswana in June, the Kruger gate in December, a trailer behind it every time. The ones worth having are the ones with the belt history and the ball joints done, because both are known, both are dated, and neither is visible from the driver's seat.