1999 Subaru Sambar#BUC71615

1999 Subaru Sambar, finished in White, came to us straight out of the Japanese domestic market. We have it on file as stock number 2852, chassis TT2023291. We have 10 pictures of this Sambar here, all of the actual vehicle.

Under the skin of a 1999 Sambar

It runs a 4-cylinder engine. The 1999 Sambar came with a manual gearbox, and that is what this one has.

What we have on record for this Sambar

Recorded against this 1999 Sambar: 90,000 mi on the odometer and a condition of used. Interior colour is recorded as Grey.

1999 Subaru Sambar: the background

Putting the engine behind the rear axle loads the driven wheels, and that is a large part of why Sambars have the traction reputation they do. The Sambar is the odd one out in the class and deliberately so: Subaru put the engine right at the back, behind the rear axle, and drove the rear wheels from there. Subaru gave the Sambar four-wheel independent suspension from the very first 1961 model, at a time when Japanese passenger cars mostly did without it — struts at the front, semi-trailing arms at the rear. Putting the engine under the bed was a deliberate load-carrying decision: on a kei truck the difference between empty and laden is enormous, and the engine acts as ballast over the driven axle when the bed is empty.

Practicalities of this Sambar

Farms, vineyards, ranches, grounds crews and building sites are where Sambars end up in the US, for the same reasons they ended up there in Japan — Japanese sources describe the kei truck as a necessity for moving tools, crops and catch. The chassis is recorded as TT2023291, and that is the number everything else on this listing is tied to. Price on this one is $5,544.