formed

model was the LJ10, launched in 1970, but that had an air-cooled two-cylinder two-stroke engine measuring a mighty 359cc. I wouldn’t ride a motorbike with such a small engine but it meant the LJ fitted neatly into Japan’s Kei class, which offered tax advantages.

Seven years later we got the LJ80 with a rather more convincing 800cc four-stroke four-cylinder engine. That allowed the Suzuki to do a bit more with the four-wheel drive and two-speed transfer

The LJ’s interior has a wonderful simplicity to it – even when it’s been totally remade and adorned with leather-trimmed sports seats. There’s a Pioneer head unit hidden away in the glovebox, which is not exactly the most convenient place but is definitely the right one as it maintains the plain, basic and completely analogue nature of the dashboard. There’s nothing plain about the system the head unit controls, though –there’s 1000 watts of power in that sub case than previously, and brought it a legion of fans in the UK. One of them was Barry Sheene, Suzuki’s motorcycle world champion, who had one as one of his playthings, to help carry around his many other playthings to pubs and clubs.

This particular model looked like it was all played out when Legacy found it as a donor vehicle. Apart from anything else, it was painted a particularly unfortunate shade of green. And the rust-proofing was never that good to begin with, so there was plenty of proof that rust will eventually win.

And the less said about the check-cloth seats the better. Mister Good Taste was clearly not at home when this thing was found and dragged into the light once again. But this is what Legacy Overland does, it brings things back from beyond the brink. In this case it was a long hard road back.

It started, as these things do, with taking things back to bare metal, to individual components, much like that Tonka toy, which this vehicle in no way resembles. It was a big job so the crew were galvanised into action and promptly galvanised everything they could see in the nuts, bolts, brackets, bits departments. This thing is built to last although, to be fair, it has lasted pretty well since it rolled off the line back in 1980.

One of the things that simply couldn’t last a day longer was that mutant green paintjob. Now it’s grey. Only of course it’s not. It’s ‘metallic intergalactic star dust gray’. Now that’s more like it even if Americans can’t spell grey.

And those rather dreadful check seats have gone too, to be replaced by a pair of sports buckets covered in leather. Only of course it’s not. It’s

If this were a simple restoration, that Warn M5000 would stand no chance of being involved. And you wouldn’t see anyone fabricating a custom bumper to mount it on either, obviously. Thanks heavens for Legacy Overland, then, because not only is this a beautiful old truck, it’s a beautiful new off-roader too

‘hand-crafted vegan leather’. So it’s not leather, it’s something pretending to be leather like a big plastic model in a field pretending to be a real cow.

One of the things that make it look so square yet cool is the juxtaposition of the big wheels and tyres jutting out in a rather manly big-jawed sort of way. A way that intimates that steak will be on the menu and it had better not be lab-grown meat. They may be 15” steel wheels but they’re chunky in satin black, particularly when shod with Cooper Discoverer STT Pro Mud-Terrains. With custom-made flared wheelarches, they give the small but perfectly formed SJ a really rugged air that implies it really can go anywhere.

A 2” lift kit takes that capability that bit further, but powering the four-wheel drive and transfer box, far upstream there is still only the 800cc four-pot, albeit totally taken apart and put back together again. It’s a light vehicle but even so this isn’t going to match a V6 Jeep when it comes to

The 800cc engine is original to the vehicle, but it’s been a long time since it looked this good. The springs are not original; they provide a 2” lift which, in conjunction with a set of 31x10.50R15 Cooper Discoverer STT Pros, gives the vehicle a lovely square stance. Without an enormous amount of welding before the fun stuff could begin, none of this would have happened – you can see how clean and sound the footwells are now (below left), but rest assured it wasn’t always this way simply churning through the gloop. Although the Warn M5000 winch might come in handy at that point, fitted to the custom winch bumper. However, the little rig gives the impression that it’s been restored and reimagined for something other than hardcore off-roading. When you’re stopped, the socking great light bar with four lamps on the top should help illuminate wherever it is you stop. And then there’s the sound system. This isn’t the vehicle to go out into Nature and reconnect with the wildlife.

Well, it could be but only until the sound system is cranked up. That really does seem as though it was designed for a small concert hall, not a small 4x4. There’s 1000 watts in there, powering through a monster subwoofer and Pioneer speakers. The head unit, which is of course Bluetooth-enabled, lives in the glove box so the cockpit maintains that delightfully minimalist look where there’s very little to go wrong.

That’s partly the appeal here. As things like dashboards get more and more complex and electronic, a 4x4 with two dials ahead of the steering wheel, with nothing obviously digital, looks refreshingly simple. The levers on the tunnel need cranking by hand, as does the handbrake, and, yes, that’s a manual choke lever for the carburettor by the driver’s left.

The LJ80 was always a fun vehicle, light and frothy rather than heavy and serious. And this may be an extremely expensive rebuild but it seems true to that emotion. It’s a vehicle to make you smile and relax rather than getting all aggressive and materialist about the world.

And, just to reiterate, it’s a Suzuki. Not a Tonka toy. Not a Jeep. It’s an LJ80. Oh, hang one a minute, what does LJ stand for, anyone know? Ah, thanks. Apparently Suzuki called it that because it stands for Light Jeep. Damn. I hear the sound of trotters approaching fast…

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