The Small Car Revolution

The Tokyo Motor Show has just been run, and since Japan is the home of the small engine city cars - there’s some sort of tax incentive to keep the engine capacity under 660 cc’s - here’s what is going to be available soon.

Take Daihatsu first. Their effort is called the Daihatsu Muse. This thing looks primitive but is functional; form follows function is the engineering dictum. It sets the theme for Daihatsu: spacious interiors and high-tech gadgets in minicars. A large front window, combined with a high-positioned seat and an extremely short nose, gives the driver a wide view. A low flat floor and a door that opens 90 degrees provides easy entrance.

Daihatsu Muse

Now Mazda’s efforts. Called the Secret Hideout, this was designed by a crew of under-30 designers who hung out in Tokyo for over a month, and this was the result. It is essentially a tall wagon, with a square two-box styling. To maximize interior space, its windows are upright. However, to soften the tall-boy look, the belt line is unusually high, with narrow vertical side windows, and three small, round opera windows. The interior is sparse, with a minimalist instrument panel, an old-style three-spoke steering wheel, and front and rear plain bench seats. Wow! I am totally underwhelmed!

Mazda Secret Hideout

Nissan came up with a couple. First, the Ideo. In this telematics showcase, the display screen stretches the entire width of the instrument panel, 46 inches wide by 11 inches tall. The data it conveys is so complete that you could paint the car’s windows black, and drive around relying only on the display screen.

Nissan Ideo

It uses its 14 CCD cameras to show front and rear, left and right. In a parallel-parking simulation, the cameras show the car’s immediate area in all directions, while an image of the car is superimposed on the centre of the screen. The effect is as if someone were hovering above the car with a camera, showing the car’s exact movements as you drive between two other parked cars. The Ideo doesn’t seem a bad idea.

Nissan Moco

Nissan’s second offering is the Moco, Nissan’s first entry in the mini segment, and is built for it by Suzuki Motor Corp (incest again!). It will go on sale in 2002, and Nissan insists that it will be profitable for the company. Nissan says that the front and rear of the car are significantly different than the Suzuki version, which has not been launched yet.

Suzuki MR wagon

Suzuki showed the MR Wagon. Pushing the front window and A pillar forward gives this wagon a roomy cabin and luggage space. The concept, close to a production model, aims to provide a large “living” area.

Be proud of your National motor car A couple of years ago (or was it even longer?) I wrote about the incestuous nature of the motor car industry. You only have to think back a few years and remember the wonderful badge engineering the British Leyland could do, where a Mini could be a Morris, an Austin, a Riley or a Wolseley. My Down-under mate and award winning motoring journalist, John Weinthal, has just sent me up the script of one of his radio programmes. I enjoyed it so much, that with his permission I have printed it here for your interest too. So here are more Words from Weinthal. “The theme for today’s chat first came to me just over two years ago. I was driving the instant-classic Audi TT - one of those rare cars that grabbed and held everybody’s attention - and, for that matter, I believe the mere sight of one still sends a thrill down most car lover’s spines. “The usual questions arose - what’s it cost, how fast, what sort of engine, is it front or rear-wheel-drive and so on? But one question nobody thought to ask was where it was made. It is an Audi - Audi is owned by the giant Volkswagen group; ergo it is, like VW, made in Germany. “However, it is not made in Germany at all - the fabulous Audi TT is made in Hungary! To the best of my knowledge it is the only Hungarian-made car sold in Australia. I would wager some of the TT’s lucky owners do not even know that - Audi certainly don’t make it their advertising headline! “And so I looked around to see where else our cars are made. Every Australian knows that Commodores and Falcons, Camrys and Magnas are made right here in Australia. But by no means all cars with Holden, Ford, Toyota and Mitsubishi badges are made here - or in the countries which might seem most obvious. We’ll return to them in a moment. “How about the rest? Cars from Holland or Finland - let’s rate them as unlikely. France, Spain and Belgium - certainly; Austria, maybe. Brazil? Mexico? Thailand? - you’re joking of course! How about South Africa? OK, the answer is clear, because there’s no reason I would have mentioned these countries otherwise. “Did you know you can buy a British-made Nissan Pulsar Hatch, but its sedan sister is as Japanese as you would imagine. We get an odd mix of passenger vehicles from the USA. Ford offers US-made Explorers and the lovely Cougar sports coupe. But, those ultimate Good ‘ole Yankees - Ford’s new F-Series brutes - are in fact not Yanks at all; they hail from Brazil in deepest South America. “The recently demised Holden Suburban was another archetypal Yank - maybe, but it arrived on a Mexican Passport! Only three US-made Chryslers are sold here - the snappy Chrysler Neon and the evergreen Jeep Wrangler and Cherokee. The fabulous Chrysler PT Cruiser - perhaps the most versatile and certainly the most eye-catching five-door hatch in the universe - comes not from the States, but Austria, as does DaimlerChrysler’s Jeep Grand Cherokee! “Everybody knows VW’s New Beetle could only be German. Sorry - make that Mexico, too. OK. Now please consider the admirably Teutonic Mercedes C Class and 3 Series BMWs. I still await the makers of these supreme status symbols boasting about their South African birthplace, but both ship to us across the Indian Ocean. (The BeeEmm 3 series are also made in Thailand.) “Two recently arrived, and richly upmarket four-wheel-drives, are the Mercedes M Class and BMW’s X5. German-to-the-core; no argument! Well, only if Germany has quietly become the 53rd State of the USA. And, whisper it, BMW’s zippy Z convertibles and coupe are Yanks as well. “See, you can’t trust ‘common knowledge’ for a moment. Almost every car I have named retains its apparent country of origin image, regardless of where it is made. This alone is quite a tribute to some of the less likely manufacturing countries’ quality standards. There may be no better example than the Holden Zafira - solid, imaginatively styled, extremely versatile. So European you almost expect a blend of marmalade, garlic and sauerkraut to assail your nostrils on entry. Make that Thai green curry, and you would be right! Our very own Thai Holden! “Holden’s Vectra Hatch comes from England but its sedan sister is made in Germany. Astras are Belgian, Barinas and Combos Spanish; Rodeo is made both in Thailand and Japan, and so it goes on. We even have a US-made Holden in the shape of the little-known Frontera four-wheel-drive. There are Toyota and Mitsubishi light trucks from Thailand and Taiwan, as well as Japan. “But, surely some cars’ birthplaces are too obvious to matter - Volvo is Swedish, of course; provided it’s not a 40 Series made in Holland. Everybody knows Saabs are Swedish. Of course they do, and that Saab is owned by the same General Motors which makes Holdens all over the map, and Saab convertibles in Finland! “However, I will assert with some certainty, that all cars bearing the badges Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Jaguar, MG and Rover are British to the core - even if BMW owns Rolls, Volkswagen owns Bentley and Jag is part of the great Ford stable along with Volvo and Aston Martin. That just about leaves us with some Italian exotica - try Ferrari, Lamborghini and Maserati - as being of true to their birthright. “Last, but certainly not least, we have Lexus - every Lexus comes proudly, and supremely well-made, from Toyota in Japan. Toyota, please do not change that; knowing where our cars hail from is adequately challenging as things stand.”

Autotrivia Quiz

Last week I wrote that in the early 1900s two brothers started building cars in America. They used their surname for the make of the cars, but called them “Their Surname” Kars. Later they changed the name of their brand to “Their Surname” Cars. The question was what was the name of these cars and why was it changed from Kars to Cars?

This was simple for the exponents of early US motor car building (so no more complaints from the American contingent that I don’t feature American Iron) and referred to the Kissel vehicles built in Hartford, Wisconsin, built by George and Will Kissel, two young men from a German immigrant farming family. They established a reputation as a fine, well-made automobile before financial woes brought on by the Great Depression brought on foreclosure.

1908 Kissel Kar

Now, the “Kar” and “Car” - the Kissel “Kar” was built from 1907 to 1918, after which they dropped “Kar” as it sounded just a tad too German in the wake of WWI. Kissel Cars continued to operate until 1931. So there you are, gentle readers, some genuine American autotrivia!

So to this week’s quiz question. In 1907 a company was established in Japan to manufacture and sell internal combustion engines. In 1930 it began producing 3 wheel vehicles and in 1951 changed its name to - what? That name is still going today and vehicle sales are over 10 million. What is the name of the company?

For the Automania FREE beer this week, be the first correct answer to fax 038 427 596 or email [email protected]