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Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

economist.com

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Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#391

Post by rtpg »

fomine3 wrote: post #346
rtpg wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This made me realize why I see so many Kangoos in Japan, despite them not really being cheap here! A bit of a nicer version of a Kei truck, without being a full minivan!

Kangoo buyers in Japan also cares fashion. Japanese vans like Toyota Townace are too boring for them but Kangoo is cute.

Yeah, sure. If you're running some successful bakery in Kagurazaka having the nice-looking truck feels like a "fine" decision. My mental image is that Townaces are bigger, but maybe that's just my impression from the Kangoo's curves

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#392

Post by TingPing »

zzzbra wrote: post #388
worthless-trash wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would have assumed larger vehicles had more stringent emission regulations, TIL!

sadly this is the consequence of green emissions standards legislation passed in 2009. thanks Obama

The law is from the 70s, but reaffirmed and expanded https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_average_fuel_econo...

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#393

Post by freetime2 »

pookah wrote: post #337
thebooktocome wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Japan is famously mountainous. I can’t imagine they don’t road test them on “real hills”.

Japan doesn't have rural American dirt roads.

Can you elaborate on what American dirt roads means? Japan has tons of dirt/gravel roads. A typical operating environment for a kei truck might look like this:

https://www.google.com/maps/@36.9510791,138.6746615,3a,75y,2...

They are pretty capable offroad vehicles.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#394

Post by TingPing »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #330
nickpeterson wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve been downvoted over this before but really we just need weight limits on cars. Efficiency is pretty closely aligned and we seem to regulate that just fine.

Efficiency is pretty closely aligned Not in the battery power era.

Of course it still is… smaller cars, smaller batteries, better all around.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#395

Post by kalleboo »

chrisco255 wrote: post #356
throwworhtthrow wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Big trucks aren't causing social ills for anyone except people that have nothing better to do but complain about other people enjoying their own lives. "These Stupid Trucks are Literally Killing Us" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35202168

Oh cute, a thinkpiece for a hot button topic exists on the internet. Meanwhile Motor Vehicle Deaths have not changed significantly in 40+ years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in...

> Meanwhile Motor Vehicle Deaths have not changed significantly in 40+ years

That's a massive failure, in other developed countries, motor vehicle deaths have drastically declined in 40 years.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#396

Post by hn_user82179 »

chair6 wrote: post #169
nyx wrote: post #29

The 25-year import rule here, which bans Americans from importing vehicles from other countries unless they're 25+ years old, is just awful for those of us who would be interested in driving small, efficient foreign cars. It would be great to live completely car-free, but absent major changes to how we plan our cities, it's just a sad reality that cars are a necessary ingredient to life in the vast majority of Americ…

We love our quirky, slow 1993 Mitsubishi JB500 campervan ( https://www.instagram.com/finnthejb500/ ), but the experience is not for everyone. We were able to register it in Washington without too much hassle. It definitely pays to do some research and try to find a local-ish mechanic willing to work on them before you make the purchase.

Wow, what a great campervan. I've seen some of the egg-like old japanese campervans but not one like yours. Very cool!

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#397

Post by zamnos »

ElFitz wrote: post #371
iambateman wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all true…and also American drivers are legitimately aggressive toward these kind of vehicles. They have a terrible reputation, primarily because they get used a lot by people who can’t afford a car. I wish it were different, but driving a moped/Vespa on American roads is a pretty big risk.

So American drivers are aggressive towards those they think to be poorer than them? Why do you think that is? (genuinely curious)

America's really big. The part I'm in, ebikes are en vogue, with people giving up cars to get ebikes, and car drivers give them right of way. I'm sure elsewhere in the US it's different yet again.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#398

Post by kalleboo »

chrisco255 wrote: post #331
porphyra wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point isn't that the smaller truck is an equally capable vehicle. The point is to make fun of people who don't need a truck but are getting an overkill vehicle as a status symbol, all the while people who actually need to transport goods can still get a lot done with a tiny kei truck.

If everyone has one, it's not a status symbol. The article talks about using the Kei truck as a replacement for a UTV/Side-by-Side, not for a daily truck. These /r/fuckcars people have never done real work in their lives and are just larping. 1100 pound tow capacity couldn't even tow most empty trailers.

> If everyone has one, it's not a status symbol

iPhones somehow manage to be a status symbol even with 50% of the US population owning one

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#399

Post by bane »

In Korea, there's a truck called the "Bongo" which is more of platform for cabover small trucks -- which includes box trucks, pickup-style utility trucks, flatbeds, etc. But all designed to be small and work well in tight urban environments.

The stock Bongo sort of vaguely represents an American pickup truck if it was built by somebody who had only ever heard of one described. However, they're ubiquitous, and the boxtruck versions handle a lot of what we in the U.S. would use semi trucks for.

In Korea they tend to be made by Kia, and I think in Japan there's a near identical variant by Mazda.

They can be had pretty cheap, a friend of mine has one for some farmland he has outside of Seoul and he says he bought it for ~$5k.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#400

Post by kalleboo »

boredumb wrote: post #59
porphyra wrote: post #37

One of the most highly upvoted Reddit posts on /r/fuckcars mocks large pickups compared to the utility of a kei truck. https://reddit.com/r/fuckcars/comments/sdrgv3/japanese_truck... A kei truck has about 90% the bed length of a pickup while being a lot more nimble. The lower bed is more ergonomic to load and unload too.

Where I live the hills would stall that kei out before you got to any real hills, with nothing at all added to the bed.

Our family car is a kei minivan (microvan?) with power sliding doors (=heavy) and everything.

No trouble going up long or steep hills in windy mountain roads with the whole family of 4+luggage in the car.

No trouble going up long hills at highway speed (120 km/h) with two adult friends in the back.

Aircon on and everything. Works great.

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