Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

economist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

431–440 of 651 posts

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#431

Post by zamnos »

worthless-trash wrote: post #368
nostromo wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't necessarily regulatory capture or protectionism. Half of all cars sold in the US are imported. Toyota, a Japanese company, is the most popular brand of car sold in the US. So, yes, you can import cars all you want, they just need to follow US safety and emissions standards. These cars do not meet those requirements, so you can't import them. If you didn't block them as imports, we'd have lots of people jus…

> If you didn't block them as imports, we'd have > lots of people just go to Mexico and buy > highly-polluting vehicles to save money, and our > problem with smog in the border states would be > much worse. In Australia there are a set of guidelines required for vehicle imports, they even outline pollution and safety requirements that must be met before it can be registered or driven on public roads. On-road non impo…

America's standards for road worthy are just that much higher. IF you: start a car company, buy a bunch of them so the NHTSA can crash test them (thanks Mercedes-Benz for that one), fix them up so they meet modern Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) (which includes backup cameras, among other things), fix them up to meet smog standards (for California), which means it'll also need a compliant OBDII port (and a Japanese OBDII port returning Japanese characters instead of ascii codes won't count), then yeah, it can be considered road-worthy and as a bonus, you can sell them.

It's just that all of the above is very expensive and a lot of work, if not impossible. Having to buy a bunch of cars just to get them crash tested is probably the most expensive part, but the rest of that isn't easy either. Coming back to the kei trucks discussed in the article, there's basically no way they're going to pass crash testing.

So it's not that it isn't a valid solution, just America has much higher standards for "road worthiness".

It's been "done" by MotoRex for R34 GTRs, though there is a bit of fuzziness as to their legality as they got shut down by the government. That's a whole other story though.

But if you're not going to use the vehicle on the road and just as a show car, or drag race car, it doesn't need to be considered road worthy and the import journey is much easier.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#432

Post by SkyPuncher »

seabird wrote: post #236
glitcher wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another factor is safety. I don't share this point of view, but I have seen others purposely choose large, heavy vehicles for family members so they stand a better chance surviving a bad collision. If you've ever sat in traffic driving a small car surrounded by large vehicles it definitely starts to sink in that you are at a distinct disadvantage if anything goes wrong. So this trend is also at least partially about…

You're at a safety advantage in a smaller vehicle more often than not. If you're in an accident going fast enough for the size of your vehicle to matter, you stand a very high chance of getting severely fucked up no matter what you're driving. You need to not be in the accident in the first place, and driving a large vehicle with worse handling, longer stopping distances, and a tendency to roll over does not help. Yo…

> If you're in an accident going fast enough for the size of your vehicle to matter, you stand a very high chance of getting severely fucked up no matter what you're driving.

The most dangerous, a head on collision, will always be safer for the heavier vehicle. It's simple physics.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#433

Post by SkyPuncher »

elboru wrote: post #184
voisin wrote: post #92

I wish the actual story was “US manufacturers announce line of small, Japanese style pickup trucks” Importing adds friction both up front and for ongoing sourcing of parts and maintenance. Just give us some options for local pickup trucks utilizing existing repair facilities! Instead everyone bitches about truck drivers having such large vehicles, when that’s all that’s on offer here!

RAM sells a small truck in Mexico called RAM 700 and it’s getting popular for work purposes (specially in urban areas). I have no idea why it’s not being sold in the US market. https://www.motor1.com/news/447996/2021-ram-700-debut/

My understanding is US emission requirements scale with something like vehicle footprint.

Therefore, it's far easier to build a larger vehicle to meet the requirements.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#434

Post by SkyPuncher »

yellowapple wrote: post #98
pharmakom wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please buy a minivan if this is your situation.

While I largely agree with you, AWD/4WD minivans seem to be harder to find than AWD/4WD SUVs - so if you live in a place with both snow and hills, you're probably going to be gravitating toward an SUV.

AWS/4WD drive can't be pulled off with a minivan while maintaining the flat floor that people expect. There's not enough clearance for a rear drive shaft.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#435

Post by d0gsg0w00f »

nluken wrote: post #114
ke88y wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Really unfortunate situation as these fit a lot of use cases that would previously require something as big as a gas guzzling Ford F150 otherwise. What about the Ford Maverick? The only issue is that the bed is fairly small, but it looks like these minis have small beds and low towing capacities as well? And Ford makes a hybrid version. (Don't misunderstand: I'm not arguing against relaxing the rules in Oregon.)

The Ford Maverick is better than most modern pickups, but still misses the mark. As you mentioned, the bed is significantly smaller than a 1990 Ranger despite being 6 inches longer[1]. Honestly the biggest issue I have with these vehicles is their height, which is a known hazard to pedestrians[2]. The Maverick doesn't fix that issue. [1] https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a36651899/sizing-up-the-20... [2] https://www.…

I have questions about the pedestrian article. The article states that almost 3/4 of all vehicles sold are light truck or SUV. So wouldn't it just be statistically more likely that for ANY accident it would be a taller vehicle?

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#436

Post by Taniwha »

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…

Here in NZ we import a lot of 2nd hand Japanese vehicles (helps that we drive on the same side of the road), in the city I live the most popular EV is a 2nd hand Japanese Leaf - we have one for an around town day to day car (complemented by a 20 year old Prius)

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#437

Post by pagnol »

zamnos wrote: post #397
ElFitz wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Where is that?

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#438

Post by bombcar »

yosito wrote: post #430
ElFitz wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

As an American who grew up feeling annoyed and aggressive toward people driving motorcycles, but now drives a motorcycle regularly for the past 10 years, it never had anything to do with how poor someone was. Motorcycles aren't the most practical vehicles on American roads, so I always perceived them as a sport, not a necessity. And motorcycle drivers has a reputation for pulling stupid stunts and causing accidents o…

Cyclists (of both kinds) are also rare enough that people are usually “surprised” by them because they can be in a blind spot much smaller than a car.

Anything that is “surprising” while driving cause stress and anger reactions.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#439

Post by glcheetham »

officeplant wrote: post #22

We've been importing them to Louisiana for 20+ years now. Although for the longest time they were only legal to drive like a farm truck (up to 40 miles from the farm) and only on 55mph or less roads. They also had limiters installed so they couldn't go over 55mph, not that its hard to remove the tiny flap of metal they installed to keep the throttle from opening fully. There is one farmer we used to call the used kei…

This is interesting. I’m from the UK, in the car trade, and setting up in Louisiana. Is there a market for European panel vans (like the sprinter, crafter, ford transit) in Louisiana?

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#440

Post by bombcar »

vlovich123 wrote: post #372
fooker wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you talking about? The vast majority of japanese brand cars are manufacturered in Japan and imported in the US.

I don’t know either way but DDG led me here [1] > The largest automobile manufacturing facility in the world for Toyota, Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Kentucky, Inc. (TMMK) is able to produce 550,000 vehicles and more than 600,000 engines per year. Two years after breaking ground in Georgetown, Kentucky, > Where are the majority of Toyotas produced? > The majority of Toyota vehicles you see on the road are made in your…

Much of this has to do with tariffs and point of final manufacturing can be key - so the question becomes if the car is shipped as a almost complete product and finalized or if it is sent as parts or if it built from local components. “Made in America” is not a simple question or answer.
Post reply on HN