2022 Daihatsu Hijet Dump Bed on 2040-cars

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Toyota's Copen GR Sport is a tiny, racy roadster

In its home market, Toyota has a designated sport brand called GR, which is meant to invoke Toyota's Gazoo Racing division. It has three tiers of sportiness: the entry-level GR Sport, GR, and all-out range-topping GRMN. Ahead of the Tokyo Motor Show, Toyota announced it is adding to its GR Sport lineup a new mini convertible called the Copen GR Sport. Toyota pulled the Copen from Daihatsu's bank of cool minicars. Diahatsu announced its own Copen GR Sport at the Tokyo Auto Salon in early 2019. Now Toyota will sell its own hotted-up version of the tiny roadster. Toyota Gazoo Racing tweaked the new model and gave it sportier equipment and a visual update inside and out. First, let's talk basic stats. The Copen GR Sport weighs roughly 2,000 pounds and has a 0.66-liter turbocharged engine that makes 63 horsepower at 6,400 rpm and 68 lb-ft of torque at 3,200 rpm. It's front-wheel drive and is available with a five-speed manual or a continuously variable transmission (CVT) with seven-speed Super Active Shift and paddle shifters. Toyota left the powertrain alone and chose to focus on body rigidity and suspension tuning. The Copen GR Sport has specific shock absorbers, updated spring rates, retuned power steering, a new front brace, and a redesigned center brace.  Toyota made the Copen a bit more visually aggressive as well. It has a unique front bumper with side air intakes, a larger front grille, and a rear bumper with a new diffuser look. It also comes with matte gray BBS forged-aluminum wheels, LED headlights, LED fog lights, and LED taillights. GR Sport emblems on the front, side, and rear assure passers-by this is not a regular Copen. In total, eight exterior colors are available, as are multiple color options for the roof. The black interior was spruced up with Recaro sport seats with GR embroidery, a MOMO leather-wrapped steering wheel with the GR emblem, piano black accents, and a new GR instrument cluster with red accents. Unfortunately, the pint-sized roadster is only available in Japan.

Daihatsu's four Tokyo Motor Show concepts bring the Waku Waku

When Suzuki showed off two of its concept reveals for the Tokyo Motor Show, one was a kei car called the Waku Spo. As far as we can tell with Internet translators, that renders the words "box" and "ish," which we'll resolve into the entirely apt descriptive "boxy." Turns out when you double up on the waku, however, you get excitement, which could be how Daihatsu came to name one of its four Tokyo concepts the Waku Waku. The cerulean blue box with the searing orange highlights looks like the result of a kei car mixed with an overlander. Black cladding hunkers over tiny wheels shod in aggressive rubber. The rear windows are replaced by full-length interior panels with a jerry can motif above and attachment points below. The back half of the roof opens onto an additional storage area, and the bumper triples as a step and a platform. What's not to like? Sticking with the two-up names throughout, next comes the Ico Ico, an autonomous shuttle with its own robot assistant named Nippote. At just 58 inches wide, the four seater's designed to navigate especially cramped urban centers. Slide doors, a retractable ramp, and modular seating that can be moved around the cabin make easier access for the disabled. The Tsumu Tsumu is a kei-class goods carrier with a removable cargo box. The renderings show an industrial-strength drone that sits behind glass panels when not in use, and launches from the roof when operational. The artwork shows the foodservice box, the Tsumu Tsumu turned into a tiny food truck. The Wai Wai minivan makes room for two more passengers than the Ico Ico, swallowing six people in three rows of two. Front doors open to nearly 90 degrees, and rear sliding doors run to the back of the second row for better ingress and egress. Twin fabric sunroofs keep prevent a gloomy interior, and all of the seats fold down for when cargo instead of people needs hauling. We don't know what powers the concepts and what other neato tricks they might hide, but we looking forward to finding out when the Tokyo Motor Show opens later this month. Featured Gallery Daihatsu 2019 Tokyo Motor Show Concepts View 26 Photos Tokyo Motor Show Daihatsu Truck Crossover Minivan/Van Commercial Vehicles Concept Cars Off-Road Vehicles

Junkyard Gem: 1990 Daihatsu Charade

The North American automotive landscape is littered with the bones of overseas marques that tried and failed to get a toehold here. Peugeot, Austin, Sterling, Yugo, Suzuki, Daewoo… the list goes on and on. Daihatsu had the backing of majority shareholder Toyota and a very successful line of vehicles in its Japanese homeland, so the idea of selling in North America seemed to make sense in the late 1980s. Things didn't work out so well in the end, but two models of Daihatsu could be purchased here for the 1988 through 1992 model years. Here's an example of the better-known Daihatsu, spotted in a Denver-area U-Wrench yard. Apologies for the beschmutzified images; I was pulling vast quantities of Junkyard Boombox parts at this yard's All You Can Carry For $59.99 Sale that day, and I got transmission fluid on the lens. The Charade was very cheap and pretty well screwed-together, but it had to compete against cheap cars from well-known makes such as Subaru (the Justy), Pontiac (the Daewoo-built LeMans), Ford (the Mazda-built Festiva), and Geo (the Suzuki-built Metro), and it was saddled with one of the worst names in automotive history. At least the suits at Daihatsu got the naming thing right with their little mini-SUV: the Rocky. Strangely, I still see the occasional Daihatsu as I roam the car graveyards of the land. I'm not sure where they hide, but they end up here. The three-banger in the '90 Charade generated a not-so-whopping 53 horsepower. Think about that the next time you moan about the new Mirage's allegedly intolerable 78 horses, or the Versa's 109. In Hong Kong, the car's Japanese origins were emphasized in the advertising. We've set a new standards for new cars todayÂ… but you can't feel the glow until you drive one away! Featured Gallery Junked 1990 Daihatsu Charade View 14 Photos Auto News Daihatsu Automotive History Junkyard Gems