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$8k Suzuki from India received a 5-star crash test rating
- nine_zeros 2y agoCan we get some of these cheap cars here? I don't want to keep funding Ford and GM shareholder greed.
- djmips 2y agoNo you have to buy a puffed up SUV or truck!
- ToucanLoucan 2y agoAll joking aside, it is a factor to consider when you're looking at these much smaller cars from foreign markets how they're going to fare when you get t-boned by a lifted F-350. This is not an argument against this car or others like it, mind you, this is if anything an argument for them and against bloated American status symbols and the less skilled and less empathetic drivers who find them so appealing.
- aiforecastthway 2y ago> t-boned by a lifted F-350. I'm not sure how a Ranger would fair getting t-boned by a lifted F-350... I think the bigger problem for these smaller cars are the (much more numerous) mid-sized SUVs.
- JKCalhoun 2y agoYeah, starting to think we're getting screwed in the U.S. I kind of think if more people in the U.S. knew what the rest of the world were paying for cars they might take up arms.
- OccamsMirror 2y agoSame here in Australia. We also have a 5% tariff, and an additional 33% on so called "luxury cars", even though we don't have a car industry anymore.
- BLKNSLVR 2y agoWe still have the tariff? Fucks sake shitty Australian governments on both sides. How long have Holden and Ford been gone now? Seven years!
- BLKNSLVR 2y agoApparently the import tariffs on cars is gone, primarily due to free trade agreements. However, the luxury car tax still applies to cars over the following values (retail cost inclusive of GST, customs, delivery): - $91,387 for fuel-efficient vehicles - $80,567 for others And the 33% tax applies to the value of the car above the threshold. I have much less of a problem with that arrangement.
- OccamsMirror 2y agoDo you have a source for the 5% tariff being removed? A quick Google search didn't yield any definitive results for me.
- BLKNSLVR 2y agoThe tariff doesn't seem to be removed, but it doesn't apply to suppliers in countries covered by free trade agreements. I was careless in my reading and writing. Source: https://www.goauto.com.au/news/general-news/regulation/77-per-cent-of-new-cars-already-have-zero-tariff/2018-01-05/68578.html https://www.goauto.com.au/news/general-news/regulation/77-pe...
- grecy 2y agoThe luxury car tax is such a scam. There’s no luxury boat tax. No luxury plane tax, no luxury watch or diamond or pool or McMansion tax.
- ars 2y agoCompanies sell what people buy. There's no car company conspiracy to keep small cars away from you.
- nothercastle 2y agoActually there is it’s called CAFE and tariffs
- ponector 2y agoThere are many small cars following CAFE rules(like 50+mpg), people just don't want to buy them.
- nothercastle 2y agoCafe increases costs and incentivizes large footprint vehicles and suvs. Small cars are not economical with those rules. Also there are a lot of import tariffs on a car not assembled in a NAFTA zone.
- aiforecastthway 2y agoCar dealership owners are a staple of state legislatures for a reason.
- pj_mukh 2y agoI'd love a small car and do have a couple of options, but in an accident, I will lose so hard (see: die quickly), the risk just doesn't seem worth it. Until some intervention starts reducing car sizes en masse, this will just be true. I'm loathed to even get a Prius with this being true.
- WoodenChair 2y ago> I don't want to keep funding Ford and GM shareholder greed. As a long suffering Ford stockholder, I'd like to understand what you mean by "shareholder greed." Go look at a 30 year chart of their stock price. It's barely changed. They do have a nice dividend. The company's PE ratio is appropriate for a very very mature industrial stock. Its market cap is $43 billion. That's about 20% of Toyota and 4% of Tesla. Who are these greedy shareholders and why are they managing to extract so little value out of the company despite being so greedy?
- pbmonster 2y ago> They do have a nice dividend. You don't say. And maybe it would look a little less greedy if that dividend were slightly smaller, but you guys make them sell the Ford Fiesta in the US instead? Hell, maybe the dividend wouldn't even be smaller! But nobody knows, since Ford doesn't sell cars for poor people anymore, not even the cars it makes in large numbers anyway.
- WoodenChair 2y ago> You don't say. And maybe it would look a little less greedy if that dividend were slightly smaller, but you guys make them sell the Ford Fiesta in the US instead? What do you mean "you guys make them." Individual tiny shareholders have 0 ability to change what a company sells. Also, why pick on Ford? It is one of the smallest of the "large" car manufacturers. As I mentioned in my original comment it's a fraction of the size of Toyota and Tesla in market cap. It has deliberately chosen a niche—trucks and SUVs—to survive. In my opinion, it does not have the brand, marketing, or research and development muscle to compete with Toyota, Nissan, Hyundai, or Honda in the small sedan market and rightly exited it. Few in the USA thought Ford was making good small sedans in the late 2010s compared to their rivals, hence why consumers stopped choosing them and Ford stopped selling them. > But nobody knows, since Ford doesn't sell cars for poor people anymore, not even the cars it makes in large numbers anyway. As is stated in this thread, across all manufacturers, the cheapest car sold today in the US is about $20K (Nissan Versa). Ford sells the Maverick pickup for $24K and the Escape SUV for $30K. It chooses not to compete at the very lowest tier of the US market and no longer manufactures any small cars like the Fiesta in the US. Is it Ford's responsibility to compete at every segment of the market? Or is it okay that they are specializing in trucks and SUVs where they have some competitive advantage and letting other manufacturers like Nissan have the small car market?
- maximus-decimus 2y agoI don't know why you aim at them in particular. The only subcompacts left in NA I believe are the Nissan versa and the Mitsubishi mirage, and the Mirage gets killed next year. They all killed their small cars. All of them. No more Honda Fit, no more Mazda 2 / Yaris, Kia Rios, Chevy Spark, Chevy Sonic, Nissan Micra, Mitsu Mirage. In Canada at least, the Fiat 500 only exists as an overpriced BEV model with such a small range it's unusable except as a pure city car.
- Nasrudith 2y agoThat is legitimately impressive. The only excuse I can see not to allow it is if it fails emissions and/or fuel efficiency tests.
- tomcam 2y agoI don’t mean to boast, but I found the “continue reading“ button in under five minutes. Bow before me, plebs.
- merek 2y agoThe speed at which airbags deploy is mind blowing. In the video, the steering wheel air bag starts deploying around 20 ms after impact. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRKAR0IZlgE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRKAR0IZlgE
- equestria 2y agoWhy? 20 ms is a very long time in the world of digital electronics. 1 MHz = 1 microsecond ticks, and most embedded MCUs run 10x to 100x faster than that. Sensors and ADCs commonly have microsecond-range response times, too. The mechanical part (rapid inflation) is more interesting, but for a long time, they did it the "obvious" way: a precisely-calibrated explosive charge, just enough to fill the bag without tearing it apart. Now, I think they're moving toward compressed air, which probably requires some clever engineering to build a sufficiently responsive electronically-controlled valve.
- fracus 2y agoIt's like you answered your own question.
- swiftcoder 2y ago20ms isn't all that long a window over which to filter all that sensor data and determine that you are actually in a crash (and didn't just take a speed bump a little too fast). False-positive airbag deployments are not viewed very positively by the affected user (even if its strictly better than a single false negative)
- WillAdams 2y agoReally miss my Geo Metro (re-badged Suzuki Swift)....
- runlevel1 2y agoA friend of mine had one when we were teenagers. It was fun in a way that only a cheap, tiny car can be. More go-kart than car. The whole frame became a crumple zone in a low-speed collision with a Lexus. Fortunately, he escaped injuries in the way only the young can.
- WillAdams 2y agoOne thing which helped mine quite a bit was that when I needed tires the correct size wasn't available, so the shop put on tires which were one R-factor larger, resulting in slightly greater ground clearance, and everything which went with that --- looked a lot better too, with more normal proportions.
- mkhpalm 2y agoMy dad logged every single fuel stop with amount, price, odometer, trip when he got his 1990 geo metro xfi. He commuted 120 miles for work and wanted the cheapest new car he could buy to do it in. IIRC the sticker said it got 52mpg highway but he was always bragging that he never got that low of gas mileage in it. We had that car until it was well over 300k miles when it got rear ended.
- lgsymons 2y agoYes, it's worth noting for those that are less aware that the Suzuki Dzire in the article is a close relation to the Suzuki Swift, which comes in a 5 door hatchback configuration and is not _quite_ as budget minded. The Swift is quite popular in many countries outside the USA, being a common choice for both first time car owners and seniors in Australia and New Zealand (and no doubt a number of other countries).
- billforsternz 2y agoLove my 2015 Suzuki Swift Sport bought new here in New Zealand. Fantastic car. Fun to drive, comfortable, practical, performant, reliable. Surprisingly spacious. Cost $NZ30K ~=~ $US18K.
- elzbardico 2y agoThe US don't have cheap cars because dealers and automakers prefer the high margins of more expensive cars. In basically any other market in the world, the Nissan Versa is definitelly beyond the entry level and not the cheapest and smallest car.
- WheatMillington 2y agoIt's also because American consumers, on average, absolutely without question prefer larger vehicles.
- elzbardico 2y agoI know, but the american market is gigantic, there is probably a sizable niche for economical vehicles. And if nobody is selling cheap cars, how can we be so sure they won't sell?
- kevin_thibedeau 2y agoThey would sell, but there is less profit in them so the manufacturers have optimized for a market where they preferably service the wealthy and those willing to overextend themselves on an expensive loan or lease. The bottom end of the market is left to used vehicles.
- infecto 2y agoYou frame it like manufacturers have never sold cheap cars. They have and they don't sell anywhere as much as you think they would. Right now the entry point across most manufacturers is ~$20-23k for a brand new vehicle. 9% of vehicle transactions are accounted for by these cars. The market for them is not large, people want crossover suvs and trucks.
- hnuser123456 2y agoAnd fuel economy regulations encourage larger vehicles with relatively more lenient emissions standards (moreso than the additional size would require) than is applied to smaller cars.
- moltar 2y agoShould be sold in Europe!
- michaelteter 2y agoPassenger and pedestrian safety is very important, and this is quite an achievement. I do wonder about the manufacturing and supply chain, and how environmentally (and worker) friendly it is given the extremely low price.
- screye 2y agoI can speak for this. I've worked as a mechE on production lines in India. The parts quality, worker treatment and environmental considerations are excellent (especially compared to what I came in expecting). These are well-paying stable jobs for low-skilled labor. The plants were clean and significant precautions were taken before operating risky machines. Unionized plants tend to be more worker friendly but also worse run. The thing about making $8k cars is they only make sense at scale. And effective operation at scale needs a well oiled workforce with little leeway for the kind of inefficiencies that come with haphazard work. Now, 3rd party supplier conditions are more suspect. They can range from being at parity to looking like a proper sweat shop. But the mines where Apple's silicon is mined isn't that different either.
- darth_avocado 2y agoIt’s cheap because PPP. The same reason it is cheap to get a Chinese EV than it is to get an American EV.
- jazzyjackson 2y agoPurchasing power parity? Public private partnership? Paycheck protection program? Pextreme Pertical Pentigration?
- Gualdrapo 2y agoTo think the Jimny originally has 5 airbags but here in Colombia is being sold with only two...
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Tor3 2y agoAs someone having owned several.. are you sure about that? I've never seen a Jimny with 5 airbags. Not in Japan either (as a Jimny fan I always check them out whenever I get the chance). I can't see how that could ever have been possible, there's nowhere to design in any more than the two my own has, as far as I can tell.
- hulitu 2y agoIt is because of regulations. You see a lot of articles on HN lately about relay attacs, but they forget to say that those are mostly old cars in US.
- muffwiggler 2y ago[flagged]
- liampulles 2y agoI have a newer Suzuki Swift - great hatchback. All straightforward dials and knobs (no infotainment system, though it has Bluetooth) and no issues for the 4 years I've owned it so far. It was the cheapest new hatchback one could buy when I bought it.
- rockyj 2y agoI am an Indian living in Berlin. I always am surprised at the price differences between the countries. A new small SUV in India (e.g. Citroen Basalt) with all bells and whistles is less than 10k Euros (https://www.carwale.com/citroen-cars/basalt/ https://www.carwale.com/citroen-cars/basalt/) and here in Germany I cannot get a decent second hand car for less than 20K. On the other hand, in India any car is probably unusable after 10-15 years, and here in Germany people buy a car for life.
- 627467 2y agoWith all the "green" restrictions in place in many european cities - forbidding cars as recent as 2005 to enter them - cars are only for life if you live in the middle of nowhere or have a short life
- OtherShrezzing 2y agoYou can usually retrofit a pre-2005 vehicle for a thousand or so euros. Approx the cost of the annual maintenance on a vehicle of that age, and certainly far less than the cost of a new or used car (either financial cost or embodied emissions cost).
- mdp2021 2y ago> You can usually retrofit a pre-2005 vehicle for a thousand or so euros Not in every Country.
- pjc50 2y agoThat was nearly twenty years ago, a very high lifetime for a car.
- ricardobayes 2y agoThe Dacia Sandero starts at around 13k in Europe and by all means a pretty good car. I have a friend who bought one new and told me it has been very reliable.
- exar0815 2y agoI would love to buy one of the Maruti Suzuki Jimnys. It's been sold in Europe, but you can't get one in Europe anymore because its not complying with arbitrary eco-guidelines (Which somehow a G-Wagon, a Defender or a Land Cruiser are). Prices for 50K KM Used Cars are nearly double the price of new ones. Since also LADA isn't on the European market anymore, you can't get a small off-road capable vehicle anymore. Okay, there are no dedicated off-road vehicles anymore, only luxury SUVs that no one can afford and no one would take off road.
- medoc 2y agoThere is the Dacia Duster if your off-road needs are not really hardcore.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- alias_neo 2y agoSince we're on safety ratings; the Duster gets a 3/5 from Euro NCAP. Many of Dacia's newer models get 1/5, some 2/5, and only the Sandero gets 4/5, their highest score (in this market). In the UK, a Duster starts at £20k for the base model , while something equivalent with a 5 star rating like a Nissan Qashqai or Kia Sportage starts at £30k.
- ponector 2y agoBut they compare with Lada Niva. Does it have any stars in EuroNCAP?
- neoromantique 2y agoLada Niva has a benefit of making sure you don't suffer for long in case of a crash.
- vasco 2y agoThe Ladas break down before you get in a crash. Can't get injured if it was parked at the mechanics.
- cies 2y agoCrash rating are "per class". So a 5-star for a mini car is VERY different from a 5-star SUV. There was once they frontally test crashed the safest mini car against the safest SUV and the mini car kind of evaporated while the SUV had a broken bumper/headlight but still could drive.
- downWidOutaFite 2y agoIt feels almost selfishly evil to buy cars that increase your safety at the expense of others. It also promotes a race to the top, bigger and bigger cars over time, which is indeed what we have seen in the US market over the last 30 years. Does SUV safety ratings include the likelihood of killing others?
- cies 2y agoNope. Only safety for the people in the car is considered. Volvo is quite vocal about wanting to produce a car that is safe for the people outside the car. They have a target that no one should die from a (new) Volvo crashing into them by some year in the future. They want to use auto-braking systems and external airbags iirc.
- AdamN 2y agoI believe that has changed for the new EuroNCAP which does consider pedestrian safety in the score.
- cies 2y agoI feel the "Race to the top" is also happening with car head lights. They are much brighter nowadays. It's nice for the driver of such a car, but super nasty for other road users. It's almost as if you need tainted glass to go with it (but then you dont see the road users that do not have these super bright lights)
- amne 2y agoEuro NCAP does. The safest car right now if you care about pedestrians/cyclists appears to be the Toyota CH-R. https://www.euroncap.com/en/results/toyota/c-hr/51098 https://www.euroncap.com/en/results/toyota/c-hr/51098
- Darthy 2y agoBe aware that for global NCAP, safety ratings are dependent on the vehicle class. If a subcompact car receives 5 stars, this does not mean it has the same probability of survivability in full frontal crash as a large executive luxury sedan that received 5 stars. In fact, if there was a head-on crash between this car and Mercedes E-Class, and you're planning to be in one of the cars, I would advise you to chose the Mercedes.
- rob74 2y agoHence the "arms race" of ever huger cars, yes. And, if you value your life, don't even think about cycling or going by foot with such cars around...
- chongli 2y agoYes. Anyone who has worked on conservation of momentum problems in high school physics should recognize this. Even at low collision speeds if there is a large disparity in mass between the vehicles then the lighter one experiences a lot of acceleration. For an extreme case think of a low speed collision between a bowling ball and a ping pong ball.
- HPsquared 2y agoIt boils down to "delta-V". In a mismatched collision, the smaller vehicle needs to withstand a higher delta-V than the larger vehicle. Also, in many cases the bumper heights are mismatched so the larger vehicle's strong structure runs into higher, weaker parts of the small vehicle, further exacerbating the problem.
- lupusreal 2y agoThere are several things you can do to dramatically reduce your risk. Cycle during the day, while sober, with bright colors, with a helmet, and avoiding multi-lane roads. If you do these things you've statistical eliminated most of the risk. > victim blaming It's an exercise in reducing risk, not assigning blame. > the law says I can cycle on those roads The law can't bring you back to life, but if you want to take the risk that's your decision.
- everdrive 2y agoIf they try to bring it to the US, it will need to weigh 4,300 lbs and cost $39,900. There are no more cheap, small, light, or basic cars in sold in the US.
- dotancohen 2y agoThe fine article opens with: > There aren’t any new models available under $20,000 in the for American car buyers anymore It then continues: > America’s cheapest car, the Nissan Versa, starts at $18,330, more than double the price of a base Dzire. Am I missing something, or were the facts bent for journalistic effect, or is this not the contradiction I think it is?
- xbmcuser 2y agoI think they mean that it's not a new model its a refresh of an older model.
- ricardobeat 2y agoMay I suggest replacing the URL with the actual article at https://www.motor1.com/news/740524/suzuki-dzire-five-stars-crash-test/ https://www.motor1.com/news/740524/suzuki-dzire-five-stars-c... The current link is an ad-infested repost.
- nubinetwork 2y agoThat link has just as many ads... /shrug
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- helsinkiandrew 2y agoAlso the Global NCAP test page/press release/article: https://www.globalncap.org/news/new-dzire-from-maruti-suzuki-achieves-five-star-rating-in-global-ncap-voluntary-test https://www.globalncap.org/news/new-dzire-from-maruti-suzuki... Which links to the original test report: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5fb4ea8933ae6c208c3dac41/t/672da0fb2dfa6175e122164c/1731043581470/MarutiSuzuki-NewDzire-factsheet-2024.pdf https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5fb4ea8933ae6c208c3da...
- rty32 2y agoI was amazed by the amount of ads on the site -- that's a lot. That's when I have uBlock origin and almost only ever see subtle text based ads occasionally.
- zaroth 2y agoYou should not give these sites the benefit of rendering their own HTML. Ask your agent to convert the URL to markdown, and read it in VS Code or whereever.
- hemc4 2y agoNo wonder this is the favorite car of taxi drivers and widely used car in India.
- Tiktaalik 2y agoA tragedy that Suzuki pulled out of NA. In Japan right now and seeing so many nice Suzukis. Especially the Jimny.
- alephnerd 2y agoIndia's branches of Japanese automakers tend to be essentially independent of the Japanese parent company. When Japanese automotive FDI in India began in the 1980s, Japanese companies would essentially create a JV with an existing Indian manufacturer and ToT much of the technology and operations. For example, Maruti Suzuki (Maruti Udyog and Suzuki), Toyota Kriloskar (Kriloskar Group and Toyota), and Hero Honda (Hero Group and Honda, though both ended up splitting in the 2000s). Korean manufacturers in India do the same, hence why Hyundai Motors India IPOed a couple weeks ago despite technically being a part of Hyundai Motors.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- DrNosferatu 2y agoHow does this Global NCAP compare to EuroNCAP? A equal score on both means very different safety levels!