Discussion
“Toyota is rebooting its Scion brand, which for 13 years sold small and entry-level vehicles aimed at younger buyers, as an experimental lab for making things besides traditional cars.
“Scion will start by selling the sort of microsize pickup truck that is beloved by Japanese buyers but long off-limits to Americans.
“The KEI-01 will be road-legal in all 50 states, but classified as a ‘low-speed vehicle’ and limited to 25 miles an hour.”
@retrosponge I doggedly maintain a hashtag dedicated to advancing this argument. Follow #AdorableCarAlert for updates
Can we call it the Fu**CyberTruck?
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@jalefkowit ok, but when are they going to make a hybrid Yaris?
@theruran I was wondering when we'd get some details direct from Toyota! Thanks for tracking that down
@jalefkowit @theruran all its missing is "it's electric!"
my ebike can go up to 18 miles. 25 miles for all that steel is bullshit.
@jalefkowit Make it electric and I'm in.
@jalefkowit Finally. Probably all the truck most people need. Not surprised Scion needs to be rebooted, given the absurd trend in vehicle prices, but I also hope this starts a trend of Kei cars finding their way here outside of JDM imports.
Before you get too excited, it’s gonna have a speed governor limiting it to 25 miles per hour. They’re aiming it at the golf cart segment.
YouTube
@jalefkowit surely no one will modify that!
@jalefkowit My (legal) Class 3 ebike can go over 25mph.
@jalefkowit i imagine this is a necessary compromise to satisfy the NTSB. american tank-cars are so deadly heavy that reasonable sized vehicles have to stay out of their way, lest the reasonable occupants be pancaked.
@jalefkowit road legal in all fifty states, with about 100 caveats
@jalefkowit so, my experience here is limited but exactly 100% of the transport modes I have ever seen with speed governors have a punch-out on the dashboard for a switch that splices into the wire with a connector in the middle helpfully labelled “speed governor do not disconnect” and there’s a store across the street that mysteriously sells a switch that fits right in that slot.
@mhoye the video further down the thread claims there will be governors in software too, to make it harder to bypass.
@jalefkowit Kei truck would be so great!
@jalefkowit I am sitting in a parking lot right now and 80% of the cars are absolutely enormous and it would be so much better if people could drive those Kei cars because a large majority of people don't need anything bigger than that. They just don't have a choice.