Comparison left vs right for a craftsman who doesnt know which one he should buy:
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l/r same bed size
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r lower bed for way easier loading/unloading
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r less likely to crash
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r less fuel consumption and costs
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r less expensive to repair
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r easy to park
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r easy to get around in narrow places like crowded construction sites or towns
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r not participating in road arms race
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l You get taken serious by your fellow carbrained americans because ““trucks”” are normalized and small handy cars are ridiculed.
So unless you are a fragile piece of human, choose the right one.
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Just gonna keep on posting this
I agree with the sentiment of this post, but to be fair, you can also carry 3 or 4 passengers in the left vehicle, as opposed to only one in the right.
The main problem is the US fuel economy regulations actually encourage manufacturers to build bigger trucks and SUVs so they get classified into a category that has looser fuel economy requirements.
I fvcking love kei trucks but one counter point - a lot of US is shitty rural roads at 50-60 mph (80-95kmh) plus freeways at even higher speeds. Kei trucks are more of a city thing and just wouldn’t fare well here. They are however very popular on university campuses.
100km/h isn’t that fast…
Yep. I’m an American tradesman and the trucks that the guys drive are way too beefy for what they actually do.
I’ve gotten by with small Toyota trucks, and rav 4s…much to the chagrin of the good old boys. Should have seen their face when I rolled up in a prius…till I tell em I get 50 mpg easy.
I would love a small little truck like this one in the photo.
Also spent a lot of time in the industry (drywall, lath, and plaster). Key cars top out somewhere around 750 pounds of capacity, and I could early blow through that with brining materials to a job site, or hauling stuff to the dump.
Key cars are cool, but you also need other solutions in place for materials delivery and hauling. American trucks are kind of a one size fits all approach to construction. Your truck for heavy hauling is also the truck you use for light hauling.
Most Kei trucks do top out around 750lbs, but I know for a fact that there are models of Honda Acty that have a rated bed load around 1500lbs and a rated towing capacity around 2200lbs
TIL. That’s pretty cool.
Although the payload capacity of an American truck is often double that. It’s pretty easy to hit 1500lbs with 10 bags of cement, a person, and some gear. I’m assuming Japan has other solutions for hauling that are pretty common. I’m guessing there are some pretty big differences in their construction workflows and logistics that make key cars practical.
IMHO, contractor’s work trucks aren’t the problem is the US. The bigger problem is that most of those vehicles are sold to private citizens who think the space is convenient for an occasional camping trip or an epic Costco run.
I don’t know about Japan but here in Europe I just see tradesmen, needing large quantities, getting their materials delivered on a pallet from a semi-trailer.
Most use vans though for carrying their equipment, since you usually don’t want your gear sitting outside, like it would on a pickup truck.
I agree with the idea with the exceptions of towing capacity, passenger capacity, and possibly (probably) bed weight capacity.
But if you’re one guy that doesn’t tow anything and needs to haul a few sheets of plywood, sure, it makes sense.
The percentage of trucks on the left I see actually doing that is functionally 0%
We don’t need a lot of anything bar food, water, oxygen and sex. I’m all for sensible cars Vs that monstrosity on the left, but as hobbies go - boating is not the most offensive.
The problem I have with boating is that it takes a number of related environmentally irresponsible “wants” and chains them together into a series of linked “needs”. One “needs” the truck because they have a boat. That’s expected to be the end of the discussion, but really it isn’t because it is fair to continue to question the whole chain. People are bad at distinguishing wants and needs, or alternatively people are very good at presenting their wants as needs when a justification is needed.
As a person who likes boating, I don’t understand people wanting to tow around their boats all the time. If I were to ride a boat sufficiently that owning one makes sense, it would stay at the marina. Because why would I want a boat in front of my house? Then again I just rent boats because I want to ride them in different locations.
R can’t tow for shit.
R has a 2,200 lb carrying capacity. It can haul or tow almost anything a regular person needs to 99% of the time.
These little trucks also build and supply massive countries across the world. It’s preposterous to think you need 4,000lbs of carrying capacity day in and day out. You absolutely do not.
Great, but carry capacity and towing capacity aren’t the same thing. And it doesn’t matter if I don’t need to tow something everyday, even if I need to tow something monthly or even yearly the one on the right just can’t do it. Also from my very brief searching it seems like a KEI truck absolutely does not have a capacity of 2200lbs, more like 800-1500lbs. I will agree though, if you just need a work vehicle and a truck bed then the KEI truck is probably fine. If you need to tow, it absolutely is not.
If you need to tow something that heavy once a year, you are not buying a car for that.
I mean, I wouldn’t but that thing still has to get moved somehow. That truck still has to be available somehow.
Yes, you can always rent one when you need it.
I don’t think the big family that is going on their once or maybe twice a year camping trip with their large trailer is going to rent a truck for their vacation. But, yes that’s a possibility.
I mean if our culture wasn’t so car centric and centered around instant gratification that wouldn’t be an issue, it’s not too hard to rent a car at all, especially if you’ve been planning a year long trip. Not trying to soapbox here, though, I’m very reliant on my car too and see doing all that as an inconvenience, but I realize how absurd it is to feel that way.
