I saw a few of the dreaded Chevy Matiz's whilst I was cruising round Denmark in my rental Fiat 500 last week.
It got me thinking how it kind of resembles the Nano in shape/size. So if the Nano can be sold new for, say, GBP2500 (cheaper in Asia but will cost more over here due to EU safety legislation etc) can any other cars be stripped-out and made cheaper?
I guess that Indian labour costs are much lower than those in say Korea or Poland or Malaysia, and that must make up a large proportion of the car's sticker price. But is there a market for a stripped-out Perodua or Matiz, i10 or even Panda? I bet the manufacturers could shave another 1000 pounds off a Panda or i10 if they wanted to (remove door cards, parcel shelves, sound-deadening, etc for starters).
I laughed when in 2005-ish the French were so proud of the then-forthcoming C1/107 because it would be priced under 8000 euros or something like that, when Fiat were already selling a cheaper Panda!
Would you pay less for less?
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www.autocar.co.uk/News/NewsArticle/Tata-Nano/245712/
I think your prices are a bit out of date:
"The Nano was launched in India earlier this year and retails for less than £2000, but due to the increased cost of making it ‘Europeanised’ (more creature comforts, improved crash test safety) it is likely to cost from £4000 - £5000 in the UK."
At £5000 it's starting to get into a very competitve market
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There is a balance I think and FIAT have got that perfectly with the Panda. Its a cheap small car which is nice to drive and has decent equipment compared to the C1/107/Recall.
Small cars need to be like the original mini to drive, need to be simple to and cheap to fix but need to be fairly safe and not too basic. The Panda Active is already basic enough!
Emisions and safety laws always mean that is impossible to make a very simple car. If it was possible all you would need is a small 800cc 8ycl engine, a simple single point injection system, no airbags, no impact bars, no seat belt pretensioners, plastic windows, cheap Wanli tyres etc.
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An 800cc 8 cylinder engine - this I must see and hear. There was a very nice sounding small capacitymulti-cylinder racing Honda in the 60s - was it a 4 or a 6?
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I meant 3 cylinder!
But if the Nano is anything like the some of the call centres over there it will be far too fast and hard to understand anyway!
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I think Bajaj (who make Vespa scooters under licence) have a competitor or one on the drawing board.
It's a pity they've got 602cc engines instead of 600 - then they could be sold over here as quadricycles.
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>> An 800cc 8 cylinder engine - this I must see and hear. There was a
>> very nice sounding small capacitymulti-cylinder racing Honda in the 60s - was it a 4
>> or a 6?
>>
Honda's RC166 250cc GP bike had a 6 cylinder engine.
I think it used a lubrication system where it used the crankshaft to splash the oil up to the top of the engine and could not be run at less than 11000rpm or the top end would run dry.
A few videos of it on Youtube.
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Am I alone in thinking that super-basic transportation isn't appealing, nor is it particularly virtuous given that most of the Earth's resources are consumed in manufacturing the car whatever its specification.
Whilst I understand the requirement for the developing world I rather like sound deadening, parcel shelves, ABS, airbags and aircon). Surely this section of the UK (or EU) market is adequately addressed by second hand cars, a 3 year old Focus must be far preferable to a noisy, relatively unsafe tin can, unless you're a masochist of course.... That's certainly where my money would go.
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I suppose there will naturally be a higher than average percentage of the readers and contributors here who are car and other motorised transport "enthusiasts".
This factor alone might reasonably give the reader of these threads the impression that falling below certain standards of build quality, appearance, performance etc were not negotiable.
Many of us though will know people who simply don't care about cars in the way most of us do. Some of them genuinely only want a cheap, fuss free method of moving themselves and their stuff from point A to point B. They might appreciate some luxuries but really would rather have a cheaper more basic car.
There will, I suspect, always be a market for such a thing and probably quite rightly so.
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Im sure there will be buyers. There were for all that eastern european stuff that came over here for years despite it being very rough around the edges.
I would be you anything you like that these cars will appear in decent numbers on hire car fleets to replace Matizs. You just have to look at a car like the Chevvy Matiz, which is to the trained eye, a rather basic and irrelevant car BUT to someone who just wants a new car at the lowest possible price ( my local dealer was flogging these on pre-reg for £4k last year ), they have their place.
It will be pensioners maybe who want hassle free new car motoring on a budget, the kind of folk who dont haggle when they buy a car so wont realise they can get a Panda for £500 more if they ask nicely. The kind of nutters who bought CityRovers, Proton Savvys, Matizs, who seem to have inexplicable reasons for wanting mundane transport.
There is ALWAYS a market for something that is average but cheap. Im quite sure this Nano will be a plucky little thing and it may even turn out to be a suprise, you never know - look at the 2CV and the Beetle - both rubbish cars really but perhaps popular because of this.
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>> The kind of nutters who bought CityRovers Proton Savvys
Thankyou for that Stu. I pride myself (if that is the quite right expression) on being something of a car name anorak but I had previously never heard of a Proton Savvy.
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>>Thankyou for that Stu. I pride myself (if that is the quite right expression) on being something of a car name anorak but I had previously never heard of a Proton Savvy.<<
No probs. You havent lived unless you have seen a Savvy. Quite a distinctive car actually, just not that well put together and a bit expensive for what they are.
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>> No probs. You havent lived unless you have seen a Savvy. Quite a distinctive car
>> actually just not that well put together and a bit expensive for what they are.
Yes, I found the Savvy courtesy of Google and styling wise it looks ok. I guess it's similar to the Lada Kalina in that it looks modern from a distance but when you get close it's more reminiscent of a kitcar.
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Which is why I bought one of the most basic cars - less to go wrong.
I've owned 5 cars in 3 years so enough is enough!
Plus most modern small cars are very good to drive, cheap cars have come on a long way since the Lada and FSO.
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>> Which is why I bought one of the most basic cars - less to go
>> wrong.
>>
But Rattle, your Panda (if that's what you're still getting) actually isn't particularly basic, I bet is still has airbags, ABS, power steering and maybe even electric windows / central locking and a radio ? That's because standards have risen - even for those who view a car as a mere appliance.
When I was growing up in the 1970s you could get a Ford Escort with drum brakes, plastic seats which didn't recline, rubber mats on the floor and no passenger sun visor, no heated rear window or reversing lights either and certainly no radio (or clock, or intermittent wipers for that matter) - I know my Dad had one, his utilitarian attitude turned me into a car nut so maybe my kids will be happy with Nanos.....
My understanding is that the Nano in its purest form is more basic than even the 1970s Escort "Delux" (sic) was, if my budget were tight then I'd buy a second hand Focus (or Panda) instead.
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It is as basic I think as I could up with. It has PAS, ABS, electric windows, only two airbags, central locking, a cd player and thats it. That is its most basic spec too but in other countries you can get more basic spec Pandas.
It does not have aircon but then it meaks me sneaze so I would never use it anyway.
I suppose even the most basic car I had (a 1996 N Fiesta) had a radio, heater, airbag and some seats.
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>>
>> I suppose even the most basic car I had (a 1996 N Fiesta) had a
>> radio heater airbag and some seats.
>>
Precisely, these Nanos are a world apart - even from your 1996 Fiesta, AFAIK all they have are the seats from your list of Fiesta luxuries....
So when the OP "laughed" at a C1 being 8K EUR the comparison simply wasn't like-for-like IMHO, even a horribly (in my view) stripped out basic C1 would have:
A proper hatchback rather than a welded up body
Front engine and front wheel drive with the associated engineering
Sophisticated suspension
A high standard of crash-worthiness
A heater and a heated rear window
ABS, Stability control probably
Airbags
To continue with the Citroen analogy, the Nano might possibly be compared to a 2CV but even that had FWD and an opening boot 50 years ago!
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The nanos will be a modder's favourite.
There will be all sorts of aftermarket toys and websites with step by steps on how to do popular mods.
I'd consider one for fun. And i'd mod it with car PC and all sorts of nonsense.
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I laughed at the C1, simply because I think it is overpriced. I actually like the C1/Aygo/107, but it's hardly cheap when compared with a Panda is it?!
In 2000 I bought the cheapest, most basic VW Lupo 1.0E - GBP8800! Expensive by today's standards when 5k-7k will by you a range of alternatives. Even the VW Fox is under 8 grand now isn't it?
So can we conclude that the cost to the manufacturer to produce a car has fallen in real terms over the past 10 years? And if so, can it fall any lower to start to compete with "giveaway" cars like the Nano or some of those Peroduas?
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I think R&D costs are now lower for small cars. About 15 years ago Ford etc wanted to make superminis as good to drive as their bigger cars. This meant spending a fortune on R&D the currently crop of city cars use mainly technology which was invented in the 1990's for their superminis.
The Panda uses lots of current and previous generation Punto parts for example.
I did look at the C1 etc but it the base spec has 3 doors, no electric windows, no central locking. For about £200 cheaper you can have a Panda with electric windows, 5 doors and central locking. The interior of the Panda is probably a bit better built too.
The Piccanto just didn't feel right for me, the i10 I did consider a lot as it is much better value than the Panda but this is a car I want to keep for a while and I've always had a passion for FIAT.
The cheaper Peroduas are a joke as are Protons. They both may as give up selling cars in the UK as their cars are too over priced.
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>>
>> I did look at the C1 etc but it the base spec has 3 doors
>> no electric windows no central locking. For about £200 cheaper you can have a Panda
>> with electric windows 5 doors and central locking. The interior of the Panda is probably
>> a bit better built too.
>>
Then perhaps you are being seduced by luxury features ? It is a slippery slope to demanding climate control, cruise control and 200+ BHP as I now do, I wonder if there's a car-spec-aholic's anonymous I could check into ? ;-)
btw, my first car was an 848cc Mini....
Last edited by: idle_chatterer on Fri 16 Apr 10 at 10:09
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Well my Corsa had everything and my Fiestas had nothing. There is nothing worse than being sat at a junction waiting for a gap when its raining, visibility is effected because the window is soaked. Just press a button and wind it down. By the time you've used a crank you've probably missed the gap.
Central locking is also brilliant because it is for lazy people.
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>> To continue with the Citroen analogy the Nano might possibly be compared to a 2CV
>> but even that had FWD and an opening boot 50 years ago!
>>
And, to misquote an advert for the 2CV at the time, it had:
Central locking: all door locks could be reached from the driver's seat.
Air conditioning: Fold back roof
Was faster than a Ferrari: If that Ferrari was only doing 50 mph
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Tata Nano - What cars can compete? - lancara
