World’s cheapest (and most dangerous?) car
Posted January 10th, 2008 at 12:27 PM by Jon Ham
The Tata Nano has been unveiled. It will cost about $2,500. It has a two-cylinder, 33 hp engine. Strange, though, that this story says nothing about it’s fuel mileage. That makes me think it’s not so good.
People used to think old VW beetles were great on gas mileage, but I drove one from 1970 to 1978 and never got more than 29 mpg. Of course, I tuned it myself and was more interested in hp than mpg. Still, I never heard of any old beetle owner getting more than 30 mpg.
If this thing takes off in North America, get ready for dramatically rising auto deaths. This thing’s engine is in the rear and it has about as much up-front protection as an Isetta.
January 10th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
http://www.engadget.com/2008/01/10/tata-motors-2-500-nano-automobile-gets-official/
They claim it gets 54 MPG. Of course, with 33 HP, it’ll take you about 54 miles to get up to the speed limit.
But yeah, if you get in an accident in one of these, or in one of those new “FourTwo” smart-cars, they’ll just take the crushed car with your body still inside and dump it in your grave.
PS: Do we really need the inevitable “Tata” jokes? “Hey baby, nice Tata.” “You pig!” What’s next, a new line of appliances from a Chinese company called “Pipi” or “Dudu”?
January 10th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
clayj, I hear there’s an upscale version coming with all the bells and whistles of most luxury cars. It’s called the Bodacious Tata.
January 10th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
Yeah, but you have to buy two of them. Otherwise your driveway would look like Dolly Parton on one side and Olga Korbut on the other.
January 10th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
Ooh, I have an idea for their next car… they should call it the Tata Nova. That way they can have two stupid things in their name (Nova, of course, means “doesn’t go” in Spanish). And maybe they could get Olga Korbut or some other similarly flat-chested woman to be the spokeswoman for the Tata Nano.
PS to Jon: Saw Mary Katharine on O’Reilly last night. Please tell her to keep up the good work!
January 10th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
[...] (H/T – Jon Ham) [...]
January 10th, 2008 at 2:00 pm
I don’t know where to begin with this one. I honestly don’t.
I’d rather have the DeWalt Nano, even though it seats 3 less and the model that’s closest to me already has some right quarter-panel damage. 800 proven horsepower beats 33 any day of the week.