Today’s Post by Joe Farace
“Among all the machines, motorcar is my favorite machine.”–
One of the joys of attending the Tokyo Motor Show, at least for us Americans, is that we get to see cars from around the world that are not typically imported into the USA. In addition to French cars, which have not been sold in the USA since the 1991 Peugeot 405— Columbo drove a Peugeot 403—you also get to see Asian cars that never make it here, such as the class of Japanese automobile known as Keijidōsha (“light automobile”) or kei cars. The below image was made at a previous Tokyo Motor Show and the little car sure is cute. Sadly, I don’t remember the manufacturer’s name; I originally thought it was a Daewoo.
They’re Small but Intriguing
How I Made This Photo: The camera used to photograph this kei car was a Canon EOS Digital Rebel with an 18-55mm kit lens (at 22mm) with an exposure of 1/125 sec at f/6.3 and ISO 400 with a minus one-third stop exposure compensation. The lens flare was added in Photoshop using the Render>Lens Flare command.
A kei car is a category of small Japanese vehicles, that includes passenger cars, vans and even pickup trucks that are designed to comply with government tax and insurance regulations. The cars feature yellow license plates with black numbers and for commercial they have yellow numbers on black background. Although regulations restrict physical size and engine displacement (currently 660cc), manufacturers sometimes include features that are associated with more conventionally sized vehicles. That’s why kei cars are often available with forced-induction engines, automatic transmissions, front, rear and four-wheel drive, air conditioning, GPS, and other features.
While successful in Japan, manufacturers consider the genre too specialized and small to be profitable for export markets, which is why we rarely see them here I guess one look at the sales figures for Smart cars are a good example.and I do see kei cars on the roads from time to time. But…
…because of suggested rules from an organization of automobile licensing boards, some states, including Colorado, made kei cars illegal. That has recently changed. Colorado passed a law in May of last year authorizing kei vehicles to be registered and operated on Colorado roads. These vehicles must be 25 years old or older, pass an emissions test and are restricted to roads that have speed limits of 55 mph or less.
One kei car that has a large cult following here as well as in the UK and Australia is Nissan’s Figaro. It was only manufactured for one year—1991. The Figaro uses a one-liter (987 cc) turbocharged engine producing 76 horsepower and is a sunroof/convertible sorta like the Fiat 500 convertible. In fact, the Figaro is three inches longer that the 500, so take that Fiat. Because of the USA’s 25-year import rule, Figaros have been entering the country from various JDM importers and I’ve seen one driving around here on local roads. And just between you and me—although I think Mary would hate it— I would love to own a Figaro.
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Along with photographer Barry Staver, Joe is co-author of Better Available Light Digital Photography that’s available on Amazon for $24.50 or used copies starting around nine bucks from Amazon, as I write this. The Kindle version, for some reason, is really expensive.