World's Cheapest Car Goes On Sale In India 571
Frankie70 writes "The Tata Nano — the car that caught the world's imagination as the cheapest ever — will finally be rolled out commercially on Monday in Mumbai in a mega event organised by Tata Motors. Ben Oliver, contributing editor, Car Magazine, London test drove the car in December, 08. These were his first impressions. This was his verdict: 'CAR's first ride in the Tata Nano felt far more significant and exciting than a first drive in a Ferrari or Lamborghini, because this car's importance is immeasurably greater. It won't compete on dynamics or quality with European or Japanese city cars, but it doesn't have to. What Tata has achieved at an unprecedented price is astonishing, although we'd guess it will cost Indian consumers closer to £1700 when it finally goes on sale, six months late, in March 2009.'"
I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:5, Funny)
or the `tata clean air - it was nice knowing you'...
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent is deliberately confusing greenhouse emissions with pollution. The US is an awful lot cleaner than India, be it air, water or land.
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:4, Insightful)
The US is the most polluting country in the world, both in absolute terms and per capita.
Environmental damage that happens in other countries counts as US caused if it's done by US corporations. E.g., the Union Carbide disaster may have happened in India, but it was a US corporation that caused it.
Come now, take responsibility for your (collective) actions.
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:5, Insightful)
"The US is the most polluting country in the world, both in absolute terms and per capita."
{citation needed}
Incorrect.
http://carma.org/dig/show/world+country [carma.org]
Actually, the US is second to China.... India is ranked third.
As far as your moralizing goes as well, how can you discount the responsibility of the Indian Government in the Union Carbide disaster? They allowed the plant. They allowed the regulations and standards that the plant was built and maintained by. I am not saying that Union Carbide (which is NOT the US, it is a corporation.) was not responsible. But I am saying that the US was NOT responsible for the pollution caused by that disaster.
However, the Union Carbide disaster does not contribute to why India is CURRENTLY the third highest polluting nation on the planet. It is not "polluted" it is "Polluting"... meaning generating pollution. One of the things that the Tato Nano is supposed to do, is make a car affordable to most Indians. In a country where streets are already densely packed with walking people, people packed on two wheeled traffic, and older vehicles... do we really need to add a few million MORE internal combustion engines virtually overnight? I would not be surprised to see little India surpass the US in pollution production once this car settles in.
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh, and a further note...
"According to CARMA's massive database, which contains information on the carbon emissions of over 50,000 power plants and 4,000 power companies worldwide, Australia is the world's worst polluter per capita, producing five times as much carbon from generating power as China."
http://www.ibtimes.co.in/articles/20071203/carbon-emission-global-warming-power-plant-pollution-greenhouse-gas-climate-change-kyoto-protocol-ca.htm [ibtimes.co.in]
There you go. Nothing like being informed, eh? What a wonderful friend we have in Google.
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:5, Interesting)
Pollution: [...] the contamination of the environment by harmful substances.
Yup, sounds like CO_2 qualifies. In spades. Sure it's a whole new mechanism for damage--not toxic, not carcinogenic, not a quick dose of nutrients to previously clear water, not ugly, etc--but it's certainly harmful!
Looks like the USA's per capita emissions of CO_2 are on the order of 10 times higher than China's (source: quick amalgam of Google results).
Some sources say that the USA leads in other pollutants as well (see http://www.crystalinks.com/pollution.html [crystalinks.com] for a start, but I'm not happy with that page's rigour). That's no surprise given that the USA is a world leader in consumption and disposal of all kinds of goods--sheer volume overcomes good intentions. OTOH, I hear China is investing heavily in coal-fired power plants, which besides helping them to pull ahead in CO_2 will add a nice dose of mercury and some other nasties. Go team! There are lots of causes of pollution, and the USA comes out ahead on many of them.
Of course, the USA isn't doing too badly (relatively speaking) at controlling pollutants, although we're not doing especially well, either. Far better than China or India, AFAIK, although I'm not happy that my country is "better than the worst"!
This is an area I know little about. Do you have a better reference than what I found?
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:4, Informative)
Of course, the USA isn't doing too badly (relatively speaking) at controlling pollutants, although we're not doing especially well, either. Far better than China or India, AFAIK, although I'm not happy that my country is "better than the worst"!
The problem with the USA's and the EU's record on pollutants is that they tend to solve the problem by shipping pollutants to other parts of the world or they just dump them in the ocean. There is a famous plastic patch [mindfully.org] the size of Texas in the Pacific ocean between California and Hawaii. Plastic is way to overused and totally under-recycled. Is it really necessary for every candy bar to be packaged in a plastic wrapper? Does every pair of cookies in an Oreo package have to be packaged in their own little plastic pouch? What's the deal with single use plastic bottles? I don't remember my candy tasting any worse when I was a kid and that stuff was sold wrapped in paper or the Coca Cola tasting any different when it shipped in glass bottles. Another major pollutant problem is agricultural runoff. It isn't very visible to Joe Sixpack from the porch of his suburban home and it isn't highly publicised but that stuff can cause havoc. The problem with Algae bloom is well known in the Baltic Sea. To cite a US example, agricultural runoff from the Mississippi River creates a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico which in 2002 measured some 8000 square miles, that's an area bigger than the state of Massachusetts. Keep in mind that this is just due to fertilisers. We haven't even begun to consider the effect of agricultural pesticides on the marine ecosystems and we all know how much faith the agricultural community, goaded on by the chemical industry, places in the lavish application of pesticides. Of course none these problems are unique to the USA, most countries put way to little effort into recycling plastic or putting some money into research into biodegradable plastic substitutes and very few of them are ready to do anything about agricultural runoff.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I'm still waiting for the Tata Touch... (Score:5, Funny)
Wait 'till your first crash. You'll find your Tata Touch has its steering controls obnoxiously embedded in your chest.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:3, Insightful)
The UK and Europe as well as the USA will never EVER see this car.
And honestly, is it really a good idea to enable more people to buy cars?
I could see it if a very low emissions small car was available to the poor to help get the nasty junk off the road...
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Insightful)
And honestly, is it really a good idea to enable more people to buy cars?
No, it's not. So please hand over your car keys.
(My point being - who the hell are you to decide who gets to drive and who doesn't?)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Gas demand will go up, pollution will go up.
This is not some miracle of technology -it is worse then good.
To turn around to countries that have been
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Insightful)
To turn around to countries that have been using cars for years in a major way and say "well give up your car" - rememebr those countries' lifestyles have been based around cars for many years...in the US since the 40's-50's (really before then, but that was an insane boom time). The AVERAGE american commute is 30 minutes by car - not feasible by foot/bike...and 30 minutes by car usually means about 1-1.5 hours by train/bus each direction. Again, it's living standard. If you never had it you didn't build your life around it.
I agree that no one will willingly give up their lifestyle (which is characterized by unparalleled per capita WASTEFULNESS) in America and Europe. The key word here is WILLINGLY. However you need to realize that people in less developed countries will not willingly give up their right to strive for a better standard of living.
Your argument is basically "we already have it, so you can't" is a non sequitur. Of course it's easy to argue for the position that favors yourself - you've grown comfortable in that position. I'm taking the other side of the argument - first it's not your decision to make - the last barrel of oil will go to the highest bidder. Supply and demand determine this, not pseudo-morality. Second - if you try to enforce a double standard on developing nations (it's ok for us but not for you), be prepared for a fight to the death - since after all a prohibition will be considered "death" by the developing nation anyway, therefore they have nothing to lose.
Humans will only understand that the oil is gone after the oil is gone. We're not good at forward thinking on a collective basis - if you want examples just look at the US government.
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Your argument is basically "we already have it, so you can't" is a non sequitur.
But that's not his argument. His argument is, here in north america, we made the huge mistake of designing communities such that a vehicle was a requirement for living. In particular, the suburban and ex-urban phenomenon has left your average American completely incapable of living without personal long-distance transportation. And this phenomenon is coupled with a truly massive underfunding of public transportation, meaning that even those within a reasonable distance of their place of work have no option but to drive.
And so, the solution isn't to give Indians more cars, thus encouraging the very lifestyle north america has mistakenly committed themselves to. The solution is to build communities where cars *aren't necessary in the first place*. Not because "we already have it, so you can't", but because "we already have it, and trust me, you really don't want it".
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Insightful)
then correct your mistake. you can't make others learn without them making the same mistake themselves.
Well that's simply ridiculous. You're saying an addict can't tell their child that drugs are bad? Or a heart patient can't tell their relatives to eat healthy?
Should the US try and fix it's problems? Yes, of course. But that doesn't mean it can't speak from authority when it says that a culture dependent on cheap gas and personal transportation is a really *bad* idea.
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Insightful)
The "I got it first ! now you DIE" argument.
Or maybe, after taking care of the supply side by invading Iraq, the US should start taking care of the demand side by invading India and regressing them to the stone age ?
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Informative)
Most people in India have lived their entire lives without cars and didn't need it
The target market for this car is not people who have never had transportation. The target market is people who run their families around on scooters and mopeds, like this: http://images.quickblogcast.com/8849-8518/family_scooter.JPG [quickblogcast.com]
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Which country would that be? Germany with BMW, Mercedes and Audi? Or rather a scandinacian one? Volvo comes to mind. And what about all the Japanese SUVs?
Meanwhile, my 99 Century Buick V6 needs less gas than a Mitsubishi Galant V6 from approximately the same year.
So what the hell is your point?
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Which country would that be? Germany with BMW, Mercedes and Audi? Or rather a scandinacian one? Volvo comes to mind. And what about all the Japanese SUVs?
Meanwhile, my 99 Century Buick V6 needs less gas than a Mitsubishi Galant V6 from approximately the same year.
So what the hell is your point?
Yeah, and where are all the SUVs from those foreign car companies sold? You don't think Toyota started making SUVs to take advantage of the lucrative large-truck-in-Tokyo market, do you?
Oh sure they do sell in other markets, but the point is that nobody has latched onto the gas-guzzling needlessly-oversized truck and SUV like in America. And therefore nobody from there, including those driving Century Buicks, should be pointing fingers at Indians buying the cheapest car ever and saying "Hey you shouldn't do that!"
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Informative)
Switzerland is overrun with SUVs as well, as is Germany. The trend may have been started in the US but Europe was quick to pick it up and give it momentum.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
i wouldn't call it "overrun". there are certainly many more suvs out there than 10 years ago and there are by all means too many of them (even one of them is one too many) but they are still a minority and they aren't as large as american ones.
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Just because it is the path that America went down doesn't mean that it is the best path for other nations to follow.
Yes, and if India decides that they should follow a different path, then more power to them.
I think that the argument against giving them gas-powered cars is valid.
We aren't giving them anything, and thus it is not our choice to not give them. We are not the Greek gods, and Tata Motors is not Prometheus, okay?
It's the whole attitude here that pisses me off. I'd have no problem if people were saying "Hey India, look at what heavy adoption of cars at the expense of public transportation did to our country. You might want to think before making the same mistake we did." Instead, all I hear is this air of superior judgement, all "India shouldn't be given cars because they're going to fuck up the environment". It's the combination of the hypocrisy of ignoring or downplaying our own effect as polluter, with the sense of superiority where of course nobody can tell us what to do but we can decide whether India should be allowed to have cars that just reeks of hypocrisy and arrogance.
India already has the gift of fire-in-a-cylinder-with-a-piston. That djinni has been out of the bottle for a long time. And I don't see much to complain about with this particular incarnation. Compared to the fuel economy and emissions of the top gas and hybrid cars, it's competitive on fuel economy and emissions. Compared to the average car in the North American fleet, it's very good. Compared to the two-stroke engines running scooters and auto-rickshaws in the cities of India already, and which the Nano is priced to compete against, it is insanely great on emissions.
I think that India would be a perfect market for electric cars. I think that India would be a perfect market for electric cars. Electric cars are not big in America because the average American's commute exceeds the range and speed requirements for the average electric car currently in production.
Except an electric with enough juice for even a short commute is going to cost a hell of a lot more than the Nano. Yes, ICEs are not the ideal solution going forward. In the meantime, electrics serve some few needs, and hopefully will serve more in the future. In the meantime, if they want to improve their standard of living in a way that will be both affordable and get them halfway across the city and back or to the next town and back, and which will actually reduce emissions when it replaces the currently highly emissive vehicles that clog New Delhi, then who are you or I to say no? It's not like we're setting a better example, now are we? There's nothing wrong with discussing the issues, there is something wrong with riding a high horse while doing so.
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Not even Americans who choose to rely on public transit? We exist, I assure you.
Lucky you that you can, and good for you that you do. Point your finger at your neighbor in the Century Buick, or the Escalade, and convince them to change their ways before pointing your finger halfway around the world at a developing country making a cheap and really quite efficient vehicle. Because otherwise you still sound like a hypocrite.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Okay the USA isn't mostly city, like people who never leave LA and NYC tend to think.
USA is mostly open country, and large portions are well outside "city limits". Even here in Nor Cal, we are surrounded by mountains and such.
LOL, yeah, cus stuck in Texas I had no idea that the US was mostly open country. Hey when crossing that open country I think having a fuel efficient vehicle is even more important, but what do I know? I only drive my subcompact across the country, through the mountains, and through t
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Talk about stupid- you do know that seven-passenger minivans weigh about as much as some seven-passenger SUVs and get about the same mileage, don't you? Or that full-sized vans are *bigger* than current SUVs and get even worse mileage?
Oh, sorry, we can't let facts get in the way of America-bashing, can we?
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No problem. I'd gladly give up my wifes guzzler (29.9mpg) for a smart four-two, I already drive a 50mpg Geo Metro summer and a 38mpg Suzuki sidekick sport 4X4 for the winter.. we only get 84 inches of snow a year here and typically had 1 foot of snowfall per storm so I'm being a pussy for using a 4x4 in the winter..
I wish I could buy a 50mpg small car here in the states for under $9500.00 but we have large numbers of really dumb people that think owning a canyonero is what you are supposed to do.
Honestly,
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Insightful)
But, enabling 29,000,000,000 people to buy a car and drive around is not always a great idea.
So when Henry Ford rolled out the Model T for under $800 or so, with the intention of selling it to the masses, he was "enabling" the destruction of the environment, etc? After all, before Ford came along, cars were an item only affordable by the 1% richest part of the population.
So how come Americans can get mass produced cars for "the common man" (with all the environmental destruction involved) and Indians cannot? Suddenly it's a bad idea if Indians and Chinese wish to progress...
Fundamentally I understand your point - if everyone has a straw sucking up the oil fields, then they will dry up much faster. But I say that you cannot stop the rest of the world from trying to progress - either physically or morally. After all, America showed the world that a life of materialism and luxury is desirable since most of your middle class has (until recently) attained it, and Hollywood keeps exporting and advertising it. Then you want to tell the world - "no, this is for US, it's not for YOU". A word of advice: watch your back.
However if we don't find a viable, portable and economically feasible source of energy soon, there's going to be one hell of a fight for the last few billion barrels of oil - and I'm not even sure the US would win.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And hippies!! Dont forget the hippies!! Before Ford came along America was basically an Agricultural nation with most of the population living on farms. Now most of the population lives in cities and thank god for that. Rural areas are the cess pit of the human condition and the faster India can get its people into cities the better and if it takes cheap cars to do it fine (though I would prefer mass transit) At least if we get the air polluted enough the hippies will stop backpacking here to shit on our st
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
But, enabling 29,000,000,000 people to buy a car and drive around is not always a great idea. Everyone is already bitching about how cars are destroying the planet so would enabling more cars be a bad idea? Just going from the eco freaks that complain here. cars still = bad right? or was that last week.
I think the whole point is that these enable "the masses" to afford these *instead of* the pollution-belching death traps that have been their only option to this point.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Funny)
Tatas are very sexy though.
Re: (Score:2)
I wonder how the Tata Nano compares to various voiturettes/brommobiels/other tiny car-like vehicles. Those are very popular nowadays, partially for disableds, partially for youths who don't have a driver's license yet.
I expected them to be not much more expensive than a scooter, and similar in performance to the Tata Nano. Imagine my surprise when I find that they tend to cost $10,000 or more, which is more than some real cars that are fast enough for motorways.
Taxation without Representation... (Score:2)
there are also federal (and state) regulations governing automobiles in the US.
there are also federal and state regulations and taxes governing damn near everything and anything in the US.
There, fixed that for ya.
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Informative)
"And honestly, is it really a good idea to enable more people to buy cars?"
I assume you don't own one, yes?
"I could see it if a very low emissions small car was available to the poor to help get the nasty junk off the road..."
Nano's emission would be far more benign than 2-cycle autorickshaws, not mention being far more safe.
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Nano's emission would be far more benign than 2-cycle autorickshaws, not mention being far more safe.
And that's the real point here. Lots of people in countries like Indian and China are transporting themselves and their entire family on old and dangerous motorbikes not suited for that task. The Nano isn't to get more people on the road, it's to get road users to use a safer vehicle, more suited for their needs.
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Informative)
Nano's emission would be far more benign than 2-cycle autorickshaws, not mention being far more safe.
The irony being if pollution doesn't kill you having an accident in this car will, far more than other vehicles.
Obviously you haven't seen the 'other vehicles' they're driving now. Ever seen a husband riding a motorcycle along a highway with his wife on the pillion seat sitting sideways holding onto a child and not a single helmet between them? I'm not kidding. This thing will be a huge improvement over the death traps people are using right now.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
As for enabling more people to drive? Umm, why is it fair to prevent others from enjoying the same quality of life that you or I have?
Quite. The solution is for you to give up your car, not for them to get one.
I mean, if people are going to start worrying about the environment, perhaps the solution is to nuke ourselves off this rock for "Urth Mother"?
You are welcome to commit suicide if you want, but don't presume to make the decision for the rest of us.
Look folks. The rest of the world wants to have the same same standard of living that US and Europe enjoys today. You can't stop or prevent its progression.
I may not be able to, but the fact is that the rest of the world simply cannot have the same standard of living that we have. Indeed, in part, we enjoy it because they work for us to have it.
What you can do however, is develop more efficient ways of achieving that goal.
That's a good idea, but I'm afraid it's rather too little too late. We're going to have to prepare ourselves for a severe cut in our standa
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Back in 1976 I took an economics class that had three professors, all of whom were about as smart as a house cat. These bozos were trying to say that the US was going to have to lower its standard of living, too, just like you are now.
That's odd, because most economists predict continual upward global economic growth (with the occasional brief hiccup). You must have had some socialist economics professors. After the fall of the USSR, the ideas of Freidman, Hayek, and Mises became more popular.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The thing is, it has to be one of the following:
- Cars don't improve the standards of living (in which case, WTF are you doing arguing about this?)
- Worldwide supply of oil is perfectly stable (and I've got a bridge to sell you...)
- Salaries in the US and other, car-dependant nations will rise at least as much as the price of oil does. (The bridge is still on sale...)
- The US *will* have to reduce its standard of living.
You hear "they can live on a thousand dollars a year, why can't you?" like I heard from the idiot economists teaching that class, but they can't see that if prices were a 50th as high as ours, we could live on a 50th of the paycheck.
Y'know, maybe that was his point. That both prices and salaries should be lowered to "th
Re: (Score:2)
The rest of the world wants to have the same same standard of living that US and Europe enjoys today. You can't stop or prevent its progression.
That progression will stop itself, if the whole Earth lived like the US and Europe circa 2000, we (probably all land mammals) would be dead from the pollution within 20 years, if we could even find enough fossil fuel to make "the dream" come true.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:And will be unavailable anyplace else.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Why not spend that money on decent public transportation? just because USA snobs poo-poo riding a bus or train does not mean the rest of the planet has that stick firmly planted in their rear ends as well...
The public transportation systems in many places need upgrading. Sounds like a better way to spend money than to enable more cars on the road. India already has a traffic nightmare in all it's major cities.. In Chennai, it's near suicide to step off the curb or to be in a car on those roads... How will this car help that?
Yes I'm a US citizen that has actually left his country and went to other places. Traffic in India is INSANE (France is even more insane!) and I cant see this car helping.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I thought it was the USA who were proponents of freedom and capitalism.
Don't believe everything they say on TV. :)
The USA is a proponent of free trade only as long as it serves its own interests.
Idiot (Score:3, Insightful)
Who's the idiot who modded parent insightful. The inbred redneck does not even know that telling lies is not the same as being Insightful Rush Limbaugh notwithstanding. Indian pollution standards are stricter than America's and California's.They match European standards and the Nano meets the future Euro V standard which even Europe has not shifted to yet. Car insurance is compulsory and everyone has at least 3rd party insurance. Every car has to go through a pollution check after every year and cars older
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And honestly, is it really a good idea to enable more people to buy cars?
Of course not. But it's a sad cycle -- people in very poor countries like this see cars as being status symbols, a sign of wealth. Society (and the government) often treat increase car ownership the same way, as some indicator that they've "made it," and try to emphasize car-oriented development.
By the time they come to the realization that having every poor schmuck in the city driving to work is a really dumb idea, and not very scalable, it may be too late...
Re: (Score:2)
It is only a bad idea because the parent asked the wrong question. The question should be:
"Since more people are definitely going to drive cars in the future, should we continue on the current path rather than developing better technologies to reduce emissions and counteract already inflicted environmental damage."
The answer to that question is indeed of course not . Asking if it is a good idea for more peop
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Not to forget this car doesn't have many standard safety features.
Not to forget India driving rules are a lot less restrictive then other countries
There is also the issue where many people in India got along fine without cars. They didn't "need" it because their life was based on not having it. Now that this vehicle came out things will change and eventually the India popu
Cheap car already tried and failed! (Score:5, Interesting)
Those of us old enough to remember the 1980s remember the Yugo [wikipedia.org], which was touted then as the cheapest car ever: $3990 when they debuted in the U.S. in 1987 (bear in mind that the U.S. has much tougher safety and emissions standards than India).
It was tried here and failed miserably, especially after the general consensus among the consumer rags, especially Consumer Reports, was that you were better of with a used car than a new Yugo.
Re:Cheap car already tried and failed! (Score:5, Interesting)
A lot of the Yugo failure was quality.
I was in the auto repair business through much of the 90's and we never saw one, despite a pretty decent number of them being sold locally. I don't think they made it out of the 80's still running.
One of my store managers had been working at an import auto parts store while the Yugo was on sale as a new car.
I recall him saying that the Yugo dealer bought a lot of starters from them - for new cars before they sold them. Fortunately for the dealer, a new Yugo was mostly just a old Fiat.
Try to get your mind around that total lack of quality - the dealer replacing an OEM, brand new, factory part with an aftermarket part to get one that would work.
Wow, talk about crappy.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Cheap car already tried and failed! (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember though that the Yugo was essentially Warsaw Pact manufacturing quality with Fiat parts. The Tata was engineered from the ground up.
Remember also that the Yugo was designed for Western markets, the Tata is not.
I'm not sure about all the concern around this thing selling in the US or EU. It's a car designed for Asian cities, and that in itself means a much larger potential market than the US.
Re: (Score:2)
India is a kind of scary place, they have the potential for greatness and a dirt cheap economy, but I have yet to see those two come together with the kind of results you get out of China.
Re:Cheap car already tried and failed! (Score:5, Insightful)
Failed?
The Yugo sold quite a lot of cars, and according to the wikipedia article you link to, they're still being sold. Not in the US, but the Tata Nano isn't aimed at the US either. Lots of stuff isn't. Just because something won't succeed in the US, that doesn't automatically make it a failure.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Failed?
The Yugo sold quite a lot of cars, and according to the wikipedia article you link to, they're still being sold. Not in the US, but the Tata Nano isn't aimed at the US either. Lots of stuff isn't. Just because something won't succeed in the US, that doesn't automatically make it a failure.
Yes. Look at David Hasselhoff!
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
The Model T's debut price in 1909 was $850 -- about $20,000 in today's dollars. Its lowest price in 1915, $440, is equivalent to ~$9,000 today.
Accounting for inflation, the Model T was far more expensive than the Yugo, and nearly 4 times the cost of the Tata.
Re: (Score:2)
The Model T's debut price in 1909 was $850 -- about $20,000 in today's dollars. Its lowest price in 1915, $440, is equivalent to ~$9,000 today.
Accounting for inflation, the Model T was far more expensive than the Yugo, and nearly 4 times the cost of the Tata.
I would hope that the world has learned a little about efficiency in the last 100 years. If nothing else, the basic supply chains that provide sheet metal, rubber, glass, etc. should be much more efficient today than they were in 1909.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The model T
Safety.... (Score:3, Interesting)
So basically it's "safe enough for India" but you couldn't sell it as-is anywhere that has vehicle safety standards.
Of course, you probably couldn't sell a Geo Metro or a Honda CRX (two 1980's high mileage cars) as a new car in the US today either for the same reasons.
I'm not convinced that changing the vehicular population makeup of India from bicycles and scooters to have a higher volume of these actually raises the overall safety of the traveling population - and it surely doesn't improve the fuel economy.
For those of us who are used to dollars, according to Google, the base price of 1700 pounds in the article is about $2500.
Re:Safety.... (Score:5, Informative)
The driving exam is a joke here. If you correctly answer 6 out of 10 multiple choice questions (mostly "guess the taffic sign" ones) you get a learners licence. Curiously, 9 out of 36 failed that in my class. 1 month later you get the full licence, provided that you can drive 100m without incident.
The traffic here is very chaotic already, but it's mostly motorbikes and 3-wheelers. Add more cars to the mix and you're asking for trouble. On the other hand the Tata Nano seems to be a scaled-up rickshaw rather than a scaled-down car.
TFA is 4 months old, and the price is way off. The base price is 100.000 rupees, or about $2000/£1350. You can still get 2 high-end scooters for that price, not one for £1700 like the article says.
Infrastructure will not handle this (Score:5, Interesting)
I think Indian infrastructure is going to have a hard time coping with this.
Tried getting anywhere in New Delhi recently? A 10km ride can take HOURS. I'm not exaggerating or kidding. You will literally stand in one spot for half an hour. Nobody obeys traffic rules and gridlock is the norm.
The Indian middle class is looking to copy the west, and they want their SUVs and their tall lattes too.
In late afternoon in New Delhi (about 6:00pm or so), you can STARE AT THE SUN without feeling any queasiness in your eyes. That's how bad the pollution is.
Instead of looking to other cultures and trying to NOT make the same mistakes, India is eager to copycat them. Heh... you think Americans go a little bit overboard with the bling and the super-size-me? Just wait.. just wait.
-Laxitive
Re:Infrastructure will not handle this (Score:5, Funny)
Heh. My first visit to New Delhi, I wondered if India followed 'British' driving rules (drive on the left side of the road) vs the right side lane driving seen in many other countries. A couple hours each way, several days in a row, I was unable to call it based on the driving observed.
These guys would make the Brazilian or Italian drivers blush... It is a wonder we don't see more of them on the race track.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Infrastructure will not handle this (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure what the plan is now, but when the Nano was first unveiled Ratan Tata (the CEO) said that they would be focusing on selling the car in smaller cities.
The larger cities like Delhi and Mumbai have good public transport systems, and most people are pragmatic enough to realize that a train will get them to work faster (and cheaper) than driving in a car. I worked in Mumbai for two years, and I was earning more than enough money to own a regular car (and pay a driver!) but I still used public transport on a daily basis. The same is true for almost all of my peers.
I don't think there will be too many people buying this thing as a status symbol. I see it being primarily bought by lower-to-middle income families in the smaller cities, or in villages which are well connected to neighboring cities. If you ever visited India, you'd see some of these people taking their whole family on a single motorcycle which is dangerous.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
So the smaller cities will become like Delhi or Mumbai, with pollution, dirt, and garbage piling up everywhere.
If you don't think there will be too many people buying this thing as a status symbol, then you don't know Indians. If there's one thing I know about Indians, Northern and Southern, Rich and Poor, High Caste and Low Caste.. it's that status is everything, wealth is status, and cars are wealth. Sure, so is jewelry, and being able to pay for ridiculously overpriced weddings, and a whole bunch of ot
Judgement already! (Score:5, Insightful)
It won't compete on dynamics or quality with European or Japanese city cars, but it doesn't have to.
That is precisely how the Japanese "came from behind" in the late seventies and ended up capturing the American mindset when it comes to quality.
I know what I am talking about because I was around at that time. No body would even think of touching a Japanese front wheel drive car! Guess what! It is second nature to most auto manufacturers now.
I guess it's the time for the Indians this time round. Let's just watch out after all, Tata's direction on quality can only be up.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Top gear (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Would be more entertaining to watch than go-kart racing, more rollover potential!
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Like real life Penny Racers! Brilliant!
This is a good thing for the carbon footprint (Score:5, Insightful)
shopping cart, anyone? (Score:4, Interesting)
Seriously, look at it. 12" wheels, and how tall and narrow it is!
But looking at what it's designed for, it appears to be very well thought-out. Anyone that's driven in europe can understand why you need a narrow car because of the streets. And anything that gets your side mirror another half inch away from oncoming traffic's mirrors is a good thing, and then of course there's parking. (no mention of how well it turns to squeeze into a tight spot?) For an in-town car in a big city, it looks to be ideally suited. 60mpg? Heck I could use that right now.
It said it accomodates "six footers". I'm 6'2, I wonder if I'll be cracking my head on the roof?
Considering the next-to-nonexistent trunk, it's NOT a family trip car, unless you're a family of two. The back seat really IS the trunk, and the trunk is the glovebox.
But I wouldn't mind trying one. I wonder what it's top speed is, they only tested it to 60mph and it took 17 sec to get there, i wonder if it can do 70? I have to take an interstate to work here and it's 70 in places.
I'd also be interested to know its range. At 60mpg though, I wonder what speed that's at? Most larger cars, that's measured at highway speed (55?) and is lower for in-town. This car is targeted almost exclusively for in-town so that's not the number I want to hear. It's not a hybrid so it lacks the regenerative breaking bonus for in-town driving. (unless the thing's got a flywheel? heh) I'm picturing it getting more like 40mph in-town, and guessing at a 5gal tank, so that'd be about a 200 mile in-town range, which I could certainly live with. My exploder gets 300 miles on the highway, 240 in town. It'd shave 70% off my total at the pump too which would be wonderful.
The review was ok but missed a lot, I'd like to have seen 7 pages, not 2. Airbags I hope? looks to be manual only. (can you smell my clutch yet?) And it doesn't look like they let him drive it, which worries me a little.
Re: (Score:2)
Regarding city driving, yah the size helps, but the lack of power steering sure doesn't. I lived in an urban area without power steering before, and it can get annoying trying to parallel park without it. On the bright side, my arm strength increased quite a bit during that time.
My impression regarding any ability to get this in the US is that the company has taken advantage of the fact that India has lax (nonexistent?) safety and emissions standards in order to keep the price low. Making one of these th
Fundamentals (Score:2)
If you seek something more than just basic subsistence, the list expands to include energy, communications, and transportation.
If you believe that a modern society is beneficial, then providing more accessible transportation is a good thing. If you believe we should all be subsistence farmers, then the Tata Nano is a plague upon
The year of cheap stuff. (Score:2, Insightful)
60mpg really 50 mpg (Score:4, Informative)
Unthinking racism (Score:4, Interesting)
Someone also mocks the Ferrari/Lamborghini comparison. Wrong. To an engineer - that's a real, chartered engineer, not just a jumped up mechanic - Ferraris and Lamborghinis are not very interesting. An example. Evolutionary biologists point out that horses are interesting, not because they are a successful design, but because they are a bit of a failed one. Very few of the world's species are horse based, whereas the beetle design, the bat design, and even the primate design have been wildly successful. (Or look at the dog design, which has proved amazingly flexible, scaling well to a wide range of sizes.) In the same way, few people are motivated to buy Ferraris, whereas the European small hatchback design has proven wildly successful and is the basis of most of the cars on the world's roads, scaling all the way from the Smart car to the "people carrier". The Tata design is interesting because it is likely to be the precursor of what most of the world's drivers are using in 20 years time.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Perhaps just as demeaning, but not founded in the mistaken belief that whites are inherently better than others.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm a Real Engineer with a good bit of auto industry experience (though not a Chartered Engineer or PE as we tend to call them in the US, that's more for the civil engineering types), and I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that engineers aren't just 'jumped up mechanics'. Most of the best engineers I've worked with are captivated with experimentation, elegant design, and high performance applications. The best mechanics work with the same drive. The best engineers I know ARE jumped up mechanics. Jus
Pollution in India (Score:3, Interesting)
Fuel consumption will be around 60mpg, and emissions around 100g/km;
I've been to India, and big cities like Delhi are so polluted it smells like you have your mouth around the back of a Mack truck. I went for a wedding, and the groom had to wear a face mask because his lungs couldn't handle it. Our flight out of Rajasthan was delayed because of "fog" - but this is desert. By "fog" they meant low-lying pollution.
I'm not sure if this will lead to more cars in India: But this car is much cleaner than the 20+ year old dilapidated taxis that are mainstream in india now. Those things blow visible smoke out of the back, so this might actually help the pollution problem.
Too cheap...? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, there is a reason we make it expensive, only few people should have a car...
if we all had cars, it would be 1 billion in India helping the pollution problem along.
Do these cars run on electricity atleast??? That would be worth the while, as well, by having such a big volume of sales helps push the price of the car even lower, thereby making the electric car technology that much cheaper....but unfortunately I am sure this is a gas car as well.
Re:Oh, Joy, Joy, more oil comsumers (Score:5, Insightful)
The developed world has had DECADES to build up moral authority on this issue, and utterly blew it. Now, efforts on our part to shame the developing world for pollution or inefficient energy use sound spiteful and hypocritical.
You may be right... but you're also wrong.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
There's no point being defeatist about it. Until fusion is sorted out (hopefully soon?) [wikipedia.org] the rest of the world simply cannot enjoy such a high standard of living as the west has indulged itself in these past few decades. I mean "cannot" in a physical rather than a moral sense. The time for crying hypocrite is over. We all have to work together now.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
OTOH, it's good if this drives up oil prices, then other people will drive fewer gas guzzlers. It will also increase the demand for renewable energy and possibly force the US's uberconsumers to reduce their lavish lifestyles.
It's also good for Indian people who want cheap taxis and are sick of riding on top of buses to get around.
Re:Oh, Joy, Joy, more oil comsumers (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
In the US the population is dispersed in suburbs making personal vehicles mandatory and public transportation impractical. At the Federal level we are passing laws that do nothing to reduce the number of vehicles on the road (it would hurt the economy, you see) and have stupidly mandated the production and use of bio-fuels that cost more or about as much petroleum to manufacture than they produce. Never mind the consequences to the world food supply.
At some point gas prices will rise to prohibitive levels
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Oh, Joy, Joy, more oil comsumers (Score:5, Interesting)
I understand the point you are intending, but consider whether your bashing 300,000,000 people with such a broad bat isn't the moral equivalent of those who "talk down" to the developing world.
Jevon's paradox (Score:2)
There won't be more oil consumed, because we have already hit peak oil. What will happen instead is that the price of oil will go up and make it uneconomic for the bottom end of US economy to use their cars. This will cause another recession and the US will respond by hyperinflating their currency, until people in America are no wealthier than people in India or China.
You are seeing the rise of the new empires and the fall of the old, corrupt one. Unless of course the US government manage to persuade Saudi
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Maybe he's talking about his first ride in a cardboard box in the "exciting" traffic flows in India - go ahead and search for that in YouTube.
Rather impressive indeed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsPbLC8ppoU [youtube.com]
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
It's news because it's not just a little bit cheaper than any other car, it's much, much cheaper than any other comparable family car. At less than half the price of any of it's competitors, it's definitely newsworthy.