Slowly disappearing pack mule
For some it will be nothing more than an ‘old van’, for others it will be a nice piece of Japanese car history. In our opinion, this Daihatsu Hijet falls into the second category.
Not so long ago, a nice Honda Acty Street brightened up your screen. Now we have a similar creation in front of us, once again spotted by Joppe te Lindert. So he does have a bit of a nose for compact Japanese vans, although it is undoubtedly mainly a coincidence that he came across two of them in a short time. Yet it is also special, because although the Daihatsu Hijet is a lot better known here than the Honda Acty, such a Hijet is now also a rarity. It is one of the sixth generation, which is virtually extinct here.
Just like the Honda Acty, its modest size is easily explained, because the Hijet was also created with the Japanese kei-car regulations as a guideline. It is less than 3.2 meters long, barely 1.4 meters wide and in this case 1.82 m high. Only compact engines were also available. Here in Europe the Hijet had at least an 843 cc three-cylinder engine, but in its home country Japan you could even get it with 547 cc two-cylinder engines. The example we have here in front of us has a real 1.0, as the ‘1000 Cab’ badge on the tailgate indicates. That three-cylinder engine unleashes no less than 45 hp on the rear wheels.
According to Joppe, an elderly lady drives around in this Hijet and, according to the license plate data, she has been doing so for almost nine years. Undoubtedly satisfactory, although we do fear a bit for the bodywork of the Hijet. Not only is this generation of the Hijet almost gone, this copy is also slowly disappearing, at least at the wheel arches. Hopefully the process can still be stopped!
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl