Serves GM and the others right for whining to Congress and dragging their feet. I hope Mahindra can deliver and the truck is a huge success.

foreign competition is going to show them how it's done

Hasn't that been a catch phrase for American industry for at least 3 decades now? I don't really understand how the US economy keeps rolling on...

I've wondered about the suitability of SUVs as electrics. Wouldn't the beefier suspensions be better at carrying a bunch of heavy batteries?

vsk

So how are they getting around the "Chicken Tax"?
The "Chicken Tax" is an import duty on all light trucks so named because it was in retaliation for a duty on American chicken exports. Been around since the 60's. I assume they must be doing final assembly in the US to avoid it as the tax is on fully assembled vehicles.

Just to keep things real the fuel economy will grab some people but two things from an auto industry follower:

- Truck buyers are loyal to their brands (Toyota had to put cash on the hood (incentives) to move those new Tundras and even then didn't meet their sales target)

- This isn't a full size truck, sure it's probably enough truck for most people many still buy full size trucks.

I don't get the whole big truck thing myself, unless is is needed for work (farm, building contractors, landscapers etc) then its just a vehicle that uses too much fuel to pump your ego. Need to haul something once in a while, rent.

My overall take is this looks like a great vehicle that would serve many peoples hauling needs

[RANT]
Who ever wrote the article is way to slanted against Detroit. You'd fight too if someone was going to cost you a bunch of money. Please get a clue when it comes to business. Please note Toyota makes much of it's money in the US off of big SUV's and trucks just like the Detroit automakers that you think need to be shown how it's done. Ask yourself, why is Toyota's big pickup little different from Ford and GM, V8 up front MPG in the teens. Sorry I'd like to see them get higher MPG and small V8 diesels are coming from Ford and GM in the next year or so to push their truck MPG up into the 20's. At this time I have heard no reports of Toyota doing the same. So who needs to be shown how it's done?

I do not work in the auto industry and I'm not a buy only American twit. I just feel the US automakers are unfairly targeted by many green writers who often don't seem to really have a clue about the auto industry. They put on blinders, American car bad, Toyota and Honda good (I got to admit my Accords great). Comments like GM and others probably means the automaker lobby group Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, check out their web site http://www.autoalliance.org/ to see who the members are.:

BMW Group
Chrysler, LLC
Ford Motor Company
General Motors
Mazda
Mercedes-Benz, USA
Mitsubishi Motors
Porsche
Toyota
Volkswagen of America, Inc.

Yup Toyota fought against CAFE right along side these automakers.
[/RANT]

vsk- If you're retrofitting it as an EV it might make a difference (though the battery weight is usually more than offset by the removal of the ICE engine) but any car designed as an electric or hybrid is going to be designed to carry the load of the batteries.

If they want to succeed, they'd better make it "THE BIGGEST, MOST POWERFUL ULTRA-DUTY TRUCK WITH THE HIGHEST PAYLOAD AND TOWING CAPACITY IN ITS CLASS" or forget it. I don't think there are a whole lot of truckers looking for efficient, and I don't think there are a lot of greenies looking for a truck (some, like me, but not many).

I have noticed the diesel VW pickup (rabbit in front, truck in back) from the 80's are selling for more than they did new (depending on condition). Mostly in the bio-diesel/SVO market. It's a great car for non-drivers, with the occasional need.

US automakers are getting their tailgates handed to them in terms of new market share. Maybe someone smart in the Big Three will go partners with Mahindra to manufacture this truck in the USA. I hope it comes in a 4x4 version too.

Hey, my family's not into trucks, but we're definitely into getting a plugin hybrid (especially for commuting). If this is one of the first ones out, it's up there on our list.

Also - taking advantage of cheap Indian labor? Does that mean sweatshops/ slavery?

Anonymous it's a shame no one makes a 'mino (From El Camino) anymore for the US market. Those old Rabbit pickups were kinda cool and as you said, enough truck for most gotta pick up bulky stuff, jobs.

Christian when it comes to trucks Ford and GM still have the lions share of the market. No one is handing them their tailgate as you put it in those segments. Their cars on the other hand is a bunch of nice try efforts with a some bright spots. GM is really making an effort and their cars are getting better, Ford is still a few years from turning the corner but it looks like we're going to get more of their world car offerings like the Focus the rest of the world gets.

I dug a bit more online. Beyond the usual rednecked comments about "ain't never gonna drive one them [insert derogatory comment about the appropriate ethnic enemy here] things" from people driving trucks made by Isuzu or Mazda and assembled in the US with a GM or Ford label, I found a few other interesting aspects of this.

• Mahindra will be avoiding the Chicken Tax by doing final assembly at a plant in Ohio.
• The truck is not a true compact; it will be comparable in size to a Toyota Tacoma.
• It will be available in two or four doors and two and four wheel drives.
• They will also be bringing a similar SUV with the same drivetrains to the US market.
• The initial target market is businesses--farmers, contractors, delivery services--rather than rednecks, err, consumers.

All of this looks good to me. I'm excited, simply because it looks like a good solution for handy-outdoors-type treehuggers who like a vehicle that can (1) get out to a trailhead on a dirt road and then, more importantly, get back no matter what the weather did in the meantime, and (2) fit a full sheet of plywood (FSC Certified, formaldehyde free, of course) on the way back from Home Depot. I do those often enough that renting isn't practical, and the dump of a city that I live in means that I have to drive pretty much everywhere. A car that does both with strong mileage might be a net gain, especially considering the energy embodied in a second car.

I'm not looking for a truck. I'm not a redneck. I haven't looked for or seriously considered a truck because the gas mileage is so horrid and they're over-everything for my needs.

So. I have a minivan and a trailer and I haul stuff weekly, if not daily. THIS truck caught my eye. I think that there is an untapped market out there. People who need hauling capacity but they just can't do a Ford 150 etc. etc.

I'm a lot less loyal to a brand than I am to how much it costs me to own and operate a vehicle/business/home etc. etc.

This has real potential. I hope it makes it to market soon soon soon.

TIm:
Thank you. People don't realize (or don't care) that it's not that the Japanese car companies don't sell trucks and SUVs--it's just that they're not as good at it.

For decades, detroit didn't put any work into small cars because they often sold them for at best a miniscule profit, sometimes at a loss, mostly because the UAW has managed over the years to get their workers $75 per hour wages and beneifits. Trucks have a health profit margin. That's why american cars lagged for decades.

It seems like nobody has looked at american cars lately. They're really just as good as anything coming out of japan.

Dan A you just named one of Detroits biggest problems, their NA division never learned how to make a good small car. Ford is getting it right. They have their Fiesta small car coming to NA. This is a sub Focus sized car. Just have to wait and see, these companies turn like oil tankers. Oh so sloooooow.

Why own an import when American made cars are cheaper to own. Less service is required of them. I have read in the Wall Street Journal that some imports cost $22,000 over five years to service. Ford and GM build as good and at times better cars than Japan and Europe. It is that the Media does not favor American built cars. When Ford and GM has a recall it is wildly broadcast but when Japanese and Korean cars have a recall, you will find it on page fourteen I would not tell anyone what car to buy it is your hard earned money buy what pleases you.
Remember next time you are in the market for a new vehicle that when you buy a foreign brand even if it is made in the States the profit goes overseas. The USA has a big trade imbalance and our national Debt is approaching 10 Trillion dollars. Buying imports is the big problem.
As a retired chassis and power train designer for over thirty years I do know that Japan and Europe designs and manufacture fine cars and they thought Detroit many things. I will still buy American brand because I want Americans employed.

Yes, the Big Three still control the full-size pickup truck market. But that's not what I said. I said in terms of new market share, the Big Three have been losing. Case in point--the Toyota Hi-Lux pickup. Japan in general, and Toyota in particular, took the small pickup truck market away from the American manufacturers starting in the 1980s. The excuse has been for years that Americans had no real interest in "small" pickups so that didn't matter. Then the Toyota came along with a full-size that tested well, and the only American response seems to be making their trucks ever larger, ever more expensive, more luxurious, and less practical all the time. Toyota makes a good product--down at the war we used to call the 4x4 Hi-Lux the "Taliban Humvee." It could go most anywhere we could in our trucks, and it was a hell of a lot cheaper.

If the Big Three ignore this development, they are going to be losing another potentially highly lucrative market--small, fuel efficient trucks at reasonable prices. Lots of people could use a small pickup if it was efficient enough. In this day and age an increasing number of people with massive American trucks may find themselves tempted to turn it in for a smaller, less expensive, and more fuel efficient truck, even some of those self-described "rednecks."

I have a lot of hope for this truck. Unlike so much of the vaporware that appears on Treehugger when it comes to transportation, Mahindra is a real company that has sold tractors in the U.S. for over a decade, and that builds several hundred thousand cars and trucks a year in India. The price point is still too high for me, but sell me a stripped out 4x4 diesel for fifteen grand and I'll queue right up. I really, really hope that our increasingly worthless dollar doesn't sink this.

Well, yay for a new truck offering. Unfortunately with the taxes on diesel the way they are, people are less likely to rush out and buy diesel -- here (Texas) diesel is more expensive than premium gasoline.

Still, maybe the hybrid will win people over; unfortunately a hybrid usually means batteries, which will, in this case, probably reduce the towing capacity of the truck, a big no-no in the truck market. afterall, what do you need a truck for? To *haul* stuff.

Good. Its about time somebody brings a diesel hybrid here. I hope its extremely succesfull.

.....our national Debt is approaching 10 Trillion dollars. Buying imports is the big problem.....

This just takes the cake!

It is this government's accomplishment, to turn a double digit surplus into dust and then punch a hole into hell's ceiling and pour the good old dollar down there!!
That's why these thinktank geniuses now want to replace it with the "Amero"! Google that ;-)

It's not the import, it is what was already here: A national thinking as if we were a bunch of dinosaurs, ready to get our egos fed by oversize meal servings, cars and waistebands.

With support of a good amount of mental "coutch-potatosim" this war in Iraq does the rest to the economy, the country, it's core values and worldwide reputation.

No wonder some of the large oil-producers want to get paid in Euros.

The republicans have done it, congrats, you handed this country over to communism (China is our largest banker - what's up with that??)
How do you sleep at night??