Sales of Daihatsu Rocky and Toyota Raize Hybrid suspended in Japan, Perodua Ativa not affected
Arvind · May 20, 2023 02:00 PM
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Only chassis for the 1.2-litre hybrid variants are affected
Business as usual for sales of 1.0-litre turbocharged variants
By the same extension, sales of our local Perodua Ativa is unaffected
Internal investigations into Daihatsu Motor Corporation's safety certification operations - following the recent 'procedural irregularities' (reported end April 2023) - have revealed yet more discrepancies, this time with regard to the UN-R135 (pole side-impact) certification of the Daihatsu Rocky / Toyota Raize Hybrid (HEV) variants sold in Japan.
This comes after the now-solved misconduct involving UN R95 side-impact (with movable barrier) testing for the (AC100) Toyota Vios / Yaris Ativ and (D74A) Perodua Axia, both developed by Daihatsu. As a result, the sales of Rocky / Raize HEV variants have now been suspended in Japan.
This latest misconduct was uncovered by Toyota after a full review ordered by Chairman Akio Toyoda, following the earlier UN R95 debacle.
The internal investigations have uncovered discrepancies in the certification whereby findings for the passenger side (left) collision test data were submitted for the driver's side (right) to authorities.
According to Daihatsu, the certification involves 56,111 units of the Toyota Raize and a further 22,329 units of the Daihatsu Rocky HEV variants sold in Japan.
Note, however, that only the 1.2-litre e-Smart Hybrid variants are affected.
The Rocky / Raize 1.0-litre turbocharged variants are not affected, and by that measure, the Perodua Ativa which shares much of its body, chassis and powertrain components with the 1.0T variants should be spared as well.
However, the situation may be different in the case of the 300 units of the Perodua Ativa Hybrid that are leased to Malaysian customers as part of a feasibility study.
In September 2022, 300 customers were handed the Perodua Ativa, which is leased at RM 500 a month for a period of 5 years, as part of a feasibility to further study the driving behaviour of a hybrid vehicle in populated locations in the country, namely in the Klang Valley, Penang, and Johor Bahru.
With regards to the earlier reported UN R95 certification issues, a later retest, conducted by the Belgian government vindicated the original results, ensuring the certification remained valid for the affected models.
An improved part designed to avoid a sharp tear (lower image) on the door panel was not installed on customer cars
Toyota has said it will work with Daihatsu to carefully address this matter while listening to the voices of those on the front lines and will continue to report on the details as soon as they become available.
Arvind can't remember a time when he didn't wheel around a HotWheels car. This love evolved into an interest in Tamiya and RC cars and finally the real deal 1:1 scale stuff. Passion finally lead to formal training in Mechanical Engineering. Instead of the bigger picture, he obsesses with the final drive ratio and spring rates of cars and spends the weekends wondering why a Perodua Myvi is so fast.
