Thats good news.

In Mar-2008, Smart has sold 1,734 vehicles in US, a decent start.

Meanwhile Toyota and Honda's Hybrids sales in Mar-2008 have crossed 35,000 lead by Prius with 20,635 units sold. Small Car sales have done excessively well while the SUV's & PU's have gone done drastically.

Pretty soon, 2, 3 & 4 seater small vehicles could take the American roads.

I am happy to hear Smart For Two has succeeded.

And now: I strongly prefer not to hear any complaints to the effect "... If the Europeans can build a car like that, why not GM, Ford and Chrysler?"

To any who would make such a complaint, please - give me (and the rest of us) a break. We should be grateful somebody has devised a very small car that has developed a cachet with the avant-garde crowd. Not everybody however can use a car such as Smart4Two. So why not let the SmartCar organization have the market for that vehicle, and let GM, Ford and Chrysler focus on larger vehicles?

In all the years I have been a student of the automobile, I never understood the logic in demanding that every manufacturer have the exact same product lineup.

There is a one to two year waiting list for the Smart in the US depending on dealer territory. One third of the Smart production is reserved for the US market. I believe there is definitely a sizable market for micro and mini commuter cars in the US.

Does this mean we might actually get the Toyota IQ ?

What I like about this car is the drive-line is fairly simple and might be replace by a plug in battery/electric system sometime in the future. How about a secondary retrofit manufacturer looking into this idea...or is the company already working on it?

Lad - the electric Smart firts appeared in the UK in 2006 http://www.verteci.co.uk/av_smart_ecar.jpg

It hasn't been available in quantity though. There are about a hundred of them entering service with organizations in London this year.

Correction -- not just London. See this GreenCarCongress report from a few months ago
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2007/12/first-electric.html or just search smart electric here on this GCC page

Correction -- not just London. See this GreenCarCongress report from a few months ago
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2007/12/first-electric.html or just search Smart Electric here on this GCC page

I would rather see micro hybrid tech on "normal" small cars like the Yaris, Aygo, Fiesta, Corsa etc.

These cars have the volume, and if you got an extra 5 mpg on popular cars, it would really have an effect.

But a lot of people want to be seen to be green, hence the Smarts and Prius's, while hybrid versions of regular cars (Civic for instance) don't sell so sell.

+ that is why people are more likely to put solar panels on their roof than replace their light bulbs or turn down their heating. (normalized by cost, that is).

don't sell so well(!)

There was a new story about this car on TV at a public place recently. It generated more attention than I thought it would.

I've seen two SMARTs around here recently. One parked, another on a freeway onramp.

Maybe GM will decide to bring the Chevy Beat here if they're convinced there's actually a market for minicars.

Alex Kovnat:

If the Europeans can build a car like that, why not GM, Ford and Chrysler?

The reason it is important, is there are a lot of Americans that only buy domestic. So it gives those folks a better option.

Stan:
Tnx 4 the jump info.

The Civic didn't sell well because they tuned it too much for performance. If they hadn't it would have sold a lot better. Not as well as the Prius but better. The market failure of Hybrid Accord illustrates this perfectly.

Mahonj you may be reading too much into the "green" thing. I bought an Altima hybrid because it makes financial sense. This car gets an honest 34-35mpg (more if you try). Between the fed credit and the gas savings I will recover the extra sticker cost in ONE YEAR! It has better performance than the non-hybrid model, and is much more fun to drive with the electric motor kicking up the torque when needed.

The U.S. version gets 36 mpg combined. Not very impressive for a car so small. I believe that one of the problems is that they had to beef it up for U.S. safety regulations. Perhaps we've gone too far in that department. Are all the Europeans dying like flies on the roads?

In the U.S., the Smart may make a statement but the statement is not backed up by the numbers, as opposed to the Prius.

>The U.S. version gets 36 mpg combined. Not very
>impressive for a car so small. I believe that one
>of the problems is that they had to beef it up
>for U.S. safety regulations.

Tom, you have touched upon an issue that has worried me for years.

If we continue to squeeze the auto industry ever more relentlessly on both fuel economy and safety, we will eventually end up with cars that can sustain no more than 40 miles per hour. Perhaps that is what car-haters want.

Whether I'm right or wrong on this, we need to have frank and open discussion on what the possible consequences will be to our life-styles, of ever-increasing legislative aggression against the auto industry.

Tom, I couldn't agree more. The Honda Insight, another two-seater, which got better mileage than even a Prius, was a complete marketing failure in the US, probably because it looked "weird" and not "cute", is no longer offered here. The Smart, which not only gets worse mileage than an Insight, but also the far larger Civic Hybrid and Prius, is already a huge success, but smart it is not.

Car haters? Consequences to our life-styles? Legislative agression?

Interesting sound bytes of trying to make it an us vs them arguement but it doesn't wash.

Whether it is AGW or energy security or pollution or whatever the case may be, the sheer number of cars and the cost of public infrasture and the cars effects on public health make it a public (ie gov't) matter.

Who made the manufacturers put in most of the safety equipement and pollution controls? Who put the CAFE standards that raised the fuel efficiency after 73'?

It's not a van. For what it does which is go from point a to point b, which is what most people just do, it's fine. The gasoline engine version gets 33/36/41 city/combined/highway of the new EPA 2008 figures.

It's the best conventional numbers. The european numbers are higher (~50 MPG US) with the diesel version getting 29.4 km/l (~69 MPG US). Bluetec ones are scheduled to hit Canada in 2009 followed by the US.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_Fortwo

I strongly applaud makers of micro cars for bringing their vehicles to the US market.

However, the not-so-Smart ForTwo is clearly a posseur vehicle that caters to those who want to give the appearance of being green without the numbers to back it up. Really, you want me to give up rear seats and live with very limited cargo in return for a measley 36mpg?

Personally, I think I'll skip the ForTwo waiting lists and get a much more useful (and better performing) Yaris at my local Toyota dealer for less coin.

Heck, Toyota's iQ is a much more useful package offering 3 + 1 seating.

If the ForTwo sells well (and I hope they do), perhaps other micro cars will soon reach the US market. Japan has a whole slew of Kei cars that are better than Smart's offering. Subaru's 4-seat R2 turbo comes to mind.

I welcome the micro car trend!

I look at the Mini Cooper as an example, they are small and fun to drive. This car is small and if it is fun to drive, there will probably be buyers for some time to come.

Here's a quick comparitive analysis between the fortwo Passion vs. the Toyota Yaris S Sedan manual:

0-60mph, the Yaris S is nearly 5 seconds(!!!)faster, and handily out-corners the fortwo: 0.82g vs 0.74g's around a skidpad.

The Yaris S has nearly twice the cargo space and twice the passenger volume (not surprising seeing the Yaris has 5 seats vs. fortwo's 2 seats).

The smart only comes with a 2yr/24,000 mile warranty, vs. Toyota's standard 3yr/36,000 mile warranty.

According to FuelEconomy.gov the average smart fortwo driver reports getting 37.9mpg, while the average Yaris driver averages 37.5mpg.

According to Edmunds, an equipped smart Passion will set you back $15,085, while a similarily equipped Yaris S Sedan will set you back $15,896.

I think the avg 0.4mpg deficit and extra $811 are more than compensated by the Yaris S Sedan's added performance, and utility.

"I look at the Mini Cooper as an example, they are small and fun to drive. This car is small and if it is fun to drive, there will probably be buyers for some time to come."

the (BMW) Mini Cooper is actually deceptively large, over 1m longer than the fortwo. unfortunately the fortwo is doomed to have poor driving dynamics because of the high centre of gravity and very short wheelbase. however it does show that you can get good fuel-efficiency with very conventional technology; no need for carbon fibre bodywork or impossibly expensive fuel cells.

I want to make one more comment on SmartForTwo, before I go on to other matters.

Some have commented that the Smart is smaller than, but gets less fuel economy than larger cars with hybrid drive systems. And that even a non-hybrid car, the Toyota Yaris, has rear seats and gets virtually the same fuel economy as the SmartForTwo. Point taken. You win.

But ..... but......

Is it not possible that the small size of the SmartForTwo, and its consequent ability to park in much less space than a Toyota Prius, and also take up less room in crowded traffic, may be a virtue in and of itself?