- Wolverine, M80 Fireworks. They're all small, mighty and
outlawed in the United States just like today's car. This 4*4 packed a big
punch in a tiny package. Today we're gonna look
at where it came from and why one of the cutest
cars to ever come out of Japan is actually perfect for devouring terrain. (engine roaring) We're also gonna talk about
the fraudulent crash report inside job that killed
it in North America. This is everything you need to know to get up to speed on a Suzuki Samurai. (upbeat music) Thanks again to our friends at Omaze for sponsoring this episode. Guys, it is officially your last chance to win a brand new 2020 Corvette Stingray with taxes and shipping included. And if that's not enough, they're also gonna give you $20,000 cash. The Stingray is an amazing car. Trust me, I've been ripping up the canyons around California all freaking day, and this thing is hella dope. (engine humming) But yours will be even
sicker than this one because Omaze sprung for the z51 package, which bumps horse perse up to 495, extremely buff yet refined horsy perse. That means 0-60 time in
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people that helped me out when I had my heart attack. That's omaze.com/donut. Go there and donate to
support an amazing cause and amazing organization. And also you could win
a fricking Corvette. Up to speed. Chapter one, A New Hope. Our story starts with
the Hope Motor Company. No, not the used car dealer in Arkansas. Hope Auto is not the same as Hope Motor. Today, I'm talking about
the Japanese automaker that got it started in the 50s with three wheeled Kei cars. That's right, Kei cars, not to be confused with K cars, okay. Now these Kei cars are an ultra mini class that became popular in Japanese cities. One, they're easy to park and maneuver and two, their owners would
be exempt from certain taxes as long as their engine and body met specific size requirements. AKA, both of them got to be really small. Now Hope Motor Company
did okay with the Kei and in the mid 60s, Hope barged into their
workshop with an idea. "Yo dudes, I have an idea,
but nevermind, it's stupid." "Oh, come on, tell us, no
ideas are stupid, tell us." "Nah, no, you guys are
just gonna laugh at me" "No, dude, come on, blue sky only baby, "no judgment, let's hear it." "I don't know, what if we, "what if we added like a fourth wheel?" "Dude, you are twisted, but I love it." So they slapped on a fourth wheel and released the Hope Star ON360. Look at this little thing, it looks like Power wheels truck for grownups. It also kind of drove like one, considering it had a blistering
top speed of 43 miles/hour. It used the two-stroke
air-cooled Mitsubishi engine, which made 20 horsepower. But what it lacked in power baby, it made up for with surprising
4*4 capability, baby. For Hope this was really
more of a concept car. They only made 15 of them, but between that and their three wheelers, a lot of people were
hopeful about the company. In 1968, Suzuki bought
the Hope Motor Company because the light bodies and engines fell right in line with
what Suzuki was all about, being small, but innovative. They saw potential in the
Hope Star and re-bodied, even swapped out the Mitsubishi engine for a Suzuki FB two cylinder,
which up to horse pers from 20 to an absolutely massive 25. And in 1970, Suzuki
released their new version of the Hope Star, now called the Jimny. What, what's a Jimny like a cricket? A Jimny is the same as a Samurai. Oh my God, you need to cut this part out, I do not need any more
problems with Samurai. This was the first global hit for Suzuki. When the Jimny launched,
it was the only 4*4 Kei car and instantly had a reputation
as the perfect froder. It featured canvas doors that zipped closed like
any proper froder should. And by 1979 outside of
Japan, it came as a soft top, a hard top and down under, you could find my adopted kangaroo Nolan 2 behind the wheel of Jimny Stockman. Oh, you think I adopted
a baby baby kangaroo? No, everybody wants the babies, Nolan 2 is a full grown
middle-aged kangaroo that was down on his luck. I actually did adopt a
kangaroo, I got receipts. Now this Stockman featured a pickup tub that had 42 free Roman Brumbies, Now four-cylinder, four-stroke motor. And when the second
generation launched in 1981, and it was more refreshing
than an ice cold Shasta. The styling took a number of
cues from Jeep's CJ models of the day, Suzuki knew
who their demographic was. And just like in the 70s, there were Kei car and non Kei car models. So you can find all
sorts of configurations. You hate your windshield, pull it down, hate the roof, pull it off. It could go anywhere and do anything. Meanwhile, we're over here in the States and people were watching
the rest of the world having all this fun, going
to restaurants and stuff in their cute little 4*4's and we were like, hello,
we'd like to have fun too. And in 1986, the Jimny came to a stop, looked us right dead in the
eyes finally, and he was like. - Suzuki Samurai 4*4.
- Hi. - Chapter two, American Samurai Warrior. The adorable off-road are debuted in some adorable commercials. The Jimny was rebadged as
the Samurai in the States to emphasize its lightweight agility and well, it's Japanese heritage. It's all about surface level references for us over here in the U.S. You can get the American
model as a convertible or a hard top complete with
a 1.3 liter four banger that made an astounding 63 horsepowers, which was a pretty hefty increase considering that the
first model only made 20. And the initial plan was to import roughly 14,000 Samurais in the first year. That sounds terrifying. But when off-road
enthusiasts saw how much dirt these little things could kick that 14,000 ended up becoming 47,000
by the end of the year. Hello, yes, I need to
upgrade my life insurance. What made it such a good off-road. Where do I begin? (upbeat music) For starters, it was a true 4*4, which should really be a given when you're talking
about cars for the trail, but the Samurai had great low end torque. When you're trying to go over an obstacle, it's nice not to have to ramp the red line just to make it through. Gearing is also very important when you're climbing over
all of them bouldies. Samurai had a transfer case
which multiplies torque to make it even more powerful in low gear. It also had killer angles. When you're off-roading, there are three angles
you're concerned about, approach, break-over and departure. The Samurai nailed all three because of its high ground
clearance and short overhangs. The Samurai also used a solid axle rather than independent suspension. This meant better wheel articulation, literally keeping the
wheels on the ground. That articulation was also helped by it's ladder frame chassis. Ladder frames are a very simple kind of body on frame chassis that's existed for pretty much, as long as there have been cars. There's probably horse drawn
carriages with ladder frames. Now they're antiquated, but they can handle a lot of torsion, which also means more wheel contact and wheel contact means traction. (engine roaring) Are there more capable off-roaders? Yeah, sure, but rarely is
so much of that available in such a small mass produced package. In addition to being good for off-roading it's incredibly affordable, just like our Buff Horses Sticker Pack - What's up guys, we've got
new LowCar Pins in stock. - I know we've also got new
HiCar Pins back in stock. These ones are different,
they're super limited, they're finished in a
beautiful black nickel finish. So if you want one, you don't sleep on it. We're only making 800 of each. Every single one is gonna
be individually numbered. Make sure you buy it from us, 'cause it'll be cheaper
than buying it from eBay when they're sold out. - Not only do we have new pins, but we also have new key chains for both LowCar and HiCar they are those remove from flight textile, so get your hands on those as well. - These are really cool, they're gonna sell out
soon, just like Nolan did. (laughing) Up To Speed. I mean a Suzuki Samurai at $6,500 only costs 2/3 of a 1987 Jeep Wrangler. Yeah, it only weigh 2100 pounds and went 0-60 in almost 17 seconds. But none of that matters
for an off-roader. In fact, the Samurai outsold
the Wrangler 2:1 in 1987. Then in 1988, Suzuki
introduced the 88 1/2 model, which had softer
suspension, better interior, larger roll bar and a lower fifth gear to make it better for street driving. Yeah, sure, they didn't
increase the power, but its lack of speed wasn't what started slicing up Samurais sales. Chapter three, Suzuki Motor Corp versus the Consumer Union
of the United States. In the criminal justice system that people are
represented by two separate yet equally important groups. The actual criminal
investigators and James Pumphrey, who makes internet car videos
about them years later, these are the their stories. This is crazy, all right,
I'm just warning you guys. All right, so in 1988, a young driver sustained mild injuries after rolling their Suzuki Samurai to avoid an object in the road. Now that wouldn't have
been a noteworthy wreck except the driver
happened to be an employee of the United States Consumer Union, the same organization that
publishes Consumer Reports, a magazine that reviews
products for safety and quality, mostly old people read it. Now this accident
prompted Consumer Reports to take a closer look
at the tip up tendencies of the Samurai. They subjected to the car
to sudden swerve tests at 40 miles per hour, and
according to their summary, Consumer Reports found that
the car was easily rolled over. This prompted Consumer Reports to give their first
unacceptable rating in 10 years. "This is a car that we
consider dangerous." said David Berliner, the Consumer
Unions assistant director. Berliner means donut in German. "The design is inherently flawed. "It's not something where
they can make an adjustment "or put on some hardware in
order to make a difference. "The only solution is to
take it off the market." And just like that sales
of the Samurai tanked. - [Man] That's it, that
looked pretty good. - The report was
published at the same time that the Japanese yen was rising against the American dollar, which had already forced Suzuki to raise Samurai prices by 30%. And it didn't help that Americans were primed to believe
the Consumer Reports. There had been numerous findings of SUVs being involved in a higher
number of rollover accident. It was a perfect storm of bad news, but Suzuki, they call BS. You see the Jimny had been around for almost 20 years at this point, just not in the US and there
had been numerous tests performed both internally
and by federal regulators that showed it was safe
to drive the Jimny. Something wasn't adding up. So they put their lawyers on the case. And after the better part of a decade, in 1996, Suzuki Motor Corporation filed a $60 million libel suit
against the Consumer Union for willingly fraudulent testing. In the course of their investigation, Suzuki found that consumer
reports had manipulated evidence and changed their testing criteria with the express purpose
of rolling the Samurai. They uncovered documents from the first time Consumer
Reports tested the Samurai in which the researcher said, "The car responds well
and corrects quickly, "leans normally and snaps back in line, "confidence, fairly
high, no real problem." He even ranked it as one
of the best vehicles tested and gave it the highest safety rating. And if that wasn't enough,
Suzuki got access to a video from the second round of testing, in which testers ran the sudden swerve 47 times before getting a single tip over. In the video, a Consumer Union executive can be heard saying to the testers, "If you don't find someone
to roll this car, I will." And it was another executive
named R David Pittle, of course, who finally
got the Samurai tip. And when it tips, you can hear another tester
shout with excitement. - [Tester] All right, Ricky baby. - Then they improvised
a more difficult test who employees who were there said was set up with the express
purpose of filming an accident. And even in that test, it took 15 tries to get the car to tip. - [Man] Can't you see it, we
get no lift off the ground. (laughs) oh God. - A witness said, "From what I heard "and saw during the
testing of the Samurai, "the objective of the test "was not to simulate
normal avoidance driving, "but was to flip the Samurai." Every Samurai I have ever met
could flip first time easily. - Those tests demonstrate
that the Suzuki Samurai has unusually high propensity to roll over for any driver during routine driving. - Consumer Reports settled out of court 'cause they got a ton of money and that's what rich people do. And they issued a public correction, but the damage to the
brand was already done. Suzuki's automotive reputation
would never fully recover. And the perception that
they made unsafe cars extended into the Suzuki Sidekick and even the Geo Tracker. It just goes to show you what can happen when one
magazine gets too much power. Chapter four, The Last Samurai. Suzuki did their best to hold
on to the American market, but when the roll cage
mandate came in 1994, the end was near, rather than re-engineered
the design of the car, Suzuki simply took out the back seats to make room for the new roll cage. And then in 1995, they pull the Samurai out of the States entirely. But that's not the end
of the story though. Jimnys are still being produced and they're crazy popular anywhere there's a market
for Kei style trucks. Suzuki introduced the
third generation in 1997 at the Tokyo Motor Show with a much more modern design and a 1.3 liter Suzuki M engine bringing horsepower up to a blistery 83. The third gen was sold around the world under different names. Maruti sold a version in India that was perfect for parts of the country where less capable
vehicles were in practical. Mazda sold a version called the AZ-Offroad with AZ standing for Autozam, Mazda's small car off shoot. In New Zealand, it was sold
as the Farm Worker 4*4. Though there it was
strictly intended for work and isn't legal to drive on
streets, it's like a nice gator. And of course it did well as a Kei car in its native land of Japan. It currently holds the record for the highest altitude driven
by a four-wheeled vehicle. On April 21st, 2007, Gonzalo
Bravo and Eduardo Canales drove a Jimny 21,942 feet up, Ojos Del Salado in the Andes mountains. And on the way they pass the sign left by the previous
record holder that read, "Jeep parking only, others
can't make it up here anyway." They brought the sign back down with them, which is just a flex. In 2018, Suzuki released
a fourth generation called the Jimny Sierra. Like all other Jimny's, it's
still a killer off road vehicle it's currently available
in Japan, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. But sadly, we probably won't
see it here in the state. So we'll have to make due with trucks that are way less cute. Thank you guys for watching this video and everything else on Donut Media. Hit that subscribe button and that bell so you don't miss anything. We put out a video dang near every day. You wanna learn some
more about little trucks that aren't meant to go off road, but are really, really fast and have more than a
blistering 83 horsepower, check out this episode of
Wheelhouse hosted by Nolan Sykes. Bye.
I want to believe I helped.
Cool video.
I like the channel in general.
I have a Samurai. It’s a real shame what they did to Suzuki. This is why we don’t get nice things!
Great video.
The most funny part is when he tells us why the samurai is a great off roader and forgets about weight, the most important thing.