Interesting post from Kmills.
Hino were restarting to make inroads around the mid noughties in the UK, dunno about the rest of europe.
I read they were reluctant, understandably, to go down the euro 6 route initially and who can blame them for that because Toyota’s strength is reliability/durability which they didn’t want to compromise.
Since euro 6 they’ve virtually disappeared from the UK, though they’ve now got euro 6 sorted, but 7 is just around the corner so doubt they’ll be coming back.
They don’t need to bother trying to keep up with europe’s fast changing eco requirements, their reliable machines sell in vast numbers throughout the rest of the world which hasn’t hampered itself with unrealistic climate targets that will only succeed in finally killing off what little UK heavy manufacturing industry is left.
It would cost massive fortunes to set up a dealer network for Hino in the UK alone, not worth the risk as its anyone’s guess what the next moves are in climategate uk/europe, why bother when they have willing buyers throughout the rest of the world, much of which in Asia particularly is taking off economically without hobbling its own industries.
Look up Hino on youtube and you can see hundreds of Hinos soldiering on in the sorts of conditions our european trucks wouldn’t make the first corner.
I’m a big fan of Japanese cars/4x4’s, those actually built in Japan, preferably Toyota because some of the others have rubbished their once fine reputations for reliable products through alliances with european makers**, run Toyotas myself and have no intention of owning anything else so long as i live, yes you have to take into account their rust resistance isn’t as great as it should be because they don’t use road salt in Japan (nor should we here), but if you take that on board and either prepare your own vehicle for long term rust resistance or get a professional to do it, the chances of buying a more reliable competent durable vehicle are non existant, their engineering is above question their component and especially electronic quality/reliabiliy unbeatable when compared to typical european made cars/trucks.
**even Toyota started to get into bed with euro makers by using BMW Diesel engines, a surprising decision that but their future lies in hybrid and maybe hydrogen and maybe an electric offering or two so probably wasn’t worth them designing a new Diesel for the supposedly remaining short term european market.
However their shared design with PSA for Aygo and its siblings has been a massive success as one of the best small cars you can buy for reliable cheap long term motoring, can’t comment on the rebadged PSA vans being sold in Toyota dealers because i know nothing about them.