The Kurogane Baby was a ''

keitora A kei truck, kei-class truck, or Japanese mini truck is a mini truck, a tiny but practical pickup truck available in rear-wheel drive or four-wheel drive versions, built to satisfy the Japanese '' keijidōsha'' (軽自動車, "light vehicle") st ...

'' and

microvan A microvan is a van or minivan which is within the Japanese kei car classification or similar, and is smaller than a mini MPV. In China, these vehicles are nicknamed ''mian bao che'' ("bread-loaf vehicle") because of their shape.

built by the

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

ese Kurogane company from April 1959 until January 1961, sold only in

. It was developed by a company of which Kurogane had assumed operations, called

Ohta Jidosha was one of the largest Japanese automotive manufacturing companies in the 1930s. The company was established in 1922, and produced cars from 1934 until 1957, when it was acquired by Tokyu Kurogane Kogyo company and ceased auto production. The fa ...

, but was introduced under the Kurogane brand and was only available until 1962. It had a 356-cc, water-cooled, overhead-valve, two-cylinder engine installed in the back of the vehicle, with rear-wheel drive. The more competitively priced

Subaru Sambar The Subaru Sambar is a cabover truck and microvan manufactured and marketed by Subaru as Japan's first truck compliant with the country's strict Keitora (軽トラ) or ''Kei'' vehicle tax class. Introduced in 1961 in microvan and Kei pickup co ...

and the

Suzuki Carry The is a kei truck produced by the Japanese automaker Suzuki. The microvan version was originally called the Carry van until 1982 when the passenger van versions were renamed as the . In Japan, the Carry and Every are '' kei cars'' but the Su ...

proved to be more popular and the Baby was discontinued after less than two years. It was available in two bodystyles, a van and a pickup.

References

{{van-stub Microvans Pickup trucks Cab over vehicles Kei trucks Rear-engined vehicles Rear-wheel-drive vehicles Vehicles introduced in 1959