Daihatsu Luxio

This week I am looking into one of the dullest car designs ever been put into production of the car history in Indonesia and straight forwardly speaking, it comes from Daihatsu and is called “Luxio”. Launched at February 26th, 2009 exclusively and specifically for Indonesian market, the Luxio is presented to offer the following all-around features: A unique and highly refined design that establishes a powerful presence; the comfort and luxury which a family of eight members could get from an affordable price; versatile seat arrangements made possible by the spacious interior; 1.5L DOHC VVT-i engine that achieves both strong driving performance and excellent fuel efficiency. I would not give a damn on car advertisements because they are frequently persuasive and sometimes tend to be manipulative as well. The name of the car sounds to be promising because it is derived from the word “luxury” and yet, it doesn’t look or feel any luxurious enough. I have read several local automotive articles and they said that the car has an “adequately” luxurious design both in exterior and interior. I honestly think that is just a “luxury edition” of a previously sold into market old brother, Grand Max and they seemed like have several things in common. For instance, they share the same platform, which means a similar wheelbase dimension; it also has an identical body width and even the suspension system are exactly the same. But then I find there is not any resemblance in other aspects, such as standard equipments and engine. More importantly, this product is targeted for different market. Unlike Grand Max which is thrown into market for customers who used it for commercial purpose, meanwhile Luxio is squarely targeted to compete in a more crowded segment of family transporter. If you want a Toyota Alphard but you think it is much too expensive, this is then a perfect car for you.

Anyway, after an objective view of the car picture from all angles, I could say that I absolutely dislike the car design. It is completely not appealing, too boxy, dull, monotonous and quite dreary. The only part which I find acceptable is the side view mirror with turning lamp, even the chrome accent around the body doesn’t improve the overall look of the car as well. The engine itself is also not a completely upside as well, since it is equipped with the same engine as you can find in Daihatsu Terios. Daihatsu claimed that the engine in Luxio is the best selling engine in the country with total volume sales of 25%, thay also said that this engine produces an astounding power and still, it consumes merely a small amount of fuel. However, after some local magazine’s road test and objective verdict, the Daihatsu Terios could only average about 9 km to a liter of leaded fuel. This figure is not made up and several users point also an approximately similar figure as can be found in some automotive forums in the internet. Considering the Luxio has a higher value of drag coefficient, this figure could possibly plummet a bit worse. Inside, things are not going very well too, partly because there are some design elements and equipments of Luxio which can be found in the other Daihatsu’s car line-up, I believe this is performed to reduce the production cost as modest as possible. For instance, the double DIN audio player equipped in Luxio is exactly the same as it is in Terios. The material used to wrap the interior is also presumably cheap and don’t think that the customer will get a massive range of standard equipments with the car. The car featured in the official Daihatsu brochure has already equipped with some extra options, such as the chromed grill, side mirror with turning lamps, Anti-lock Breaking System (ABS), rear spoiler with high mounted stop lamp, automatic transmission, fog lamp, wood panel and HID head lamp. Tragically, these features can only be found in type X, which is the top range model. The car is so badly equipped and I think that Daihatsu only equips it with seats and a steering wheel for its basic model, don’t think of any other comfort features because you basically get nothing else. But it is normal considering Luxio is sold in the mid price range, judging from its dimension and production cost in the middle of crisis.

"If you want a Toyota Alphard but you think it is much too expensive, this is then a perfect car for you."

So far things look bleak to me, mainly because the design is catastrophically ugly, the car feels cheap, not well equipped and ruthlessly built. But, does it have any upsides? By judging some point of views, the answer will be: yes, this car does have several positive points. Hm well, no.. actually. It has only one upside and thanks to its odd-looking boxy design, Luxio has a very spacious amount of room to spare for all passengers. The spaciousness of the interior is also additionally supported by the height of the car which almost reaches 2 meters, it enables a kid with a maximum height of 1.3 meters high standing inside the car and yet, it still has an acceptably high ground clearance of 180 centimeters. Inside, a massive amount of storage compartments can be found on all third row seats. I am trying hard to figure out if there is anything else good in this car and sadly, I just can’t find anything else apart from the spaciousness of the car. That is how terrible it could get.

The monthly sales target is 1,000 units and the manufacturer's suggested retail prices range between 136 million and 165 million rupiah for the top range model type X, customers could choose from six paint colors option. The managing director of Astra Daihatsu Motor stated that the customer response to Luxio is profound considering the world financial crisis, Daihatsu managed to book more than 150 sales orders in an auto event in Serpong lately for just within two days. But it is still to fast to assume that Luxio will be the next Daihatsu’s best seller after Xenia, customers will have to look some other aspects before recommending it to their colleagues or family members to buy one, these parameters of course include fuel efficiency, reliability, service intervals and safety aspects of the car. For more information please log onto the official Daihatsu web page.