Can It Be Saved, Thrashed 1992 Daihatsu Hijet, This Thing Needs Love.

Wasn’t this just on marketplace? Hah I thought about buying it. Now I get to see it without having to spend anything. Thanks Mustie!!

Just realized 1992 was 30 years ago. Feel old now.

One of my greatest pleasures in watching Mustie videos is that the comments from other viewers are as interesting and insightful as Mustie himself. Darren has attracted a very knowledgeable and competent community. Thanks to all.

If the engine does turn out to be ireperrable I would love to see you retro-fit one of your bizarre collection of engines into it, would make quite a handy little utilitarian vehicle! Great video as always!

Got an engine story you'll appreciate. I took a gas powered pump that my Grampa was gonna scrap. It turned free, had spark, but no compression. Valves were clean and moving. The engine had been sitting on a dock in Ontario cottage country, where it gets to -25C in winter. Turned out the rings had seized in the grooves on the piston over winter, the engine warmed but the rings did not expand back out.... I sprayed some oil on the rings and actually heard them ping when they let go. That pump is still running strong.

If nothing else, make a vid tearing down the engine to find out EXACTLY WHY it went bad !!! We like THOSE kinds of vids, TOO !!!

I have a 1981 Mitsubishi micro van. Twin cylinders 550cc. Awesome little machine. Love it. I lifted it and put some meaty treads on it. Gets all sorts of attention.

My favorite thing about your videos is that you never let the frustration get to you. No matter how bad it is you never deviate from your happy "it is what it is" attitude.

Worked in a garden centre in Scotland in the early 90s, and we had one of the panel van versions (and not limited to 20mph, had it up to 65 on the motorway) for delivering flowers etc locally... Winter we threw a few backs of compost in the back to help hold it down in winds. Running it with 1/2 pallet of sacks of compost to deliver to a customer was challenging, uphill (downhill was pure scary).... and at 6'4" it was a tight fit.

Darren has NO FEAR! I swear, someone could pull up with half the titanic on a trailer and he’d give a little chuckle…do a walk around…poke it a few times with a stick…and be like “let’s put it on the lift and see what we got”. He’s my hero!!!!

These Daihatsu were used at work on shift. They ran 24 hours a day and were always overloaded with tools. They are incredibly tough. The garage could pull the motor in less than 25 min. A testament to the Japanese automobile industry.

I always enjoy watching you work on things and sometimes I learn a little something

Before I retired I worked in the ocean shipping industry here in Canada and every month we would bring in literally boatloads of these used small Japanese right hand drive cars that people import through specialized brokers. They are cheap and incredibly popular (even if you have to be brave enough to pull halfway out in to the oncoming lane if you want to see ahead of the guy in front). You see many this size that even have teeny tiny baby duals on the rear. The most popular non North American model, however, is the Toyota Hiace 4 wheel drive passenger van.

I'm in New Zealand and yes we had them here. we had them in the workshop from time to time. We did headgaskets on them. i remember that. Looking into your radiator, seeing the tubes blocked and that hose clip and piece of radiator hose on the elbow underneath. Then the lack of compression and the antioilyfreeze that came out of the sump. She'll be blown. poor little thing . Its a shame as the body isn't bad on it. Time for a repower. Hyabassa. That'd smoke the tyres.

In all seriousness, I'm 90% that that extra lever on the transmission is for controlling a PTO. When he's under the truck, there's an extra housing at the end of the transmission and it looks like a transfer case like for a 4x4. Instead of sending a shaft forward, it does...what? That much I don't know. That would also explain the little extra dealie on the accelerator pedal. That's for locking in a throttle setting for driving the PTO.

This has been a very interesting video! A step by step demonstration of what sequence to take to diagnose the problem!!!

I worked as head mechanic for a private membership Golf Clubs here in southern California for over thirty years many of the private Golf Clubs here purchased a fleet of these Diahatsu truck`s to get the 30 man Maintenance crew all around the facility. We had the S60 (early model 1980`s) and later the S80 model. These were good work vehicles that was truly over loaded when hauling heavy bags of fertilizer all over the golf course. Timing belt must be replaced at, or to be extra safe, little before the manufacture`s suggested interval. The engines are (interference) engines, if the timing belt fails you can bank on bent valves at a minimum. The cooling fan is electric and I had problems with coolant sensor failures, the engine would overheat due to no fan operation, I had some operators who would continue to drive to engine failure.

We used to have an Asia (Kia) Towner, pretty much the exact same thing except ours was a "coach" model with a whooping 7 seats. That thing was HEAVEN to drive on the city; had a very tight turning radius, could park it everywhere and the seating position made it easier to approach intersections when your vision was obscured. The build quality was excellent too, but the poor thing was pushing 20 years old so of course plastics and such kept breaking. Also, that tall front end meant fuel economy was bad, especially for an 800cc engine (yes, it carried 7 people with that engine, don't know how). Even then i still miss it, and consider it the most practical vehicle we've ever had (and also the deadliest too, no crumple zone here lol).

I lived in Japan for 15 years. These are the Japanese version of our Pickups and are used by just the same way we use our trucks.

I know a few people in the U.K. that have the pickup and or the van version and they love them. not restricted speed on them over here. a friend had a few for his video distribution business and he gave me a 200 mile lift home in it and was proud that he got nearly 70 mph out of it on the M.4 on a very long down hill stretch. ( only did it to show off) incredibly useful and economical, fun to drive and great in towns. don't know if they still make them. great video Mustie (as usual) nice to see something without critters to make you scream!!love to see a full resurrection , but an engine swap would be fun too.