Fake In China: More On The Faux F150, And Its Chevy Precursor
Tycho, my Dutch friend in Beijing, scored the big one with his fake F150 story. After we wrote about it, everybody from Motor Trend to Pickupinfo.ru wrote about it as well, taking the Carnewschina.com server on a shakedown tour. Tycho does what a good journo needs to do: Feed the beast. He found even better pictures of the pseudo Ford. And he found imagery of its older brother. Which is a Chevy copypaste.
JAC’s Ford-clone JAC 4R3 pickup truck is not available yet, and will be shown at the Beijing auto show end of April. JAC is headquartered in the village of Jingxin in Hebei Province. Villagers there are fiercely loyal to their largest employer, and when uncamouflaged preproduction models of the JAC 4R3 showed up — pictures of the truck appeared minutes later on the Internet.
Tycho has a whole collection, courtesy of the fiercely loyal villagers
On further digging, Tycho unearthed that the truck’s older brother also looks like a Detroit lovechild. According to a new report in Carnewschina, “the JAC 43R is based on another existing JAC pickup truck, the JAC Ruiling. The Ruiling, meaning ‘Lucky Bell’, is a copy of the 2003 Chevrolet Silverado, with a Ford-style oval on the grille.”
Some commenters think it looks more like a 2005 Chevy Colorado. Opinions?
Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.
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The Chevy knockoff is sort of a Chevy/Isuzu hybrid with regards to the grill. The F-150 knockoff has the tailgate from a Nissan Titan for some reason.
This does smack of poetic justice when one remembers Ford making Ferrari change the name of an F1 car.