Datsun- the recently launched budget-end brand of cars from Nissan, has unveiled its new hatchback at an event in New Delhi. The new car, which was known as the K2 until now, has been named as the Datsun Go and will be launched in 2014. The Go has been developed at Renault-Nissan’s Chennai technical facility.
The Datsun Go will rival the Hyundai i10 1.1 and the Maruti Suzuki Wagon-R & A-Star in Indian car market. Rumors are abound that the Go will spawn a 7 seat MPV in near future. There are good chances that the Go based MPV would be first launched in Indonesian car market.
The Datsun Go will be positioned below the newly launched Nissan Micra Active and from what we know, is based on an old Nissan car platforms. However, in no way can the Datsun Go be thought of as a cut-price and stripped out versions of the Nissan vehicles. The car looks well proportioned and looks every bit like a modern hatchback should.
Datsun hasn’t yet unveiled the interiors and has told us that the interiors are still in prototyping stage. However, a sneak peek shows that the car has dash mounted gear lever and the overall design of the dashboard is slightly akin to that of the Micra. Thanks to the interiors being far from final, we aren’t sure if this is how they would look in the final stage. The steering boss design, however, seems to have been finalized and the car gets a 3 spoke steering wheel that looks nothing like that of the Micra. The seat upholstery seems to be of good quality. NOTE- No fabric inserts on the door pads. Also, the car won’t get a tacho, rear power windows and a ‘close-able’ glovebox!
The front seats get fixed headrests. The front passenger seat extends all the way till the drivers seat, to form a bench seat like arrangement. We can already see people trying to squeeze three in the front.
Powering the Go will be a 1.2 litre petrol engine that will have performance figures at par with those of most of the rivals. Datsun hasn’t yet unveiled the spec sheet but our guess is that this is the same 1.2 litre engine that powers the Micra, albeit in a lower state of tune to boost fuel efficiency at the cost of outright performance.
The K2 will also be joined by a smaller hatchback, codename I2 sometime next year. The I2 would battle it out against the very popular Maruti Suzuki Alto 800 and Hyundai Eon.
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Looks far better than any of the Nissan vehicles, at least in photos.