Around the turn of the century many manufacturers were making attempts to make cars as fuel efficient as possible. Toyota with the first generation Prius and Honda with the Insight. Mitsubishi gave it a try with the Pistachio. Based on the eight generation Minika three door version, the body was the same but a different shape front bumper and new grille was used. The Pistachio also came in two unique colors called Citron Yellow or Loire Green with the lower part of the car in dark gray color.
The engine was a 1,094cc 4A31 in-line 4-cylinder DOHC 16-valve with Mitsubishi’s GDI technology. It produced 74 horsepower at 6000 rpm and 100 Nm of torque at 4000 rpm. It was coupled to a 5-speed manual transmission. In good driving conditions it could reach up to 30 km’s on 1 liter of gasoline fuel, a record for a pure gasoline engine at the time. This was achieved by keeping the car at a low weight of only 700 kg and equipping it with ASG, Mitsubishi’s Automated Stop-Go system.
Equipment wise the car was focused on fuel efficiency, so there was not much luxury but air conditioning and electric power windows were fit. For fuel economy performance, the power steering was made electric and lightweight Enkei 13″ allow wheels were used, the hood was made of aluminium and lightweight glass was used. With this special components for the Pistachio the sales price was still reasonable with just under 1 million Yen, however the car was limited for sales to companies and government only. It said that only 40 units have been produced.
Click on the picture below to see all Pistachio detailed specifications such as weight, new price and equipment for each version in the Goo-net.com catalog.
