The 2024 Mitsubishi Triton has introduced the midsize truck effectively into the twenty first Century. In honor of the truck’s sixth era, let’s check out how far the Triton or L200 has come. Not too way back, the Mitsubishi L200 was technically thought-about a compact truck fairly than a midsizer, and it was bought within the U.S. because the Mitsubishi Mighty Max — an apt identify for the truck’s small dimension throughout its gross sales run within the U.S. from the ’80s by means of the early ’90s.

The primary- and second-generation Mighty Max had been additionally bought because the Dodge Ram 50 in America, the place the small truck competed with fashions from Toyota and Datsun, in addition to Isuzu and Mazda. Enjoyable truth: the Mitsubishi Mighty Max and Mazda B Collection vans had been in some unspecified time in the future powered by the identical 2.6-liter inline-four engine, albeit with slight variations and completely different names.

The Mighty Max and Ram 50 really bear a placing resemblance to Mazda B-Collection vans, however I assume it’s onerous to make a single cab truck with a beneficiant mattress look all that completely different from its rivals. The Mighty Max/L200 and Ram 50 had been workaday utility automobiles, very similar to different compact vans on the time. The identical form of sensible, reasonably-sized pickups I check with as truck shorties.

However even again then, fashions obtainable on the worldwide market already hinted on the Mitsubishi truck’s aspirations as a gnarly off-roader. On these markets, the truck was strictly often called the L200, and it was obtainable as a double cab from the second-generation on. The L200 might be optioned with four-wheel drive and a turbodiesel. The turbodiesel was obtainable within the U.S., however not in the identical mixture that was obtainable in the remainder of the world, which additionally bore colourful graphics.

Have a look at these wheels! I’m not one to gush over double cab vans, however I’ll make an exception for sure vans, such because the Mitsu L200 or the Chevy S-10. And, apparently, the remainder of the world feels the identical, given the recognition of the Mitsubishi truck in markets overseas. Ever because the truck’s launch in 1978, the Japanese carmaker has bought 5.6 million fashions in 150 international locations. When it was launched overseas 45 years in the past, it was known as the Mitsubishi Forte and has since been often called the Strada and L200 and, most not too long ago, the Triton.

Most of these mannequin’s lifetime gross sales have come from Southeast Asia, the place Mitsubishi says it’s bought one-third of all Tritons produced. The significance of the truck can’t be overstated for Mitsubishi as a model in the present day, with it accounting for 20 % of the carmaker’s international gross sales. The brand new Triton can be making a return to Japan after a 12-year hiatus. Who is aware of? Perhaps it’s time to mud off the Mighty Max badge, and even the Ram 50 badge, and produce it again to the U.S.