The Tata Magic Iris is a 3-door, 4- or 5-seater

cabover Cab-over, also known as cab over engine (COE), cab forward (U.S.), flat nose (Canada), or forward control (UK), is a body style of truck, bus, or van that has a vertical front, "flat face" or a semi-hood, with the cab of the truck sitting ab ...

microvan A microvan is a van or minivan which is within the Japanese kei car classification or similar, and is smaller than a mini MPV. In China, these vehicles are nicknamed ''mian bao che'' ("bread-loaf vehicle") because of their shape.

minivan Minivan (sometimes called simply as van) is a North American car classification for vehicles designed to transport passengers in the rear seating row(s), with reconfigurable seats in two or three rows. The equivalent classification in Europe i ...

( MPV) manufactured by the

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

n automaker

Tata Motors Tata Motors Limited is an Indian multinational automotive manufacturing company, headquartered in Mumbai, India, which is part of the Tata Group. The company produces passenger cars, trucks, vans, coaches, buses. Formerly known as Tata En ...

. Powered by a 600cc one-cylinder

diesel engine The diesel engine, named after Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which ignition of the fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to mechanical compression; thus, the diesel engine is a so-ca ...

, it is intended to compete with auto-rickshaws.
With its engine delivering and 31 Nm of torque, the vehicle has a top speed of just . The Magic Iris is made using an all steel body and frame – reinforced by reverse hat section chassis rails and beams, welded under its floor.
The vehicle features all-around independent suspension with coil springs –

MacPherson strut The MacPherson strut is a type of automotive suspension system that uses the top of a telescopic damper as the upper steering pivot. It is widely used in the front suspension of modern vehicles, and is named for American automotive engineer Earl ...

s in the front, and semi-trailing arms in the rear. It uses a

design, meaning the driver seating on top of the front

axle An axle or axletree is a central shaft for a rotating wheel or gear. On wheeled vehicles, the axle may be fixed to the wheels, rotating with them, or fixed to the vehicle, with the wheels rotating around the axle. In the former case, beari ...

and the engine mounted at the rear, and with a vehicle length 1 cm shorter than the 1957

Fiat 500 The Fiat 500 ( it, Cinquecento, ) is a rear-engined, four-seat, small city car that was manufactured and marketed by Fiat Automobiles from 1957 until 1975 over a single generation in two-door saloon and two-door station wagon bodystyles. La ...

, the Magic Iris is one of the shortest four-seater cars ever produced — however its limited top speed would prohibit actually registering it as a ''car'' in many countries.

References

2010s cars Cab over vehicles Cars introduced in 2010 Microvans Minivans Rear-engined vehicles Rear-wheel-drive vehicles Magic Iris {{van-stub

See also

References