You Could Fit GM’s New Chinese ‘Mini Pickup’ In The Back Of A Silverado

General Motors sells pickups hand over proverbial fist. It didn’t sell as many of any particular model in the US last year as Ford did of its F-Series, but the combined sales of the Chevy Silverado, GMC Sierra, Chevy Colorado, and GMC Canyon make GM (by our count) the largest provider of pickups in America – never mind the rest of the world. And this is its latest.

It’s called the Rong Guang, and as you might have guessed, it’s not a Chevy or a GMC. In fact it’s not even going to be sold in America. It’s a Wuling, built by joint venture with SAIC in Shanghai for sale in China.

Joining the Rong Guang van, the “mini pickup” is rolling out in the so-called People’s Republic in either single-cab or crew-cab forms. At its longest, it measures 3,150 mm (124 inches), which is shorter than just the wheelbase of the Colorado/Canyon. And in shorter form, you could (theoretically) fit the entire thing inside the longer bed available on the Silverado HD. It’s that tiny.

Power is provided by a choice of 1.5- or 1.8-liter engines of unspecified parameters. But as best we can tell, the larger of the two produces all of 95 kW (127 hp) and 170 Nm (125 lb-ft) of torque – less than half of what even the base (4.3-liter EcoTec V6) engine on the Silverado offers. But then it doesn’t cost anywhere near as much as a Silverado, Colorado, or even a Spark for that matter. Pricing starts at just 45,800 Chinese Yuan, which works out to less than $7,000 at today’s exchange rates. So in short, it’s as cheap as it is small. Just don’t go looking for one at your local Chevy or GMC dealer.