“Make sure to make a good car!” The development manager of the new Toyota Noah/Voxy talks about “Why did we come this far?”
The new Noah/Voxy is a project in which Toyota Auto Body's fortunes depended
MF I was surprised at how much effort was put into this new Noah/Voxy. Are you always enthusiastic about developing Noah/Voxy? Mr. Mizukan: I am in charge of the second and third generations, and this time the fourth generation, but I put in a lot of effort each time. However, one thing that is different from before is that Toyota Auto Body has become the business manager and is paying for development. The power unit and advanced safety equipment are outsourced to Toyota Motor Corporation. In other words, Toyota Auto Body's company's future is on the line, and they have a strong obsession to make it a success. So normally, our product planning members make a proposal, and the designers make a design, and development progresses in the form of making it a reality. I think it's a big part of us thinking, coming up with ideas, and making proposals.
Also, this time, we have adopted a lot of advanced safety equipment, but in the previous generation, customers often asked, "Why isn't ACC (adaptive cruise control)?" We wanted to provide our customers with something that exceeded their expectations. In that way, while thinking about wanting to provide the latest equipment... Advanced equipment belongs to Toyota Motor Corporation, but the Toyota Motor's engineers did not say anything negative about Toyota Auto Body's request. , On the contrary, ``Because it is a familiar car, it is a car that has a large number, so we can disseminate the technology we have developed, and I can directly feel the results. Thank you.
MF Mr. Mizuma, you worked for Toyota Motor Corporation in the previous generation, and now you are working for Toyota Auto Body? Mr. Mizukan Yes, he transferred in 2018, so his permanent address is now Toyota Auto Body. However, as a chief engineer, I also have to give instructions to Toyota Motor Corporation, so I also serve at Toyota Motor Corporation.
MF So, the reason why Toyota took it seriously was because Mr. Mizuma was able to say to Toyota, "Let's do it!"...? Mr. Mizukan That's not the case (laughs), but the Noah/Voxy is a familiar car, and the number of sales is very strong. There are only cars, and there are few Japanese monopoly models, but among them, it is a familiar car with many people around me, and it is well known and has a large number, so it is easy to get cooperation. .
Free-stop backdoor and mechanical step
How will the development progress in the MF minivan with Toyota, Nissan's Serena and Honda's step wagon as powerful rivals? Is it a thing? "While there are a lot of things I want to do, I think I have to do something like crushing the negatives in order to compete with my rivals..." Mr. Mizukan: There are things that we should do because our rivals did it, but there are times when we check our rivals and learn from them before saying, “Let’s do it next time.” For example, the intermediate stop mechanism of the back door. The total length of this class is 4.7m, because it's basically a 5 number size. When you open the back door, it becomes about 5.7m. Many Japanese parking lots are made with a height of 5.4m or less, so you can't open them all the way. Therefore, in order to improve the usability of the back door, Serena made it a glass hatch, and Stepwagon made a "wakuwaku gate". Among them, we received feedback that the back door of the previous generation Noah/Voxy was difficult to use, so when we thought, "What should we do?" When I think about a method that can be used within that range, I go to the point where I think, 'If I just needed a little more, I could open it.' And I said, "It's probably best to be able to stop anywhere." "Then how can we stop it?" I made a request, "I want you to create a mechanism that can be stopped anywhere."
MF To be able to do that without a power tailgate... Mr. Mizukan Yes, the result was the Freestop Backdoor.
Mr. Mizukan Yes. In the previous generation, the floor was lowered to the limit in order to make it easier to get on and off. Trying to lower it even by 1mm. However, no matter how far it is lowered, it is difficult for elderly people to get on and off, and some people use step stools. In that case, there should be an auxiliary step. However, the auxiliary step will cost more than 200,000 yen if retrofitted by any manufacturer. I wanted to make this dramatically cheaper. Therefore, I asked him to create a step that is easy to provide to customers with a simple structure and groundbreaking. The result was the "Universal Step". The designers of Toyota Auto Body desperately came up with the idea to meet the customer's needs and make it a reality. Even if you can make a one-of-a-kind product like that, it's actually difficult to make something that can withstand mass production. Reliability and mountability = size, cost, mass... all must be established. When I think about it, I never reach that level of perfection. For the back door, while the strength is supported by a huge gear with a plate thickness of about 5mm, we put various mechanisms inside so that it would not break, keeping the size and cost within a reasonable range. I really struggled.
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