This Triton model is now available at all Mitsubishi showrooms.
Mitsubishi Motors today isn’t quite the company you may remember from the 1990s. The Mitsubishi of the past produced street racers and rally legends year after year. While the Colin McRae days are over, and the company has put all of that WRC winning experience into more practical use – making trucks that can deliver great performance with great durability.
They’ve been in the pick-up truck business for well over 40 years and have earned a reputation for building reliable workhorses. The current Triton can trace its lineage back to the earliest Mitsubishi pick-up truck models and the same tough DNA is still present today.
The latest evolution of their Triton introduces a 6-speed automatic transmission with ‘Super Select 4WD-II’, which lets your switch between 2H, 4H and 4L using an electronic actuator. The centre locking differential can also be controlled electronically. This is a great marriage of rugged, off-road capable hardware with convenient, easy-to-use controls.
Powering the new Triton is a 2.4-litre MIVEC turbo diesel – with a variable geometry turbocharger. This is actually a new and modern engine as far as pick-up trucks go. Mitsubishi Motors made the introduction of this power unit into the market slow and steady, bringing this 4B12 engine into the Malaysian market late towards the end of the previous Triton’s model run. It has proven to be extremely reliable and carries on serving in the all-new Triton that was shown in 2018.
The 4B12 engine was engineered to have better fuel efficiency than ever before. To do this, a number of things were redesigned from scratch. MIVEC technology was used in this engine on both the intake and exhaust valves. Along with advanced common-rail direct fuel injection that creates an ultra-fine microdroplet spray, the engine is able to squeeze out an incredible amount of energy from diesel.
Other parts of the engine design have been optimised for better overall efficiency too. The water pump now has a high-efficiency plastic impeller that uses less energy and does more work than before. The engine also uses low viscosity 0W-20 oil, which reduces internal friction. To lighten up the entire motor AND strengthen it, the block was constructed from cast aluminium. Other parts, like the exhaust manifold, use stainless steel.
But a tough pick-up truck that’s no fun is… well, no fun. That’s why Mitsubishi Motors made it a point to give Triton’s 2.4-litre engine a little more pep than you might expect. It produces 178 hp and 430Nm of torque – a lot more than other engines of this size. This boost in power comes from its variable geometry turbocharger as well as those other optimised parts in the engine bay. By creating a more refined powertrain, more power gets put down to the ground than turned into wasted noise, vibration and heat.
What’s best of all is that Mitsubishi Motors are so confident of their engineering work on the Triton that they provide the longest warranty of any pick-up truck in Malaysia. The warranty limit has a mileage cap of 200,000km, where 150,000km or less is offered by their competition. This gives owners the peace-of-mind to enjoy the truck as much as they like throughout ownership without worry.
