Fuso Canter FE71

Like on the outside, the interior cabin of the Fuso Canter FE71 manages to impress with the welcoming addition of a few modern-day design elements and comfort and convenience features, with the build quality ranking the best among commercial vehicles.

The four-spoke steering wheel, as well as rounded dials in the rectangular-shaped instrument console behind it, looks very car-like, and it is only the size of the steering wheel and panels surrounding the instrument console will make you remind that it belongs to the cabin of a commercial vehicle.

The overall dashboard carries a rectangular theme for the center console as well as a co-passenger side, the latter of which has an open as well as a closed glove box. The center console looks quite modern for a truck and features a 1-DIN music system as well as dials for the manual air conditioner. There are additional cup holders as well as small storage spaces in the cabin, including between the seats.

The Fuso Canter FE71 happens to be one of the better looking commercial trucks out there, with a design which looks contemporary and has a few modern design cues. However, it does get the boxy conventional stance of a light-duty truck.

The Fuso Canter FE71 has got a not-so-flat front design, with a large rectangular windscreen, that is slightly tilted and has minutely rounded edges. At the edges of the front windscreen, there are mounts for the large rearview mirrors, which are positioned slightly outwards, thus making the front profile of the Fuso Canter FE71 look quite wide.

There are sleek split horizontal air vents placed just below the windscreen, which are placed on the top of the large front apron. Talking of the front apron, it gets bold Fuso lettering spread across the width, below which there is a rounded trapezoidal grille. The grille gets a sleek chrome bar in the middle of it and a logo of its parent company Mitsubishi below the former.

The headlamps of the Fuso Canter FE71 are shaped in the form of trapezium too, with the upper border having a curved design. The halogen headlamp units also feature turn indicators integrated above them. The slim bumper at the bottom gets blacked-out portions of the width equal to that of the headlamps, with a long body-colored panel in the middle of the former.

When it comes to sides, the curved lining of the headlamps extends towards the side and forms a prominent character line flowing through the handlebars. The trapezoidal influence can be witnessed in the side windows as well, with the window waistline flowing steeply upwards, thus forming a sense of continuity on the side profile. 

The Fuso Canter FE71 feels sturdy on the go and has got good load carrying capacity, thanks to the rigid laminated leaf springs at both front and rear. The double-acting hydraulic telescopic shock absorbers perform their job well to absorb all the undulations but are tuned on the firmer side, which do make an impact on the ride quality by making it a bit stiff.

The Fuso Canter FE71 sources its power from a refined and reliable 3.0-liter inline-four diesel engine, which is paired here with a 5-speed manual gearbox. The engine feels decently powerful, with a maximum power output of 125 PS and a peak torque output of 294 Nm. For its size, the Fuso Canter FE71 feels powerful on the road, despite the fact that the performance outputs seem quite low on the paper.

For a commercial vehicle, the Fuso Canter FE71 gets a collapsible steering wheel, along with side impact beams which are strong enough to absorb the harshest of the impacts from the crashes on the sides. 

With a contemporary and practical design in and out, the Fuso Canter FE71 feels like a modern age commercial vehicle, which thanks to its Japanese routes, offers unquestionable reliability for its engine and other mechanicals as well.