Toyota drops caravan onto new Hilux in Top Gear tribute test
By William Fletcher MBE, Chief Executive Officer, New Reg Limited
Toyota has recreated a famous Top Gear destruction test by dropping a caravan onto the latest Hilux, this time an electric version.
Toyota has marked more than two decades since its Hilux became a television legend by subjecting the newest version of the pickup to the same kind of punishment, dropping a caravan onto it to see whether the truck's reputation for toughness still holds.
The original test took place on Top Gear roughly 23 years ago and became one of the most widely remembered sequences in British motoring television. Producers subjected a Hilux to a series of increasingly extreme attempts at destruction, and the truck kept running. The clip has remained a reference point in conversations about pickup durability ever since.
What makes the latest recreation notable is that Toyota chose to use the electric Hilux for the test rather than the conventional diesel version. According to multiple reports, the company is deliberately carrying the stunt into what it describes as a new era for the nameplate, using the same broad formula of caravan-meets-pickup to make a point about the electric model's structural integrity.
No detailed technical results or damage assessments have been published alongside the reports at this stage. What is clear is that Toyota used the stunt as a deliberate piece of communications around the electric Hilux, linking the new model directly to the reputation built by its predecessor on prime-time television more than two decades ago.