Mighty Cultus

Second generation of Suzuki Cultus was introduced in 1988 worldwide and the last region (other than Pakistan) was Europe where it was sold till 2003 under the name of Subaru Justy. The car we know as Suzuki Cultus is known by many pseudonyms. While Europe knows it as Suburu Justy, Canadians know it as Pontiac Firefly, Americans prefer to call it Chevrolet Metro / Geo Metro but our Australian mates say Holden Barina when they see it. Japanese (who also call it Suzuki Cultus) discontinued the 5 door hatchback in 1998 where everyone else stopped its production in 1994. However Cultus took some time to reach the shores of Pakistan which is totally understandable considering the small 1.0 liter 3 cylinder engine has its own limitations.

Pak Suzuki introduced Cultus in Pakistan in the year 2000, yes 2000 when most of the world had already forgotten this car we received it as a new and one of our own. Even today after 15 years of the car being introduced locally and 21 years after most of the world stopped producing it we are still fortunate to be able to get a brand new Cultus for a little over 1 million rupees with minor cosmetic changes from the day it was first launched.

Cultus in Pakistan is powered by G10 engine which is Suzuki's 1.0 liter 3 cylinder engine introduced in the 80s however to meet the EuroII standards Cultus was blessed with a EFi engine setup by doing some modifications to the existing engine. Cultus is basically hatchback version of Suzuki Margalla, its the same car minus the boot. That would be a one line definition of Cultus in my opinion.

I personally don't like Cultus however it is considered as some kind of a symbol among masses, I don't know what that symbol is called (sorry for my ignorance) but people take pride if they are able to own a Cultus. It is supposed to make some kind of a success statement, people perceive you're doing okay in life if you're able to afford a Cultus. I disagree to this but then who am I to oppose the masses.

Whenever I hear about a Cultus I think of only one problem which is pretty common in all the Cultuses i.e. a faulty fuel pump. You see the design of Cultus has the fuel pump inside the fuel tank which means with our substandard fuel the fault comes quite often however if you're not OEM crazy the issue can be cured if your mechanic does some minor adjustments to the setup and put a fuel pump outside of the fuel tank (the fuel pump of another car is used and not of Cultus).

Suzuki Cultus in its era has received 5 different face-lifts (to date) all of them were minor and cosmetic. 

When Cultus came out in 2000 it was offered with a 2 spoke steering wheel & all plain & simple interior, the front indicator lights were also orange colored. At that time you could pick a Cultus in color options of white, sky blue, black, silver, maroon, grey, golden & green and it was offered in VX (non AC version) and VXR (with factory fitted AC). Later the option of opting for a factory fitted CNG was also offered. Around 2002 Cultus VXL was launched which was their power pack version, it had Power Steering, Factory Fitted Alloy Rims, Power Windows & Central Locking as factory fitted. Later the non AC non painted bumpers version VX was also discontinued to maintain Cultus as a "premium car".

Then in 2004 Cultus received its first face-lift, this time the steering wheel was replaced with a three spoke one (which is there to date) and white colored speedometer dials were also replaced with the old ones. In Exterior Cultus' orange indicator lights at the front were also replaced by the clear lens lights, all the old variants were continued in this facelift however bottle green was replaced by teal color.

In 2005 the bumpers of Cultus were replaced with the ones we have today as well as Eminent Blue color was also introduced in 2006 during the regime of same new bumper while golden was discontinued along with sky blue.

The year 2007 was a new time for Cultus, a lot was upgraded, it is then that VXR became VXRi & VXL became VXLi and the added "i" was only there because Cultus was now equipped with EFi engine to fight every enemy. The color "cool beige" was also made available in Cultus.

The current face-lift of Cultus came out in around 2012, my personal opinion is that some minibus driver designed the lights this time, the excess of chrome makes it look cheap and hideous to me, Factory fitted CNG was discontinued on the instructions of Government due to lack of CNG and so was VXLi, Today Cultus is offered in Grey, White, Silver & Maroon and the only option of buying Cultus is of VXRi, as per the instructions of Government all cars are now Euro II compliance (minimum) which Cultus proudly displays on its back . I pray Pak Suzuki upgrades Cultus soon but till they do that we are left with that they want to offer us.

Just One Guy's Opinion

OA

#Suburu #Justy #Pontiac #Firefly #Chevrolet #Geo #Metro #Holden #Barina #cars #karachi #lahore #islamabad #rawalpindi #peshawar #suzuki #cultus #margalla #pakistan