A Suzuki Vitara JX 3-door hardtop with black license plates, seen in 2014 on a car market in Beijing, capital of China. The good Suz’ was in a surprisingly good shape and appeared to be 100% original, up to the Dunlop GrandTrek AT2 tires. Only the paint was fading a little bit, it had a few scratches here and there, and the left-rear hubcap was missing. Not bad for such a fine old car.
Otherwise perfect.
The Vitara was available with a long list of petrol and diesel engines. The smallest engine was a 55hp 1.0 liter four-cylinder petrol, and the largest engine a rather advanced 134hp 2.0 V6 petrol. The best engine, considering weight and power, was probably the 95hp 1.6 four-cylinder petrol. This pretty white example in Beijing had a 80hp 1.6 petrol under the bonnet.
The famous black license plates were issued to foreign owned companies from the 1980’s to the mid 00’s. These companies could buy a car locally, or import one. There were no limits on the number of cars, or on price, or engine type. The numbering started at 京A·00001, and then up. So the lower the number the older the car. Any black plate beginning with 京A·0 or 京A·1 is considered ultra rare. I know, I had one too!
In the old days black-plated cars had some privileges comparable to diplomatic cars; no police officer would dare to stop them and they could basically park wherever they wanted without fear of a fine. Nowadays, a black-plated car is counted just like all the others. The government does not issue new black plates anymore but those who have one can keep it until eternity. Other Chinese cities, including Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Chengdu, had similar black plate license plate programs.
The first generation Suzuki Vitara, also known as the Suzuki Escudo or Suzuki Sidekick, was manufactured from 1988 until 1998. The first gen Vitara was never officially exported to China, but some arrived via diplomatic channels and some were, apparently, imported via the foreign owned company rule. Interestingly, there was some non-official and basically illegal local production under the infamous Guangdong-scheme.