Skoda builds a pickup truck - that you can't pick up!

Skoda has built a car that you would expect to be something of a slam-dunk in terms of sales, given the ever-increasing market around the world for medium-sized pickups — a pickup truck based on the Kodiaq, called the Mountiaq.

Sadly, for now at any rate, the Mountiaq is not going to go on sale. It’s actually a student project, created by apprentices at the Skoda Vocational School in Mlada Boleslav, Skoda’s home town in the Czech Republic.

35 Skoda students, studying seven different disciplines, worked on the Mountiaq, a project which occupied more than 2,000 hours over eight months.

Although dimensionally it’s similar to the standard model, the most obvious difference is the removal of the rear bodywork to create a load bed and a two-seat cab. The car’s ground clearance has also been increased, by ten centimetres, to a full 29 centimetres, to give it some serious off-roading ability.

Lightweight 17 inch Rockstar wheels with off-roading tyres have also been fitted. Power comes from a standard 2.0 litre 190hp TSI turbo petrol engine.

At the front, the Mountiaq looks properly heavy-duty, with a nudge bar and a chunky winch. The car is also festooned with lights — the load bay is illuminated, as is the engine bay, and there’s an ultra-bright LED light bar mounted to the roof (because, presumably, people like to off-road at night?).

The Mountiaq’s radiator grille, and Skoda badge on the bonnet also feature lighting effects, and there are lights in the doors which project a Skoda logo onto the ground when activated. The eye-searing colour? It’s called Sunset Orange and it’s a paint finish developed specially by the students. All of that is topped off by a snorkel for the air intake, and a chunky roll-over bar in the load bay.

Inside, there are even more lights including a backlit Skoda logo stitched into the rooflining, as well as an integrated fridge, and two built-in walkie-talkies. Skoda has a reputation for adding small, useful touches to its cars and the Mountiaq is no different, incorporating a neat funnel to help when filling up the windscreen washer reservoir.

Shame about the no sales thing, but there might be hope for a Skoda pickup in the future. Volkswagen has already confirmed that it will spin two new medium pickups — the Tarok and Tanoak — from the MQB chassis and platform that undeprins the Kodiaq.

If the public reception for the Mountiaq is good enough, then there’s every chance of a Skoda-badged version of one or other of those.

Carsten Brandes, Head of the Skoda Academy, said: “Like its predecessor models, the Skoda Mountiaq highlights the exceptional technical competence and craftsmanship of our students. Year after year, their work demonstrates the superior quality of the professional training at our vocational school.”