it's shit

2 hours in and i've got really bad back ache around my shoulder blades

it doesn't like going round corners

the steering is wooden in the dead ahead position, then you try to turn and nothing happens, and then it's "wahey!" and you feel like it's about to topple over

the brakes, while good, feel like cardboard when youpress the pedal, and then you have to figure out when it's actually going to do some braking because it feels like you are lightly touching the brakes and you slow down a little, and then it's like you've slammed them on to do an emergency stop, so plenty jerky

who the fuck designed the dash? you can't get your tomtom stuck onto the screen where you want it because it's too bloody far away to reach the fooker

you need longer left arm/leg or shorter right arm/leg combo because the seat is piss poor and the steering wheel won't adjust

and i won't go on about why the bean counters decided they needed a poverty spec van with windee windows and not even a decent cup holder in the dash, and no steering wheel controls for the radio (that's shit too, looks like it's going to fall apart when you press the buttons) and not even going to bother with the fit and finish of the plastics and steering wheel (they look like they've been made to the same standards and using the same materials as my old mk2 cavalier)

so, basicly, if you want a van, even a poverty spec transit is much much better, and the shaggedout connect i went up to swap felt much nicer to drive, even with 100k on the clock, shagged suspension and a fucked steering rack

on the plus side, it's got a 6 speed gearbox and 6th is 30 mph/1000 rpm so it's supposed to be a good motorway cruiser, even though it was doing about 45 miles per bar on the fuel gauage

i think i'll stick with my sprinter thank you very much

 

Really mate, what did you expect before getting it?!

 

that they would have given the peole who actually have to live with the things a choice in what they were getting, like they did a few years ago when we had the toption of getting a vito, a transporter or a dispatch

 

Silly dreams....lies! LIES I TELL YOU!

 

well, monday it's getting a new windscreen as this ones broken

not going to be keeping it though, health and safety stuff, i can't drive it for long distances because it fucks my back up, 2 hours after getting out of it i'm still crippled with back pains

 

Course mate...

 

Must be something wrong with you dojj, my new 60 reg Vivaro is fine and ive done 600 miles in it since wednesday, exactly the same driving caratistics as my old 07 Renault Trafic.

Gotta be you mate.

 

bet you will be putting a new box in it within 6 months lol

 

A vivaro is a renault trafic! same as the primastar. The vivaro has all renault parts on it. Love my trafic goes well and comfortable (as far as vans go)

 

Their a Renault underneath I believe?then they will be shit,no match for a sprinter/transporter/transit etc.

 

If you have a look in the engine bay closely you can see renault on the coolent pipes and on the engine cover. We have a few at work. Tbh i think the tranny is a nicer van to drive.

 

when my 06 plate dispatch broke they got an 08 plave viaro, had 20k on the clock.

although a lot slower and doesnt handle as well, its a lot better to drive. i can adjust the steering colomb, and the seat lol

the radio is better than the citroen and its a lot bigger. its quieter to drive too. one thing that does annoy is that it only has 1 sliding door, on the passenger side lol.

on friday i left wood end at 7.30 and arrived near wembley at 10.30 - a distance of 17 miles in 3 fucking hours. got out fine, no pains etc! and the day before done less than 50 miles in 7 hours driving around london! although not all in 1 go.

the vivaro is ok, but gutless, and london traffic is fucking dog shit!

 

one thing going for the vivaro is the launch control lol. when stationry, foot on the floor it will rev to 2800rpm, then work the clutch and off you go lol

i can launch it pretty good now lol. just a shame that 10 meters down the road, whatever you pulled away from just out accelerates you, even 1.2 corsa's

 

ive driven 1, glad i have a transit

also put the satnav on the 1/4 window nice and low, less conspicuous to theiving cunts and close and not obstructing views

i keep mine there, leads better than screen mount, loop teh wire tho, dont want it getting tight hwen you open the door


if its that uncomforable get some cushions or summet, or stop moanin, either i guess, i'd get told to stop moaning if i did

 

we hired a vivaro an i thought they where ok to drive tbh. not as nice as my old transit but good enough

 

Just hope it doesn't catch fire like my mate's did then

 

rich, that doesnt look particually like its been on fire lol

queens square in bath no?

 

oh now lets see the transits never have a problem, my arse! only thing is a transit is a lot dearer to repair when they go wrong. Know of people who have had transits and now drive vivaros and trafics, that tell you something.

 

Lol at you lot who go from one shit van to another and then say it's better

Vitos, sprinters, connects, mk7 transits, and then dropped down to a vivaro

did a whole 46 miles in the sprinter in 12 hours the other day in London and got out feeling great because it's such a nice place to be as far as vans are concerned, same with the vitos, same with the connects, they handle so well out of the box and have plenty of poke and yet are narrow enough to slot in where cars can go, and then there is the transit, the nicest van I've driven for any length of time, everything is "just right" and it's gotthe best stereo of the bunch and even a iPod connection and more kit than the others apart from some of the higher spec sprinters we had a while back. I suppose I've been spoilt these past 6 years and now have to suffer for it.

Still, being the boss I can give it to one of the underlings so not all bad eh

 

vito is made in spain (badly) and rot like fuck plus then there is the "black death" injector problem that gets them all eventually plus they are crap to drive
sprinters are pretty good, nippy good longevity tho exspensive when they do eventually break
transits! well dont get me started they have become the biggest pile of shit ever! aside from the pump, dmf, starter motors, injectors, alt tensioners and timing chain faults they are plauged with they also happen to rot as badly if not worse than the older trannys. then to top it off the seating position is crap
now the vivaro/traffic imo is a good van, yes its french and you would expect it to break every 5 minutes but they dont ours at work is great it drives well is great on fuel, comfy, nippy and by far has the loudest set of standard speakers out of all of the vans lol! probably why i steal it from work all the time lol

 

6 years worth of vitos, 10 years worth of various sprinters, 5 years worth of connects and 3 year worth of transits and half a million miles in them

compared to 121 miles in a vivaro

would say otherwise

with the vito's we had issues with suspension, gear selectors and not a lot else
with the sprinters we didn't really have any issues
the connects go through tyres and driveshafts and had issues with the clutch slave cylinders
and the transits suffered from egr valves

out of several hundred vans over the years, i think i'm in a good position to have an onion, besides, no one else likes them either, the next "worst" vans we had were the previous shape vito's that were a bit crap whereas the hdi disptaches were very very quick for a van

one more thing, the gear selector is even worse than i remembered, it's like it's got some elesatic bands in the middle soemwhere

 

pfff my transit rocks, it is topspec mind leccy everythin, heated this and that etc, pisses on a viv and ive had it in for being stuck in 3/4th and the erg valve too, the viv went in for locks, stereo never has worked right since new, air con, loads, now its getting damaged thru neglect so it will get punted, only done 60 k and seats worn thru

deffo trannys can be trouble but vivs love eating engines, me mate just paid Ł1200 for a new lump and half way thru fitting it now needs injectors and alsorts, bill will be more than a newer better van!

nothing beats a topspec connect tho, they are nice (unless you are a passeneger and have to sit on that tray table they call a seat )

 

The Dojj van review

To sum up
Sprinters are the best
everything else is questionable and the eurovans are just plain rubish

 

but the sprinter is a bit too big to park up to be truely the best van

the transit also has a better turning circle than the connect

 

What vans do the AA use? They are driven 24 hrs a day and wont look good to be broken down. Renault traffic.

I bought my new trafic because im self employed and was paying for the van out of my own pocket(not company owned and thrashed) it was better value than other over priced vans. I put Ł80 of diesel in it and it returns 600 miles on the tank. That works out at 39/40 miles to the gallon. its a 27dci+ 115bhp . its horses for causes, how many fords,transporters, vitos or sprinters return them figures?

 

So what is the best, most economical medium sized van ?

VW ? Merc, Traffic ? Transit ? Fiat ?

 

my vito 111 would do 59 mpg at 60 mph on the motorway cruise so that's one, and with the fridge on it would do close to 35 mpg (this was before the fridges were hard wired to remain running with the engine*)

and even if you thrashed the pants off it on the motorway and reached the dizzying top speed of 112 mph, it would still do 24 mpg

lwb sprinter 313 never did more than 29 mpg no matter how you tried, but never did less than about 23 mpg no matter how hard you tried

the transit, driven sensibly, will do nearly 800 miles to a tank and 450 even around town

the dispatch hdi's did around 600 miles to a tank

the connects are a bit pants on fuel and will struggle to do 300 motorway miles

besides, if the aa vans break down they tend to get fixed properly and not on the side of the road

*these figures are based on years of experience with vans that are fitted with refridgeration units that poke out the top and about 4 to 5 inches worth of insulation that adds approx 300 kgs to the base weight of the van so the figures can be much much better

only one guy i know has a transporter and he paid a lot of money for it, but it was spec'd like a car dual climate control and all that bullshit that goes with it, but he's only had it for about a month so too soon to know what sort of shit it's going to give him

 

im just going off my experience of repairing all these vans on a daily basis tho dojj for well over ten years so whearas you have the experience of using them, i have the experience of fixing them!

 

not doubting the repairs fella, just saying that we work in london and so have to put up with more stop start traffic, more sitting in the same spot, more speed humps, pot holes, pedestrians, etc so our works vans suffer different problems to those in the rest of the country that do long distance stuff, so the issues are going to vary from city to city

 

There is only 1 reason to buy a Tragic/Vivaro/Primastar or a Bastard/Movano/Interbred and that is because they are cheap to buy. Once they have done 100k plus then they are scrap.....

The only way you can make one of those pieces of shit last is if you're an owner driver or keep the van allocated to 1 person only.

On average we spend 6k over 9 months on these vans (individual vans, 6k per van) repairing them.

 

Surely thats being a bit optimistic ? Is that an on board computer figure, or actual ?
What do they average at Ł

Ive a couple of small vans, which are very economical, but they wouldnt do 60mpg.

 

Some of you may know that i work on the vans for the royal mail. Tbh the trannys arnt that bad. The only boommm things that go wrong on them is the starters and the gearbox syncros wear. The van get driven really hard and get wrecked. We have a few trannys now with close to 200.000 on them and they are still going strong. Now dont mention the vauxhall combos lol.

 

Actual, none of this trip computer stuff, even though the transits got a ceil left range the the sprinters got an actual trip computer with all the kit in it

Real world brim to brim stuff when I know I've got a motorway trip to do and I don't have to hurry.

Tbh though you can't take that as an average for the van as it's the best I can get and the worst I've been able to achive so somewhere in the middle is more likely to be the norm.

Fuel consuptiomthough isnot the be all and end all of vans though, you've got to actually spend time in the vehicle over a few weeks before you take the plunge. With the transits, the rear lights are virtually impossible to change as the insulation gets in the way, and because it's open to the cold temratures the bulbs tend to popmore often

 

Just considering options for what is mostly small van work, although a slightly bigger could be handy at times.
Maybe 80k a year sort of thing, so fuel economy is quite important

 

the new transits are crap for seating postition, im only 6 foot but my left knee is against the centre consul which gets uncomfortable very quickly.

the dispatches i had, the 4th gear syncro was dead by 70k miles, but they were fast lol

only ever managed just over 500 miles to 80l of fuel in the dispatch, and in the vivaro to 80l of fuel, im getting no more than 550 lol

but i dont hang about as i dont pay the fuel, nor have time to fuck about driving like a fairy.

 

i like my dispatch ... even fully loaded it shifts quite nicely...
had 6 years of vitos before this and this is much more fun to drive .. and they corner well ...
even had some bloke fone my office and commend me on taking a corner ..
as he said to my boss ..
even i wouldn't have gone that fast in my golf gti im driving now ...

only did it as the knob was cutting everyone up jumping lanes .. thought i would show him how a real driver does it

 

Got another one, I didn't think they could get worse but they do

This ones got stereo controls by the steering wheel, but they are so close you bang your fingers off of them

And because the seating position is so shite, I've banged my head off the roof twice this morning and now my head hurts

 

i had me vivaro 2months before the box went 2000grand later .the brakes are crap but than there is racking fulla plumbing gear in the back ,good on motorways but thats it ,have get me a newer van soon

and you gota love the fact you have change the bearing an lot just to do the rear brake disc'z whats that all bout

 

[QUOTE=Fudgey;5077312]the new transits are crap for seating postition, im only 6 foot but my left knee is against the centre consul which gets uncomfortable very quickly [QUOTE]
You must be sat in a funny position cause about 6foot2 and ny knee is no where near the centreconsole/gearstick when ive driven them.

 

We had issues with a guy who was 6 foot 4 but, strangly, none with the guy who's 27 stone in a connect. I somehow doubt either are going to be capable of snuggling into a vivaro though

And the silly sods who've wired it up have taken the supply for some of the relays from the cigaret lighter fuse, so now you can't plug a charger into the socket toncharge anything up twats