SA Road Tests

Welcome

This is the home of automobile road tests in South Africa. We drive South African cars, SUVs and LCVs under South African conditions. It also just happens that most of the vehicles we drive are world cars as well, so what you read here probably applies to the models you can get at home.
*To read one of our road tests, just select from the menu on the left.
*Please remember too, that prices quoted were those ruling on the days I wrote the reports.


We try Great Wall's 2011 Steed5 4x2 diesel double-cab

This vehicle is called Wingle 5 in some markets

Pics supplied

Rugged daily transporter


Not everyone has limitless loot and  ability to spend amounts equivalent to small pension funds on individual vehicles. For many of us, just one family car is a fact of life so we have to choose something that does it all. At one end of the scale this might be a small car with a large boot and lots of versatility in the ways seats can be folded and tipped. Others need a family car that can also lug garden refuse to the dumpster or DIY stuff home from what will soon be the Walmart. If it can carry the tribe plus camping gear out to weekends away, that's great too.

Like everything else the second kind of family car, the double-cab pickup, can also cost a medium-sized ransom if one gets carried away with thoughts of 'new' and opulent options lists. The alternatives are to do without, buy second hand or look to other eastern alternatives; like behind the Bamboo Curtain.

Many Chinese makes have been offered here over the past few years but only a few survived the big recession. Already quite well established since March 2007 and with major industry muscle behind it, Great Wall Motors SA (GWM), has not just survived, but come out ahead of some long-established traditional players. The company boasts some 30 000 of its products on SA roads and is currently selling about 500 units a month. These are mostly little Florids and Coolbears but SUVs and pickups are making inroads too.

The latest and possibly most 'westernised' of these is a range of four Steed 5 pickups with 2.4 petrol and 2.5 diesel engines, available with either 4x2 or 4x4 drive trains. We tried the diesel 4x2 shortly after handing back the Steed 3 petrol version recently. Faces and bodies are very similar with a common wheelbase and track widths, but the Steed5 is 25 mm shorter, 80 mm wider and 55 mm taller. Ground clearance is 18 mm greater while approach and departure angles are a few degrees more 'interesting' from an off-road point of view. Suspension, tyre size and five-speed gearbox remain unchanged. Refinements and safety features not found on the 3-series are dual front airbags, automatic locking, ABS with EBD, and audio controls on the steering wheel that still adjusts for height only.

The most marked difference is in the way it goes because the legacy Japanese diesel is not the quickest horse in the paddock. Revs peak at 3400 rpm and the limiter makes sure you behave by kicking in at about 3800. As a result, you need to use the five-speed gearbox quite a lot in order to keep going. No figures appear to have been published, but we would estimate its top speed at around 140 - 145 km/h.  GWM's forthcoming in-house 2.0-litre, 110 kW/310 Nm diesel should make a huge difference. In the meantime an unofficial tweak involves substitution of the management chip, but speak to your dealer about possible warranty issues first.

Getting down to practicalities, the load bin is square, substantial and equipped with four lashing eyes inside and six attached to side rails on the outside. Cab protector? Of course. The convenient rear step bumper has fog lights incorporated, just as on the Steed 3. In the back seat your SA Standard tall passenger will find 'good' knee- and foot space, but 'just enough' headroom. The seat backs are very upright, probably contributing to this. He might also complain of rather narrow rear doorways and bump his head on the way in or out. Two seat belts and a pair of head restraints are provided. The wheel spanner and triangle are attached behind the seat back, while the jack and a useful fire extinguisher (common fitting on all GWM commercials) are stowed beneath the seat.

The office area caters for the chronically untidy with a pair of cup holders, a double-layered central box, four knick-knack trays, door storage with space for one-litre bottles and a decent glove box. There are two reading lamps in front and another at the back. Being a more modern vehicle, the Steed 5 panders to vanity with a single makeup mirror. The dash is similar to that on the Steed 3 with its black and dark silver hard plastic and very acceptable standard of fit and finish. Taking some getting used to, are foot pedals offset to the right.  This is awkward at first, but one adjusts.

Our overall impression is of a rugged and potentially long-lasting vehicle that should look after daily transportation and leisure needs of family and fleet users for years to come.

The numbers

Price: R199 990 (4x4 at R217 990)
Engine: 2499 cc common rail, direct injection, turbocharged diesel
Power: 80 kW at 3400 rpm
Torque: 300 Nm between 1800 and 2600 rpm
Performance figures from GWM China website:                                                               Zero to 100 km/h: "Under 20 seconds"                                                                         Maximum speed: 140 km/h                                                                                           Fuel economy according to SANS 20101: 8,2 l/100 km                                                   Tank: 70 litres                                                                                                         Ground clearance: 198 mm                                                                                     Approach and departure angles: 30/24 degrees                                                       Warranty: 3 years/100 000 km with 2 years' roadside assistance

To see a report on the 2012 2.0 diesel double cab 4x4, click here

What We Do

This is a one-man show, which means that road test cars entrusted to me are driven only by me. Some reviewers hand test cars over to their partners to use as day-to-day transport and barely experience them for themselves.

What this means to you is that every car reviewed is given my own personal evaluation and receives my own seat of the pants judgement - no second hand input here.
Every car goes through real world testing; on city streets littered with potholes, speed bumps and rumble strips, on freeways and if its profile demands, dirt roads as well.

My articles appear every Wednesday in the motoring pages of The Witness, South Africa's oldest continuously running newspaper, and occasionally on Saturdays in Weekend Witness as well. I drive eight to ten vehicles most months of the year (press cars are withdrawn over the festive season - wonder why?) so not everything gets published in the paper. Those that are, get a tagline but the rest is virgin, unpublished and unedited by the political-correctness police. Hope you like what you see, because there are no commercial interests at work here. As quite a few readers have found, I answer every serious enquiry from my home email address, with my phone numbers attached, so I do actually exist.

I am based in Pietermaritzburg, KZN, South Africa. This is the central hub of the KZN Midlands farming community; the place farmers go to buy their supplies and equipment, truck their goods to market, send their kids to school and go to kick back and relax.
So occasionally a cow, a goat or a horse may add a little local colour by finding its way into the story or one of the pictures. It's all part of the ambience!

Comments?
Want to ask a question, comment or just tell me you thoroughly disagree with what I say? That's your privilege, because if everybody agreed on everything, the world would be a boring place. All I ask is that you remain calm, so please blow off a little steam before venting too vigorously.