SA Road Tests

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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.
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We get nostalgic in the 2012 JMC Boarding 4x4 double-cab

Pics supplied

Cloned with permission

Published in The Witness Motoring on Wednesday December 5, 2012

Copy watchers will grin happily and say: “Oh, another Chinese knock-off of an old KB.” They would be partly right because there is a lot of Isuzu DNA in this pickup, both in styling and the slightly uprated version of the KB280 diesel motor we last saw in the early 2000s.

A spokesperson put it this way: “Yes, there is a lot of Isuzu in our products. The difference is that we have permission.” By that he meant that the Japanese company owns a large block of shares in JMC, with another smaller slice funded by Ford, and both companies contribute technical expertise.

A buddy owns a 1998 KB280 double-cab that he uses regularly to tow his boat to Zambia and back, visiting the family spread on the lesser-known bank of Kariba. We asked him for input. His eyes lit up as he recognised manually lockable front hubs, manually selectable high and low range, the familiar steering wheel and internal layout and everything in the engine compartment. The back seat area didn’t feel quite as he remembered it although he admitted that he is usually driving. He also reckoned that the JMC felt a little “bouncier” than his KB when the road gets rough. And the engine is noisier, he said, because his Isuzu has a double-insulated tappet cover to smother the clatter.

True to its old-timer roots, this one does without ABS brakes, airbags and ESP although it does give you powered windows and mirrors, air conditioning and a radio with CD player.  Included are leather upholstery, alloy wheels with practical, 75-profile Maxxis M+S tyres, a rubberised bin, reverse radar and side steps labelled BaoDian. That’s its Chinese model name that was anglicised to Boarding so we round-eyes could pronounce it.

Practical features include vinyl covering for the floors, sufficient storage, hard plastic panels on dash and doors, and wipers, indicator stalk and parking brake lever sited for rhd. The last item is possibly a bit closer than we usually expect, but usable.

As can be expected of an 85-kW diesel in modern surroundings, performance would best be described as “slow and steady,” giving X-series BMWs nothing to fear. The five-speed manual gearbox is positive but not racy and nicely spaced pedals include a rest for the clutch foot. First and third gears are a bit of a reach, but fifth and the even numbers are easier to get to. Gearing is certainly higher than on the all-commercial Loading model, turning over at about 3300 rpm in top at 120.

The test period was short, so there wasn’t time to take it out into the boonies, but we presume that it would be as capable as its Japanese twin in that respect. On a normal dirt road, it was more comfortable than many other pickups but not like a modern monocoque SUV - just like an Isuzu, in fact.

Buddy naturally wanted to know, “how much?” We told him and added that a new KB250 with equal power would cost almost R180 000 more. “I’d buy it,” he grinned, “and the main reason is that if it should break down in some place beginning with Z, I could fix it with my Leatherman.”

Test vehicle supplied by JMC Pietermaritzburg

Our review of the 2016 JMC Vigus 2.4 TDCi is here

The numbers
Price: R195 466
Engine: 2771 cc, four-cylinder, direct injection, turbodiesel
Power: 85 kW at 3600 rpm
Torque: 235 Nm at 2300 rpm
Zero to 100 km/h: Somewhere around 19 seconds
Maximum speed: About 140 km/h
Estimated real life fuel consumption: ’Round about 11,5 l/100 km
Tank: 53 litres
Payload: 916 kg
Ground clearance: 220 mm
Warranty: 3 years/100 000 km; with roadside assistance
Service plans: Optional

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 they can see 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!

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