SA Road Tests

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This is the home of automobile road tests in South Africa. I drive South African cars, SUVs and LCVs under real-world South African conditions. Most, but not all, the vehicles driven are world cars as well, so what you read here possibly applies to the models you get where you live.

My most recent drive is on the home page. Archived reviews and opinion pieces are in the active menu down the left side. Hover your cursor over a heading or manufacturer's name and follow the drop-down.


Review: 2015 Mercedes-Benz V 250 BlueTec Avantgarde

Most V-ersatile

Posted: 21 August 2015

The numbers
Price: R987 992 with standard CO2 tax
Engine: M-B OM 651 DE 22 LA, 2143 cc, four-cylinder, turbodiesel
Power: 140 kW at 3800 rpm
Torque: 440 Nm between 1400 and 2400 rpm
During overboost: 150 kW / 480 Nm
Zero to 100 km/h: 9.1 seconds
Maximum speed: 206 km/h
Real life fuel consumption: About 7.9 l/100 km
Tank: 70 litres
Luggage: 1030 litres
Warranty and maintenance: 6 years / 100 000 km

Whereas Mercedes-Benz’s Viano was basically a jazzed-up Vito workhorse its descendant, the new V-class, is a lot more carlike. It’s now marketed as a passenger vehicle rather than as a commercial.

This third generation V-Class was launched overseas in 2014 as a full size MPV and marketed as Viano’s successor rather than as an upgrade. Sales commenced in Germany that May, European sales began a month later and its South African release followed in June 2015.

The new vehicle is plusher and upgraded with C-Class passenger car goodies that turn it into, effectively, a tall sedan with sliding doors and flexible seating. You can still fit plush seats that can be turned to face each other, albeit with some sweating and grunting, and neat accessories like work tables for office activities or conferences in transit. If you feel so inclined, you may whip out some, or all, of the second and third row seats to turn it into a panel van with windows, or fit tie-down rings into the seat rails - to stand a couple of recreational bicycles upright.

The range consists of five models, all diesels: V 200- and 220 CDI Standard, a fairly plain V 250 BlueTec, V 220 CDI Avantgarde and V 250 BlueTec Avantgarde.

The standard internal configuration gives you seven seats. That’s the pair up front, two (reversible) singles for the second row and a line of three (two plus one) for the third. An optional pop-up island with lift-out work surfaces, like those on the front chairs in an aeroplane, and extra cup holders, can be fitted between the pair of second-row singles. Or you could substitute two singles for the third row and add a second work island. The final alternative is to spec’ it as an eight-seat shuttle or tourist bus with the standard front pair and two rows of three.

For more details, including its “tour guide” feature, see our launch report here:

Our review vehicle was a seven-seat, top-of-range, V 250 BlueTec in Avantgarde trim with 7G-Tronic Plus gearbox and Agility Select – that’s four driving modes; Eco, Comfort, Sport and Manual. The P-R-N-D selector is a short wand on the steering column and manual gear selection, if desired, is by means of paddles behind the wheel.

Performance, interior sound levels and overtaking ability were all perfectly satisfactory for this size and class of vehicle. But you can’t get away from the fact that it’s big, wide and tall. It would probably be best to keep your boy racer aspirations for when you’re driving something smaller and tauter. This is a bus for ferrying rock stars, business people and tourists; not a pocket rocket.

Its C-class-style equipment includes high end safety kit and electronics such as blind spot monitoring, lane-keeping aid and reversing camera, but the best feature of all is its parking assistant. Once you have cruised past, stopped and agreed to accept the car’s choice of suitable spot, selected reverse and given the accelerator pedal an initial nudge, the rest is all automatic – hands and feet off steering wheel, pedals and gear lever – this car does it all. It’s magical; an amazing preventer of grey hairs and elevated blood pressure, and almost indispensable, because the “V” is huge at over five metres long, 1.9 wide and 1.875 high.

A selection of optional packages allow one to set up the basic “V” as your choice of family transporter, executive shuttle or sports bus, but the Avantgarde package covers most “essentials.” Beyond adding work islands and refrigerator if the objective is as rolling executive conference centre, you shouldn’t really need much else because standard kit includes extra air conditioning outlets and all the recharging points you are likely to want.
 
While on the subject of executive seating, the conference setup requires that conferees be really close friends because space for legs and feet is limited. Second row chairs can be slid back on their rails for some added space but that’s limited by how much legroom those in front need. The seatbacks eventually bump up against each other.

Although M-B tried hard to make it ultra-plush, a few reminders of its proletarian roots remain. The engine still sounds very diesel-like from the outside, its front chairs are rather hard and shorter under the thighs than we would expect in a car at this price level and the head restraints on the rearmost seats block one’s view out through the back window. They need to be able to slide down further or fold away.

While even the basic “V” is very luxurious and adaptable, a vast selection of options and accessories can turn it into possibly the most V-ersatile family, sport, business or executive machine of all.

Test unit from MBSA press fleet



What We Do

This is a one-man show, which means that every car reviewed is given my personal evaluation and receives my own seat of the pants judgement - no second hand input here.
Every test car goes through real world driving; on city streets littered with potholes, speed bumps and rumble strips, on freeways and if its profile demands, dirt roads as well.

I do my best to include relevant information like real life fuel economy or a close mathematical calculation, boot size or luggage space, whether the space is both usable and accessible, whether life-sized people can use the back seat (where that applies), basic specs of the vehicle and performance figures if they are published. In the case of clearly identified launch reports, fuel figures are of necessity the laboratory numbers provided with the release material. If I ever place an article that doesn't cover most things, it's probably because I have dealt with that vehicle at least once already, so you will be able to find what you want in another report under the same manufacturer's heading in the menu on the left.

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.

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