i Miev Van Draws Closer – But Will It Pay?

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A while ago, I wrote about the imminent release of the all-electric i Miev (pronounced “i meeve”), due in the UK in 2010. UK motoring publications have now been allowed to test the electric i Miev in car format – here are a couple of examples:

I also mentioned two further i Miev related possibilities:

  1. It may be made under licence in Europe by PSA and sold under the Peugeot and Citroen brands
  2. It will also be available as a van in the UK in 2011

I don’t know if volume production in Europe by the PSA group might bring down the i Miev’s estimated £17-£20,000 price tag (for the car version), blamed on the poor yen-sterling exchange rate (the i Miev’s made in Japan).

It’s also possible that for a van used exclusively in London, the extra cost of purchasing the i Miev might be cancelled out by having zero road tax, congestion charge or MOT costs and much lower fuel bills – Mitsubishi estimate that the i Miev will only cost 45p/100 miles to run. I don’t have the figures but instinct says that the loss of a diesel bill might be enough to make the whole life costs roughly equal – although resale value could be a big unknown.

Even in a best-case scenario, the i Miev still only looks useful to niche, city-only markets and drivers who don’t do more than 70-80 miles a day and can hookup their cars or vans to mains electricty every night.

(Thanks to SimpleMotoring.co.uk and CarHirePlace.com for the road test links.)

LDV In Trouble As Vauxhall Launches Van Cashback Deal

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LDV Needs £25m Government Loan To Survive

Today brings news that the mystery automotive factory threatened with closure is in fact the Russian-backed tentative success story that is LDV.

Although its Maxus van appears to have been a success (indeed, LDV has just won an £11m contract to supply Maxus-based vehicles to the Jewson and Graham chains of builders merchants), LDV is in trouble and in need of government support.

According to today’s Guardian, LDV is in need of a £25m loan from the government if it is to survive. Apparently, LDV’s Russian owner, Oleg Deripaska, has been hit hard by the credit crunch and cannot finance the van maker. The short-term, emergency loan is needed to fund a management buy-out of the company, aimed at turning it into Europe’s first green van firm. Not sure what that means.

Update 1830 23/02/09: The government has ruled out a taxpayer-funded rescue for LDV, leaving its future somewhat uncertain and up to 6,000 jobs at risk. The Times has the latest update.

Vauxhall Offers 5% Cashback to New Van Customers

As LDV hits the buffers, Vauxhall has come up with a rather novel way to encourage people to start buying new vans.

The company is offering van buyers who put down a 20% deposit on new vans a cheque back for 5% of the total amount financed (i.e. a maximum of 4% of the purchase price). Although cashback deals aren’t new in the automotive world, the scale of this offer is larger than usual and reflects Vauxhall’s desperate need to start shifting new vans – even if they don’t make much money on them.

In this, however, they are no different to most car manufacturers – who collectively have around 500,000 unsold new vehicles sitting around in Europe at present. At least Vauxhall are trying to do something about it – although I suspect that used vehicles will continue to be more attractive to many buyers, as the UK’s vehicle auctioneers are finding.

Great Van Hire Deals from Sixt

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Need to hire a van between now and the end of February?

Check out these 3 great van hire offers from Sixt:

1. Daily Van Hire Special

Rent a Ford Transit from just £45 per day (unlimited mileage)

2. Weekend Van Hire Special

This deal is perfect for anyone moving house:

  • 3 days for the price of 2
  • Ford Transit XLWB Jumbo or similar van – they’re huge inside!
  • From just £114 for the whole weekend, including unlimited mileage

3. Week Van Hire Special

Rent a small van such as the Volkswagen Caddy for a whole week (Mon-Fri) from just £172 per week.

These rates are usually internet-only deals, so why not visit Sixt’s website now for an instant, no-strings quote?

Electric Bin Van Powered By Its Own Garbage!

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kirklees-electric-vanHuddersfield-based Kirklees Council has just become the organisation to run a van powered by the waste it collects!

The van, a Smith Electric Vehicles Ford Transit, is completely electric and is being used to collect garbage from a number of rubbish bins in the Huddersfield town centre area.

This rubbish is then taken to the council’s Energy from Waste plant at Emerald Street, Huddersfield, where it is converted into electricity.

The electricity generated by the Emerald Street EfW plant is then used to charge the electric van overnight – completing the circle and creating a zero emission vehicle.

New Van News – Ford & Kia Introduce New Models

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Ford Transit Connect Hits US Shores

Ford has been promising the Transit Connect van to the US market for some time. It looks like that time has now come.

The Transit Connect will go on sale in the US this summer with a starting price of around $21,000. It will have an optional second row of seats and extra windows, making it a viable people carrier as well as a useful small van. Needless to say, it will be powered by a petrol engine with an automatic gearbox, rather than the manual diesels favoured on this side of the Atlantic.

Ford has also confirmed that the Transit Connect will form the basis for Ford’s promised electric van, due to market in 2010. This seems likely to be based on Smith Electric Vehicles’ existing Transit Connect model, the Ampere.

For full details and photos, click here for the AutoblogGreen report.

Kia Introduces 4×4 Sorento Van Model

A rather more surprising vehicle introduction is the new van from Kia. Known for its good value cars and people carriers, the Sorento SUV has now been converted into a 4×4 van!

The Kia Sorento XE-C is still identifiably a 4WD passenger vehicle but has been modified to remove the rear seats and provide a reasonably large load area.

One downside is that it still retains passenger-style rear doors – which are not a patch on van-style sliding doors when it comes to accessibility. That said, it’s a niche vehicle for a niche market and should benefit from Kia’s usual competitive prices and reliable build quality.

You can read an early review of the Sorento XE-C here, in the Scotsman.

Job Losses and Short Time For UK Van Factories

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Falling van sales across Europe mean that the UK’s two largest van factories are cutting back on manpower.

Ford has taken the difficult decision to cut 500 jobs at its Southampton factory. The plant, which makes the Transit van, as recently moved from running a double day shift to a single day shift, but as I reported here the company’s original intention was to manage this transition by cutting working hours, rather than jobs. Perhaps this was always a little too optimistic…

Ford are struggling with falling global sales – last year, the Southampton factory only produced 66,000 Transits – against almost 75,000 in 2007. This year’s total may be even lower – with export markets all over Europe suffering a downturn.

Vauxhall are also experiencing falling demand for their hugely-popular Vivaro van. Workers at the GM plant in Luton, where the vans are made, have had their working hours cut from 38 to 34 hours per week, although no job losses have been announced as yet.

Snow Driving – Essential Tips

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Driving in the snow is not something that most of us have much experience at.

Here are a few tips for anyone renting a van in the next few days who may need to drive in the snow:

  • Take it easy – steer, accelerate and brake much more gently and slowly than usual
  • You may need up to 10 times your normal braking distance to come to a safe halt
  • Drive in the lowest gear possible – if you set off in 1st gear, shift up to 2nd as soon as you are moving
  • If you start to skid, take your foot off the brake/accelerator and steer gently into the skid – don’t brake or accelerate hard to try and drive out of it
  • Make sure you have plenty of fuel, warm clothes and perhaps a drink and sugary snack with you. You may get stuck, break down or have to take a long diversion and the cold is your enemy in these cases.
  • Remember that if you break down you should get out of your vehicle to wait for assistance – you will need a warm coat.
  • Make sure all of your windows are cleared of condensation, ice and snow before you set off. Allow plenty of time so you won’t feel tempted to try and rush.
  • Make sure your windscreen washer bottle if full and has plenty of anti-freeze in it
  • The compacted snow in other vehicle’s tyre tracks is more likely to be icy – fresh snow often gives better grip
  • Put a shovel in your van if you have one – it will enable you to clear the snow from around your wheels if you get stuck.

Take care out there – most collisions are preventable and are the result of driving errors, even in this bad weather.

For the latest traffic information, visit the Highways Agency Traffic Information website.

Van Hire in Dublin & Cork

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easyVan at Silverstone with StelioseasyVan has just opened three new branches in Ireland – in Dublin and Cork.

easyVan is one of the most popular and fast growing van rental businesses in the UK. Its van hire broker business has proved remarkably successful, taking advantage of Northgate and other rental companies’ established branch networks to build a retail-focused, 160-branch van hire offering.

easyVan has now expanded further with two new branches in Dublin and Cork. The move into the Republic of Ireland means that easyVan’s reliable and affordable service is now available outside the UK.

The two new locations are:

  • Dublin: 38, Rosemount Business Park, Ballycoolin
  • Cork: Advance Pitstop, Little Island and Advance Pitstop, Togher Industrial Estate

We’re working on a way of expanding our van hire directory to include Ireland as well as the UK – until that happens, you can get quotes for these new locations by going directly to easyVan’s website.

Update: We’ve now added both Dublin and Cork to our van hire locations database. You can find branches in the Dublin and Cork area by searching for van hire at those locations or you can visit the location pages for these cities:

More New Van Deals

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Hot on the heels of Renault’s recent National Van Week, two more major van manufacturers have launched new van marketing programs to try and entice small business customers to buy new vans.

Peugeot has launched its own ‘Van Week’ – running from 2nd-8th February. According to April Harris, Peugeot’s UK LCV Product Manager, “Van Week is the ideal opportunity for our customers to take a look at the award winning Peugeot LCV line-up.”

Peugeot’s line up of vans includes the award-winning Bipper, which has been awarded both the What Van? ‘Van of the Year’ title and the International Van of the Year 2009 titles. It’s a city-sized van that is designed to make light work of tight city environments while retaining an impressive payload and loadspace.

Volkswagen, meanwhile, is offering new van customers 3-year, fixed-price service plans on all van models, including the Transporter-based Caravelle and California models. The deals start from just £295 and are available until 31st March, 2009.

Any retail or business customer* purchasing a new van before 31st March 2009 is eligible for the deals and there are a choice of mileage bands, ranging from 45,000 to 90,000.

*maximum fleet size of 25

Staffordshire Fire Service Finds Sprinters Highly Effective

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The last year has seen several fire and rescue services around the UK take delivery of specially-equipped Mercedes Sprinter vans.

My local fire station (in North Yorkshire) has one, and Staffordshire Fire & Rescue service has recently taken delivery of two further Targeted Response Vehicles (TRV), as they are known.

Mercedes Sprinter TRV
Mercedes Sprinter TRV

The vehicles carry 800 litres of water and are specially equipped to deal with small fires such as grass and bin fires.

According to Staffordshire Fire & Rescue Service Chief Fire Officer Peter Dartford, the TRVs have been extremely successful at dealing with such incidents. “Unfortunately a large proportion of fires we attend to now are small, deliberately started fires – this new vehicle has been purposely designed to deal with these types of incidents, particularly as it can get to areas where a normal fire appliance wouldn’t be able to access.”

These latest two vehicles were ordered following the success of Staffordshire’s first TRV, based at Stoke-on-Trent which dealt with 346 incidents during its first six months in service, in 2007. This freed up larger, traditional fire appliances to attend more serious incidents and improved the fire service’s ability to access difficult or remote locations.

Update: Avon Fire & Rescue Service are also using Mercedes Sprinters – but in a completely different way, creating smaller conventional fire appliances from crew-cabbed Sprinter chassis with custom-built bodies. Click here for the full story.