Driving impressions

You've only got to look at the Iveco Daily to see it is different from most other panel vans on the roads.

It sits on a monster ladder chassis and looks like a cuckoo among the other sparrows in the LCV next.

This heavyweight build quality may have its advantages but it has its drawbacks too.

For example, Iveco’s salesmen are hardly likely to score a success among the types who deliver flowers, bread and feathers, so the firm’s sales expectations are limited to the big fleet hitters.

But in that area Iveco is buzzing.

In the first six months of the year, around 5,060 vans up to 3.5 tonnes were sold compared to 3,950 last year.

nd with the improvements for next year listed above, Iveco’s fleet sales story can only be enhanced.

I joined a party of journalists testing the new vehicles at Juan Les Pins in southern France and the terrain proved perfect to show off the Daily’s new-found muscles, with a good mix of fast autoroutes (which you have to pay to travel on) and narrow twisty mountain tracks.

I headed straight for the new 3.5-tonne 166bhp version, figuring that I might as well start at the top and work down.

And the first thing I noticed after firing up the powerplant was a great deal of nothing. But that was actually a good thing.

Whereas I had expected a meaty growl to go with that championship performance, all you hear in the cabin is a quiet thrum.

As we accelerated away and up to motorway speeds, my co-pilot and I were able to converse in hushed tones with ease.

With all that torque on offer, you can almost pick any gear at any speed – it didn’t seem to make a scrap of difference to this vehicle, even though it was three-quarters loaded.

In a fast hour-long thrash we simply left every other commercial vehicle on the roads standing, although whether or not that is a good thing for a fleet van to do is questionable.

Next up was the 136bhp version and I’d say this must be the fleet choice.

It may have felt a little more excitable than the more powerful unit but at 3.5 tonnes, there is never going to be any serious shortage of power, even on steep hills.

Maybe the 6.5-tonners will need the top engine but we didn’t have one of those to test.

I was eager to try out the Daily AGile for no other reason than that I had previously tested a Ford Transit DuraShift and a Mercedes-Benz SprintShift – both automatics – and had been left unimpressed by their jerky changes.

There were no such problems here. The AGile proved smooth and sure, if not entirely seamless.

The good news is that it is an ‘intelligent’ unit and can alter its change patterns to suit individual driving styles.

It also changes down as the driver decelerates, rather than going into idling mode as most automatics do.

Before getting our hands on the vans, the journalists present were shown a demonstration of the new ESP’s powers, with a stunt driver first performing a series of manoeuvres with the system switched off and then with it switched on.

The safety benefits of ESP are clear – the big problem will be that many penny-pinching fleets just won’t fork out the extra cash to keep their drivers safer.

The same problem will surely arise with the splendid automatic gearbox.

If I was a city-based delivery driver I would just love a van like this.

Whether my employer would buy me one is a different matter.