Citroën Berlingo — June 2008

Date: Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Standard equipment includes a driver's airbag and height-adjustable seat, a stereo radio/CD player, electric front windows, central locking, door mirrors that can be adjusted from within the cab and a trip computer. Upgrade to LX trim and you additionally benefit from remote central locking, electrically adjustable and heated exterior mirrors and an external temperature sensor.

Tyre pressure sensors are on the extra-cost options list, as is air conditioning and Electronic Stability Programme complete with a hill start package. It allows you to pull away on a 5 gradient fully-laden without the worry that you'll roll backwards.

Anybody who has to make periodic forays off-road in conditions that don't really justify acquiring a 4x4 is likely to be interested in the optional All-Road pack. It includes additional protection beneath the vehicle to make damage less likely if you wallop the odd boulder, and bigger tyres.

Sat Nav

New Berlingo is debuting with Trafficmaster Smartnav satellite navigation and stolen vehicle tracking as standard on virtually all models. That's a first for a vehicle of its size and a welcome initiative given that some police forces appear to be treating vehicle crime as a pastime rather than an offence.

Three years worth of Active Traffic Management is included with the sat nav package. It automatically re-routes you if the road ahead is clogged and is without doubt a valuable asset; Citroen deserves high praise for making it available.

In mainland Europe Berlingo is being offered with a navigation system called My Way and with a telematics-based fleet management service that allows operators to monitor vehicle speed, fuel consumption and so on remotely. It will be coming to the UK in 2010, but at present its application appears to be limited solely to PSA Peugeot Citroen products, and not all of those products at that; a drawback if you run a multi-make fleet.

Peugeot and Citroen are of course sister companies and the former markets a vehicle that's virtually identical to Berlingo apart from the badges under the Partner banner.

The 1.6 diesel is on a 12,500 mile/two year service interval and the cam belt only needs swapping every 150,000 miles/10 years. The petrol lump has to be serviced once every 20,000 miles/two years.

On the Road

We went over to France and took to the highways just outside Paris to sample an L1 Berlingo powered by the higher output diesel and fitted with an Extenso package.

With lots of head, leg and shoulder room for the driver, the initial impression the cab creates is that of a pleasant working environment and there's ample space for all the oddments van users like to carry around with them.

Our van featured a small and a large bin in each door the bigger bin has a moulding that will hold a bottle of water a lidded glovebox and a lidded compartment built into the top of the dashboard in front of the steering wheel. In addition there was an open shelf on top of the facia in front of the outboard passenger plus shelves above the windscreen and round cubby holes on each side of the heating and ventilation controls.

There's even a curry hook so that you've got somewhere to hang a late night bag of curry and poppadums.

While the extra room that can be created by making use of Extenso has to be welcomed, and the outboard passenger seat is comfortable, we heartily loathed the middle seat.

It offers zero legroom and you sit way too close to both the driver and passenger for anybody's comfort. Matters aren't helped either by the way in which the gearstick emerges from a moulding that bulges out from the centre of the dashboard, stealing even more space from piggy-in-the-middle.

PSA Peugeot Citroen states that the seat is only really suitable for a short trip of no more than 20 minutes. If your boss thinks so little of you that he expects you to use it for 20 seconds, never mind minutes, then look for another job.

It's a perch with a saving grace, however. Fold the back flat and you can use it as a desk so that you can complete paperwork. The seat has a further advantage in that it hides a roomy storage bin. That's a good idea because it allows you to conceal from the light-fingered items you'd rather didn't vanish.

In a two-seater Berlingo the passenger seat can be folded flat to create a desk complete with a pair of cup-holders.

When we flipped open our van's back doors we were greeted by half-a-dozen load tie-down points and a compartment that contains a removable, rechargeable, torch.

Providing users with an easily accessible torch that doubles as an extra load area light must have seemed like a great wheeze in the design studio. In theory it is, but in practice it's likely to be lost, damaged or stolen within the first six months of the van's ownership. Fortunately a fixed cargo bay light is provided too.

To prevent minor dents and scrapes causing damage, the cargo box is protected by panelling up to the waist rail. Externally it's good to see deep side rubbing strips defending the paintwork.

On the road the 90hp diesel is no slouch not with a modest 200kg load in the back anyway and we had no trouble whatsoever with the gearchange. Though a little on the soft side Berlingo's suspension seemed more than capable of dealing with any pot holes or ridges we encountered; not that there were all that many given that France's roads are so much better maintained than those in the UK.

Berlingo rolled slightly on corners and the steering felt a little spongy at times. Otherwise the handling was competent and noise levels, aside from some droning from the tyres, were well suppressed.

Our Berlingo was equipped with air conditioning and we had both it and the booster fan turned right up on one of the first warm days of the year. Both were effective, but a minor annoyance was the way in which the dashboard air vents gradually closed during the course of the trip.

Citroen's latest offering seems well put together. Nothing rattled or creaked and overall the standard of fit and finish was good.

It seems a pity though that Citroen's new van isn't on offer with the 110hp 1.6-litre diesel that we sampled in the MPV version. Fitted with a particulate trap, it's without doubt one of the best engines of its size we've ever sat behind.

Flexible and responsive, it offers bags of performance. Marry it to a six-speed 'box and Berlingo really would be a van to be reckoned with.

It seems a pity too that the new Berlingo cannot be specified with an automated manual gearbox given that one is on offer under the SensoDrive banner in Nemo, its baby brother. Such a 'box could be added to the line-up in the future, however, says Citroen.

While some operators will welcome the ability of Berlingo van's HDi engines to run on B30 biodiesel, the fuel's environmental credentials have come under heavy fire in recent months. Aware of the need to offer other alternative fuel solutions, the manufacturer has been working with a Continental converter to produce Berlingos that will run on compressed natural gas, although there is some doubt as to whether they will appear in the UK.

VERDICT

Slotting above Nemo and Berlingo First, but beneath Dispatch, Citroen's new Berlingo is a worthy addition to the range. Go check it out, but don't forget that your local Peugeot dealer offers virtually the same model. Play the one dealer off against the other and you could walk away with a bargain.