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The What Van? Road Test: Isuzu D-Max
Date: Monday, April 24, 2023
Ensuring that all the sophisticated safety devices increasingly found on panel vans are fitted may not be the first requirement of anyone buying a 4x4 double-cab pick-up destined for off-road use. Far higher up the list of priorities are likely to be the truck’s capacity to ford streams and its ability to tackle steep, muddy, boulder-strewn slopes without getting stuck.
While such an attitude is understandable, even a 4x4 that spends much of its life squelching up farm tracks is likely to spend far more time trundling along ordinary roads in the company of other vehicles, cyclists, and wayward pedestrians.
As a consequence, the stress placed by Isuzu on on-highway accident-avoidance systems right across the current D-Max range makes solid sense. It has resulted in the pick-up being awarded a five-star Euro NCAP safety rating; the maximum that can be achieved.
It has also driven off with the What Van? Pick-up of the Year award for 2023. It won it the year before too.
With both 4x2 and 4x4 variants up for grabs, entry-level D-Max Business models with their Utility trim are sold with single-, extended- and four-door, five-seater double-cabs.
Moving up the range, DL20 and DL40 (the All-Purpose range) and V-Cross (the Adventure range) are marketed solely as 4x4s. All three are available as double-cabs with DL20 also listed with an extended-cab.
Mention should also be made of the extraordinary AT35 Arctic Trucks D-Max – ideal for touring the furthest-flung corners of Iceland, but a bit over the top for most UK builders and farmers.
A 1.9-litre diesel at 164hp is standard across the line-up with the choice of either a six-speed automatic or six-speed manual box depending on the variant you select.
Isuzu really now needs to follow the path trodden by Toyota’s indestructible Hilux and offer a more-powerful engine delivering at least 200hp as an alternative.
We tackled the pothole-strewn highways and byways of Herefordshire and a few of its fields in a D-Max DL40 double-cab automatic. Here’s how we fared.
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