Nissan’s NV200 line-up includes, as a factory-built option, a refrigerated van. costing £19,100 or, with £300 extra for one with a side loading door, it’s £5400 more than the 89hp 1.5-litre diesel in SE spec that the chilled unit is based on.
Built at the Barcelona factory belonging to Gruau, close to the NV’s own Barcelona facility, the vehicle is ordered and delivered through the manufacturer, and the insulation cell and cooling unit comes with the same three-year, 100,000-mile warranty as the NV200.
The cooling unit is a Carrier Neos 100, can chill to zero degrees, and has an overnight standby mode courtesy of an external socket that can be plugged into the mains supply.
The moulded polyster-polyurethane panels cut the load area from 4.2m3 to 2.2, and payload drops from the standard panel van’s 739 to 524kg.
Standard kit, as with all SE trim NV200s, includes an airbag for just the driver, rear parking camera, CD/radio with MP3, USB and iPod compatibility, Bluetooth and a trip computer. Additionally, optional extra include the £1000 safety pack which brings air conditioning (a £575 option in isolation), front fog lights and a passenger airbag, while strip curtains for the chilled load area are a £100 extra and foldable shelves £200.
The refrigeration unit itself is a very neat design that adds minimal extra height and is a far cry from the huge square units traditionally associated with refrigerated vehicles. The lack of extra height helps with fuel consumption, as well as being aesthetically preferable to a large box on top of the vehicle. It is though far from quiet when working to bring down the temperature, though it quietens down once it’s at the point set by the driver from the keypad in the cabin, mounted where a rear-view mirror would be. It’s as simple as can be, and moves downwards at the rate of around a degree every two minutes.
A factory-fit system will be preferable to many looking for an easy solution, and the NV200 Fridge Van is about as straightforward to acquire and operate as this sort of vehicle can be.
Verdict:
Compact and neat factory-fit refrigeration van