Last Updated: 11/08/08
Van about town
Having tested Peugeot’s Bipper in last month’s issue (Van User July 2008) there would appear little more to say about the Citroen Nemo that has been our regular runabout this week. The two vans come down the same factory production line, the only differences being in grille, trim and specifications.So what do you get if you call at the Citroen dealer? Well, the Nemo range starts at a competitive £7,995 plus the VAT and delivery, and as with Bipper there are a choice of 70hp 1.4 litre HDi engine and 75hp 1.4 litre petrol motor.
With Citroen the trim levels are X and LX, though you can only have an LX with the more popular diesel power. A five speed manual gearbox is the standard fit, but for just £400 you can opt for SensoDrive to accompany the diesel engine, which is a clutchless automated manual transmission.
We have yet to try SensoDrive, but at that price if it is anywhere near as good as say VW’s DSG box, then it could become a very popular option.
Payload is 610kg and the Nemo offers 2.5cu m of load carrying volume. However, fit what Citroen calls the Extenso passenger seat, which folds virtually flat into the floor well, and you can extend that volume to 2.8cu m, with a load length of almost 2.5m. Not bad when you consider that the whole vehicle is only 3.86m long.
That overall length of course makes Nemo an easy vehicle to drive around town, nipping into tiny parking spaces when needed and easily keeping pace with urban traffic. Surprisingly the compact Citroen is also a reasonable long distance drive too, though it’s certainly no high speed cruiser.
Citroen talks about combined fuel consumption for the diesel Nemo of 62.8mpg, which sounds a little optimistic, but certainly you should be travelling quite some distance between visits to the pumps. The diesel Nemo can also be run on B30 biodiesel, if that’s a route you’d like to go down.
Inside the cab the compact van is comfortable and there is plenty of room to stretch out, even with a full bulkhead fitted. Large doors and a relatively sit-up-and-beg driving position make it an easy van to get in and out of, which is good for urban delivery drivers.
The standard X trim level includes ABS, a driver’s airbag, pretension seatbelts and power steering. You also get a pretty good stereo with an MP3 compatible CD player and four speakers. Pay the additional £720 for LX specification and you can add a nearside sliding side load door, though it wasn’t actually on our early production vehicle. You also get electric front windows, electric heated door mirrors, a lockable glove box, remote central locking, a height and lumbar adjustable driver’s seat with armrest, a folding passenger seat and a reach and rake adjustable steering column.
To that little lot Citroen had added to our LX spec Nemo a half height steel bulkhead with mesh upper grille at £90, and air conditioning for £500. The basic price of the 1.4HDi LX Nemo is £9,515 plus the VAT and delivery, so we were looking at just over £10,000 for our test vehicle.
Aside from that economical fuel use, the Nemo comes with 20,000 mile service intervals, which means that for some urban operations you probably won’t see the inside of a dealership for up to two years. The compact Citroen also gets a choice of the firm’s two years unlimited mileage or three years/100,000 mile warranty.
To be honest the choice between Citroen or Peugeot, or indeed Fiat for that matter, will probably come down to the local dealer and the deal that you can work out at the time of purchase. Whatever badge you have on the front though, this is an impressive compact high cube van. It will be interesting to see how this new sector of the market develops.
Citroën has added the Nemo X 1.4i dual fuel van to its Ready to Run range of Nicholson McLaren Engines (NME) converted dual fuel (petrol/LPG) vans. The van is priced from £8,820 + VAT + delivery and will go on sale in August.
“Rising petrol and diesel prices, along with the confirmation, last week, that dual fuel vehicles will retain their London Congestion Charge Zone exemption status, have considerably enhanced the appeal of Citroën Ready to Run dual fuel vans,” says Robert Handyside, Citroën’s commercial vehicle operations manager.
“Both the Nemo and existing Berlingo First dual fuel vans are exempt from the London Congestion Zone charge as they meet Powershift Band 4 emissions standards.”
With an average price of 58p per litre, LPG is around half the price of petrol and about 40 per cent of the cost of diesel. If the operator is based within the London Congestion Charge Zone or regularly works within it, dual fuel Nemo and Berlingo First vans can deliver considerable savings.
The NME dual fuel conversion is the same system which has been proven in around 2,000 Berlingo/Berlingo First dual fuel vans. The Nemo conversion includes a 53 litre LPG tank mounted in place of the spare wheel. Nemo dual fuel vans have the same performance characteristics as the petrol engined vehicle and meet European standard R6701 and are fully European On Board Diagnosis (EOBD) compliant.
