9 minute read
Mercedes-Benz eVito
Quality counts – and the eVito has it where it matters most
Andrew Walker
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The latest electric van to enter the commercial sector fray is the Mercedes-Benz eVito, which made its way to Company Car & Van’s HQ recently.
The entire Vito range was facelifted in 2019 and the new eVito includes all of those updates with the vital addition of that electric powertrain.
The electric eVito, offers customers 85 (70) kW of power, 300 Nm of torque, a 91-mile average range, combined with a six hour charging time. This is based on three-phase charging, which is lucky because CC&V uses a 7kW Rolec home charger, so we could really find out if this charging time was true.
To keep things simple the front-wheel drive eVito has been aligned with the current Vito range and offers a standard specification that mirrors the PURE model. Specification includes a height and rake adjustable steering wheel, Hill Start Assist, electrically adjustable heated exterior mirrors, sliding doors on both sides of the vehicle, wood flooring and an adaptive brake light.
In addition to the PURE specification, the eVito exclusively offers Mercedes PRO connect, which adds a heated driver’s seat, TEMPMATIC air conditioning, a four-metre charging cable, with a CanTrack vehicle tracker.
The eVito is offered in two lengths, L2 or L3. Prices start from £39,895 ex VAT for the eVito Van PURE L2, increasing to £40,415 ex VAT for the eVito Van PURE L3. However, to knock the edge off these numbers a little the eVito is eligible for the Office For Low Emission Vehicles (OLEV) Grant. This means that customers can benefit from a 20% reduction on the vehicle purchase price, up to a maximum of £8,000.
As far as storage goes, the L2 model offers 6.0 m 3 cargo volume, 2,277 kg kerb weight, 3,200 kg GVW, with a payload of 923 kg. The L3 offers 6.6 m 3 cargo volume, 2,302 kg kerb weight, 3,200 kg GVW and a payload of 898 kg.
If you want a bit more on your van, then you can always opt for the eVito PROGRESSIVE. This adds colour coded bumpers, full wheel covers, front fog lights, Headlight Assist, a 75mph speed limiter, Audio 15, lumbar support and electrically foldable mirrors. The eVito PROGRESSIVE van L2 costs from £41,600 ex VAT and £42,120 ex VAT for the L3 variant.
For both specification levels, Mercedes PRO connect, which we first experienced in the new Sprinter, comes as standard and is free for the first three years. Benefits for driver and fleet manager include Remote Access, Digital Drivers’ Log, Drive Style monitoring, real-time variable servicing monitoring, parking time monitor and geo-fence options.
As an electric van, the eVito also benefits from pre-conditioning of the heaters and highlights the vehicle charging options nearby.
So far so good, but what’s the eVito like to drive and what’s it’s real range? Well, from the outside it looks just like a standard Vito. We were testing the entry level PURE L2 and you’d be hard-pressed to know it’s an electric van unless you get up close and read the discreet eVito and eLECTRIC badging. Even the ‘fuel’
cap is in the same place on the left hand side of the van.
Inside, this continues and all seems familiar. You get the 2019 updated Vito interior, which includes two USBs and a heated front driver seat, but not proper air conditioning, which is a known battery drainer. It was 30 deg C the week I drive the eVito and I was forced to drive with the windows open just to keep vaguely cool.
There’s a three-seat configuration up front, as well as some top-of-the-dash storage, a decent glove box and two handy deep door pockets, but nowhere to fit a large bottle or drinks container, which is a bit strange nowadays. The ignition is on the left.
Power steering is standard and the wheel is both rake and reach adjustable. The driver’s seat also offers a myriad of adjustments, so getting comfortable was not a problem. The handbrake is located on the floor, as it is in Mercedes cars. You push a ‘fourth’ pedal with your left foot to engage the brake and then pull a dash-mounted lever to release. I found it straightforward to use, although some may not like it as it doesn’t help you with hill starts.
In the centre of the dash and higher up than in some vans are the Audio 15 infotainment system and heating controls. The infotainment screen is slightly awkward to reach for the driver, as is the USB inputs which are on the left of the dash. For a left-hand driven Vito, this location would make perfect sense.
Elsewhere, the front windows are electric and keeping the cabin quiet is a full width bulkhead. Overall, as perhaps you’d expect from a Mercedes-Benz, the quality is top-notch, althought I’d reckon it not to be quite as practical a cab as some of its competitors.
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“Unlike many of its rivals, the range is a genuine 90 miles... most electrics deliver no better than 70-80% of their claimed range, so the eVito, at 88% or better, scores a significant victory here...’
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The rear load space is easily accessed as the L2 Vito we drove comes with left and right hand slide-opening side doors and twin rear doors that open 180 degrees. To be fair we used it only once, to transport a mountain bike into the Peak District, and it was a simple enough task to fix the bike to the hooks located in the rear floorspace, to stop it moving around.
Of more interest, I’m sure, is how the eVito drives and how far one can travel in it. For starters it’s easy to drive and very relaxing on the motorway. The gear lever offers Neutral, Reverse or Drive options and even with the battery weight underneath the floor, the eVito handles pretty well for its weight.
As with most electric cars, the eVito offers several levels of regenerative braking which can be adjusted using the paddles on either side of the steering wheel. In traffic or town this allows you to utilise D-, the strongest regenerative level, which is also the most noticeable. You can then decrease the strength of regeneration by pulling on the right hand paddle, moving through the options of D, then D+ and as we found for motorway driving the very useful D++.
When driving the eVito you can choose from three drive modes: E+, E or C. There is a dash-mounted button in the centre console to select these. E+ offers the most efficient driving style, while E is the middle option and the one we preferred. Finally, you can select C, which is the least efficient – or the most fun!
The eVito was delivered with a full charge, which offered a 91-mile range. We took the eVito to Chester in drive mode E along the M56 at around 70mph, a total distance of 30 miles. On arrival at Tesco, we took advantage of a Podpoint charger while we shopped in the store, which allowed us up to two hours of free charging. You can access these via the Podpoint App. Our journey had decreased the range from 91 miles to 55 and after an hour charging was back up to 71 miles for the return leg. Thirty miles later and back home, the range now showed 36 miles.
We then repeated the identical journey the following day and we concluded that if driven unladen with just a driver, at mostly motorway speeds, then the eVito offers an 80-mile range. For the remainder of our week we drove locally and once up into the Peaks and back, at lower speeds of up to 50mph. At these speeds the range is a genuine 90 miles, as you can really take advantage of the regenerative braking to keep that battery topped up.
This may sound like damning with faint praise but when we have driven other electric cars or vans, they regularly deliver no better than 70-80% of their claimed electric range, so for the eVito to be at around 88% or better on our test, was a major victory for Mercedes-Benz.
The comparison with other similar-sized electric vans is interesting. If you take the PSA Group’s Vivaro-e, e-Dispatch and e-Expert, for example, the eVito’s 91-mile range doesn’t come near its rivals claimed WLTP battery range of 143 miles. However, we’d be surprised if the PSA vehicles’ range in real-world driving is more than 110 miles, so suddenly the difference isn’t quite as stark.
Should your business get one? If you have a van that only travels locally, covering fewer than 75 miles a day, then it’s well worth a look. It’s not as cheap as the diesel Vito, where the entry level model costs £23,900 + vat . Our test eVito was higher specced but the difference is still large, retailing at £39,895. But if you subtract the £8,000 OLEV grant the price reduces to £31,895, so again, what starts out as a large difference comes down pretty quickly to one that isn’t quite as striking.
In conclusion, the eVito was much better than we expected. It performed well above average on our EV mileage range tests, it’s comfortable, quiet to drive and now offers Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, something we really can’t live without.
On the negative side, we really would have liked proper air conditiong in lieu of the heated driver’s seat, and cruise control would have been handy too, as we found the accelerator pedal quite heavy going on the motorway.
You may be reading this and thinking that the 80-91-mile eVito range is nowhere near enough, but we reckon that plenty of businesses don’t need a complete fleet of long-distance diesel vans. Factor in that charging is about 75 per cent cheaper than the equivalent cost of diesel, and again we have a gap that is narrowing.
Ultimately, we think it will come down to the buyer’s confidence in the eVito range, the daily mileage you need from your van, plus local access to the charging network.
If your business has charging stations, or you have one at home, there really is nothing to fear from an electric Vito.
V d It’s a great van, no question. At first glance it sounds expensive and the range offer looks weak, but when you compare like with like in the real world the eVito stacks up nicely. It’s still the eVito Corleone of the (electric) van world – though there’s nothing to be afraid of.
