FIRST DRIVE
SUZUKI JIMNY COMMERCIAL Rescued from death at the hands of emissions law, our former 4x4 of the Year becomes a van – and remains a wonderfully beguiling if at times frustrating way to go off-road
JUST UNDER THREE YEARS AGO, Suzuki launched the new Jimny. It looked amazing, it drove well, it was fantastic inside and it came in some really cool colours, and everyone who saw it wanted one. It romped to victory in our 4x4 of the Year awards and looked firmly set to carry on where the ultra-popular old model had left off – and then some. But then along came emissions law to wreck everything. The same regime that thinks the most envi-
ronmentally friendly vehicles on the road (proper 4x4s built to last forever) are actually the least also uses a fleet average figure which punishes manufacturers whose range includes anything a bit interesting. Suzuki is the prime example. It sells mainly city cars with tiny hybrid engines, as well of course as similarly frugal small SUVs. The Jimny is a different kettle of fish in that it’s a traditional off-roader with a ladder chassis, live axles, a
separate dual-range transfer case and a conventional petrol engine, so what it gains in longevity it loses in tailpipe emissions. The problem is that because of the fleet average rule, Suzuki’s UK importer was set to be fined heavily for every single vehicle it sold, just because it also sold the Jimny. Rational people can see the idiocy in this, but we’re dealing with political agendas here. Anyway, let’s not get drawn into that debate; what matters here is that the emissions regime that was being phased in here just as the Jimny was launched meant that what could have been an absolute smash hit of a 4x4 was instead restricted to tiny numbers then withdrawn altogether just a year or two after going on sale. Happily, the rules are different for commercial vehicles. Unhappily, they’re not that different, but this
does mean Suzuki has been able to bring the Jimny back as a van – albeit in what the company calls ‘very limited numbers.’ We’re yet to drive it on the road, but Suzuki gave us the chance to test one recently in the wilds of Walters Arena. This is a venue where some of the terrain could reduce a brand new vehicle to scrap in about five minutes, so we were following a set route, but the off-roading was still more extreme than anything we’d done on the original launch in Germany back in 2018. As with the passenger-carrying model, the take-away verdict is that the Jimny is exceptionally manoeuvrable, very agile and capable of finding traction in the most unlikely places. Once again, though, this also has to be qualified by observing that it would be so much better if only it was properly geared in low range.
4x4 2pp Suzuki Jimny Van.indd 28
03/08/2021 11:52
