On 12/04/2021 00:02, williamwright wrote:
On 11/04/2021 20:50, Fredxx wrote:

1. Transit LWB high top 3.5

When I had one it was lovely and stable on a long journey, I guess its
length had something to do with it!

Being white I found I was given a little respect too!

2. Merc 709D

Yes, in big vans you really feel you're moving along very smoothly. It's
far nicer than being in a car.

When we moved house we hired a Mercedes LWB van and spent a week driving
from our new house to our old one, loading up, returning, unloading -
rinse and repeat every day for a week. The "old house" was my parents
holiday cottage so we had access to it - we didn't have to be out on a
set day. We just got a small removal van to bring the really big things
like fridge, freezer and washing machine right at the end.

It was a bit unnerving to drive to begin with, especially as the first
journey from the hire place to our new house was on my own (no wife to
look the opposite way at junctions etc because she had to drive home in
her own car), and it was a bit tight reversing into our drive with only
a reversing camera and door mirrors, but no view through the central
rear-view mirror. As with all things, what is scary the first time
becomes easier and piece-of-**** by the end. Without a reversing camera,
and only views down the *side* of the van, reversing would have been
very scary.

We both found it a nice van to drive, and not too bad on acceleration.
Best not to dwell on the diesel consumption. Keeping down to 50 on
single carriageway and 60 on dual took a bit of remembering - especially
coming off the A1M (motorway) onto the A64 (dual, not motorway). The
full van handled very differently to when it was empty, but it still
made it up Garrowby Hill on the A166 between York and Bridlington and
even managed to overtake a slow vehicle on the hill. We decided that
Sutton Bank was too steep to manage when loaded, hence the longer
Garrowby Hill route coming home. Sutton Bank would probably have been
fine, but I didn't want to risk the embarrassment of not being able to
set off from rest on the hill if some pillock in front ground to a halt
- I've witnessed too many HGVs, especially triple-decker waggons of
sheep, gradually grind to a halt on Sutton Bank and then be unable to
set off again. *Those* are the people who should be banned from Sutton
Bank, not drivers of car+caravan who probably have better power:weight.
Ideally they should be banned from driving altogether for even
attempting it in a vehicle that is underpowered enough not to be able to
set off on the hill.

The one thing we both fell foul of occasionally was the dreaded clipping
a kerb with the back wheels. Even when I allowed extra distance, going
wide at the front end, I still once or twice mounted the kerb.

Maybe because the van had hire-company markings so other drivers knew we
weren't as used to driving a longer vehicle, I noticed that cars and
other van drivers were inclined to give us a quick flash when we were
overtaking them and the back end was safely clear of their front end, to
say "OK to pull in now".

Given the lack of central rear-view mirror and the poorer side
visibility (no side windows behind the driver/passenger), the door
mirrors had to be good to compensate - and the Merc's were excellent:
plane glass, convex blind spot, and convex angled down to show back
wheels and a feet feet forwards of that. Much better than the ones in
either of our cars. Parallel parking was not much harder than a car -
use the angled-down mirror to show when the rear wheel was about to
touch the kerb, full lock to straighten up, reversing camera to check
that I didn't get too close to the vehicle behind, wife to keep an eye
on the front wing against the car in front.