On The Road
This is definitely a van that likes to work, and is one of those rare beasts that performs better the more it’s loaded. In truth, the prodigious amount of torque is a liability when running unladen. Under hard acceleration the traction control, which now works by reducing engine power instead of applying braking effort to the spinning wheel, can result in rather jerky progress, and roundabouts and junctions need considerable respect.
Load it to the maximum, though, and it’s a different story. The engine gets enough to do to stop it feeling like a Formula 1 car negotiating Hyde Park Corner, while the suspension also gets compressed enough for it to work properly. Even on damp, greasy roundabouts the traction control rarely gets disturbed.
Compared with the 127hp 3.5-tonner, the laden Sprinter 416 takes two seconds longer for the proving ground sprint to 50mph, and loses about the same time during the 48-80km/h and 64-96km/h tests. Top speed is academic, but just in case your drivers feel the temptation to race reps’ cars up the motorway, the makers have restricted it to the magic ton.
Our initial experiences with Sprintshift were a good test of its intuitiveness, as the van’s handbook had gone missing. The system is controlled by a stubby lever on the dash which is an easy reach away from the wheel. The starting position, logically enough, is N, from where it nudges backwards to R and then left for A. In normal use you just leave the lever in A (for automatic) mode – simply press the accelerator to go. The lack of handbook only caused us one problem; if the engine was switched off before engaging neutral the electronics became confused, making it exceedingly difficult to find neutral at the next start up.
From a standing start the first up-change feels rather ponderous but the change improves considerably the higher you get. In its 416 form the Sprinter benefits from a more leisurely, part-throttle driving style which gives smoother and earlier changes, keeping in the torque band and losing virtually no time, maybe even gaining some. Attempting to use full throttle in every gear is pointless as the Sprinter wants to gallop away.
Downshifts are hardly ever noticeable, except that you need to kick down to accelerate away in a hurry, such as when nipping into traffic gaps, there is what seems like an interminable delay while the electronic brain decides what to do. Sprintshift’s fine control during low speed manoeuvring, a weak point of some clutchless vans we’ve driven, proved to be perfectly satisfactory. It was seriously tested in every tight situation reversing out of a drive with literally millimetres to spare, but once the transmission engages it can be controlled extremely precisely, both forward and back.
If you require manual control simply move the lever backwards or forwards to change up or down. Any attempt to make a damaging out-of-parameter shift is not permitted. In manual mode Sprintshift will hold the selected gear until you decelerate, when it will find a suitable gear for moving away. However, the automatic mode works well enough that there is no real point in using manual, expect for the extra engine braking it gives on severe descents. It isn’t possible to hold the current automatically selected gear by changing to manual – the system will only allow entry to manual mode by changing up or down a gear. Hill starts are helped by the system holding brake pressure for one second after release of the pedal to prevent rolling back. When we finally got hold of a handbook we found that it should be possible to choose either first or second gear for starting off, but we didn’t manage it.
Overall Sprintshift works extremely well, although this type of automated conventional transmission is never likely to become as smooth as a torque converter/epicyclic system. Maybe a little more on-board computing power could be used to improve the kick-down response.
The firm suspension needed to keep the 4.6-tonne gross weight off the road has an inevitable penalty when unladen, giving a firm but tolerably comfortable ride on all but the worst surfaces. With a full load in the back, the ride was fine. Besides the obvious benefits of load restraint and noise suppression given by a full bulkhead, a less obvious advantage is the extra rigidity given to the body. Our van, with no bulkhead, was already suffering from some creaking and rattling of the load compartment doors on rough surfaces. Spend the £180 – you won’t regret it.
Despite the smaller amount of rubber on the road at the front of the 416,it didn’t demonstrate any sign of the mild understeer apparent on the 313. The handling remained neutral in all weight conditions unless provoked by carelessly unleashed torque. Steering is excellent, with just the right amount of weight and accuracy.
The latest Sprinter still features the traditional, and once controversial, long brake pedal travel, but the braking action is as powerful and progressive as you would expect from a system which incorporates the very latest in ABS and electronic braking distribution technology. Less impressive was the poorly adjusted handbrake. It ran out of travel before providing enough effort to hold on to the 25% (1-in-4) test hill, and was slightly awkward to reach requiring a noticeable drop of the driver’s shoulder.
Manually adjusted mirrors give a decent field of view but, disappointingly for a new design, they have no dual-zone blind-spot facility. Visibility in every other respect is good.
Cab Comfort
One big advantage the Sprinter enjoys over some competitors is the ease of access given by the doors, which open to a full 90o. Once aboard the driver is cosseted in an excellent mechanically suspended seat with full adjustment, including height, recline, adjustable cushion length, pneumatic lumbar support and driver weight. All three occupants get three-point inertia belts, height adjustment on the outer positions. A sober light-grey fabric is used to trim the seats, while the roof is lined with Merc’s traditional tweed-look material. There is plenty of painted metal on view on the tops of the door frames, an issue which varies in importance according to the body colour – ours was bright orange!
Space in the footwell was rather cramped for the right foot, even with our delicate daisies, so the standard-issue emergency service size 12s likely to be controlling the Sprinter 416 could face real problems.
The newly facelifted dashboard is thoroughly contemporary, as it should be. Its grey grained plastic finish has a softer feel, but an even softer soft-feel is available as an option. Housed in a cowled binnacle, the instrument panel is home to water temperature and fuel gauges, a 90o-scale rev counter and an absolutely accurate 180o-scale speedo. Although the speed is predominantly indicated in km/h, the mph reading on a smaller inner scale is easy to read once you get used to it. The digital odometer display includes a clock and the Sprintshift gear position indicator.
The attractive four-spoked steering wheel contains a horn push but no airbag (a £168 option for the driver only or £961 for all occupants). The large hazard-light switch is mounted on top of the steering column shroud, where its use involves sticking an arm through the wheel, not always a good idea, while conventional column stalks have lights on the left and wipers on the right. A panel to the right of the column contains the headlamp leveller and rear foglight switch.
The central dashboard is arranged tower-fashion, topped by a basic Mercedes-branded RDS radio/cassette player, just above the rotary controls for the four-speed heater (with recirculation facility). Mercedes claims, and we couldn’t possibly argue, that its new common-rail engines are so thermally efficient that there isn’t enough wasted heat available to fully warm the cabin, so markets with cold climates, including the UK, get an auxiliary diesel-powered heater as standard. Four fresh-air vents are evenly spread across the fascia, with two more on top for the windscreen.
Continuing downwards, next to a useful document clip, we reach the secondary switch panel, which in this case houses the traction control override and two-way central locking button allowing the front, rear or all doors to be locked as required. Below this is a pen-holder, then the Kienzle digital tachograph, and finally a combined receptacle for smokers and drinkers.
The driver’s door carries electric window switches back to front on this example with the passenger window switch on the left, and vice versa). The windows themselves are rather leisurely in operation, with no one-touch facility. Dual-compartment door bins are fitted to each door, as are dropdown pockets in the lower panels intended aid kit and warning triangle which are compulsory in many markets.
Tools and a wheel-changing kit continue to hide beneath a false floor in the passenger footwell.
In front of the passenger is a deep tray with a good-sized lockable glove box with cup recesses, and there is a small under-seat box behind the centre occupant’s shins. What looks like a length of drainpipe bolted behind the driving seat is actually a two-litre bottle holder, although with no bulkhead it is rather vulnerable. There are two large plain sun visors bereft of vanity mirrors and ticket holders, with their central gap shielded by a blacked out area on the glass. A combined interior and map light lives over the screen, with two further lights in the loadspace.
