ISUZU builds only commercial vehicles, puts only its own diesel
engines in them and has been in business for nearly 100 years.
During this century, the group has built more than 24 million
diesel engines and for the past 50 years, the Japanese company has been packing
all this trucking know-how into its bakkies.
The expertise shows in many small ways, like the fog lights on the
top models that are sunk into the bumper panel to keep them out of harm’s way,
and the excellent towing ability across the range, with the 4x4s towing 3,5 tons
and the 4x2 lugging 2,2 tons.
These abilities come from relatively ancient long coils up front
and flat springs at the rear tuned so that even the double cabs can still carry
a 1 092 kg payload. You’d expect a juddering ride from this suspension set-up,
but on the South Coast, sugar barons buy Isuzu double cabs for the soft ride.
As for reliability, the bakkie has a high-performance steel timing chain and service
intervals of 15 000 km or 12 months.
In Port Elizabeth, Ryno Jonker recently made news with his
1995 KB 250 that at the time had 726 838 km on the clock. Despite the high
mileage, he still uses it every day to transport his workers and heavy loads of
equipment.
“My bakkie is a reliable workhorse. At any given time it can handle
a load of 900 kg. The bakkie travels between 1 000 and 1 300 kilometres every
week,” said Jonker. He also owns two other Isuzu bakkies, with 550 000 km and
430 000 km on their odos.
In Pietermaritzburg, plumbers swear by the 2,5 Fleetside single
cabs for their great fuel consumption, despite making more than enough
power — 100 kW and 320 Nm between 1 800 and 2 800 rpm.
Not quite as sippy as the
2,5 is Isuzu’s 3,0 turbo diesel, but even this engine gave me 8,7 l/100 km along
the undulating Umbumbulu Road, where 130 kW and 380 Nm had the big bakkie
flashing past crawling cane lorries. Several bakkies produce more power, but
Isuzu drivers retort that’s just “overkill” and mutter words like
“compensating”.
While comfy on tar, it’s on dirt roads where the KB300 LX is really
at home, with shift on the fly between four low and four high for when the dirt
becomes veld.
The handbook boasts that the automatic transmission picks the
right gear uphill to avoid hunting for a cog, and keeps the ratio and speed low
going down. To see if the double cab can do what the book says, we sent a pair
of 4x4 novices up The Slope. Storming the track in 4x2 mode they impressively
got to the midway axle bender before getting stuck.
With the knob then turned to four high, they ambled to the top like pros,
even pausing to cock a wheel on the axle bender.
The interior of the Isuzu provides the same levels of comfort as
the Chevrolet Trailblazer, with a driver seat that adjusts vertically and
horizontally until it fits any body shape just right. Six air bags are standard
in the top-of-the-range models, ditto electronic stability control with ABS and
traction control.
The vagaries of fashion
So why then are Isuzu’s bakkies the third-biggest seller in SA,
behind Toyota and Ford?
Snobbery, is the short answer. The longer answer is that South
Africa has only two types of bakkie drivers — those in a Hilux, and those in
other bakkies.
Compare this to Thailand, the world’s biggest market for bakkies,
where Isuzu outsells the Ranger, Hilux, Navara and Scorpio on a monthly basis.
You can thank the Thais for those handy hooks on the outside of the Ranger’s
load bin. It was smooth, like that of the Isuzu, until Ford’s market researchers
were told a real bakkie needs hooks on the outside of the bin to tie down the
giant loads that Thailanders habitually transport.
That is really the only problem I have with the
top-of-the-range KB — it ain’t got no hooks. But the wheel turns and fashions
return, which means Isuzu may yet return to hook the hearts (and wallets) of
local bakkie buyers as it did in the nineties. With 18 carefully configured
models to choose from, there is certainly a bakkie for every occasion and
trade.
All Isuzu KB models are sold with a fully comprehensive five-year
or 120 000 km warranty and roadside assistance programme, a five-year/unlimited
mileage anti-corrosion warranty and a five-year/90 000 km service plan.
The KB 300D-TEQ 4x4 auto we had on test courtesy of Isuzu retails
for R529 700, and the Key Group in KZN is known for giving excellent trade-ins.
For pragmatic Isuzu fans who know most drivers hardly use a 4x4,
the 2015 model KB Serengeti offers all the buttons for R436 900, while stocks
last, as part of the Red Tag Sale.
