I recently took delivery of the new Mahindra Pik Up 2.2 CRDe Double Cab S10 4x4 and whisked my fiancé and two kids away to Witsand for the weekend. It’s reasonably priced for everything it has in terms of convenience features, plus it has selectable four-wheel-drive.
While it’s certainly not the suavest bakkie we’ve ever laid our eyes upon, there’s something to be said for the price of R357,995, making it one of the least expensive 4x4 double cabs in the country - yet is it worth the monthly instalment?
Thanks to the Pik-Up’s boxy profile and high roofline, the cabin feels spacious and the view to the outside is brilliant for kids in the back, especially those who tend to feel carsick in cars with high beltlines. There’s a decent amount of rear legroom in the second row too, but I wouldn’t place more than two adults in there on long journeys.
The Pik Up’s chunky steering wheel has a solid feel to it, while the instrument binnacle’s analog displays are funky and modern. The 2.2-litre mHAWK diesel engine (103 kW / 320Nm) is torquey, and quite frugal if you don’t drive faster than the national speed limit of 120 km/h - push it harder than that and you’ll soon see your fuel consumption rise from eight to eleven litres per 100km.
There’s not much lean in the corners, surprisingly, and it’s mostly a fun-to-drive bakkie once you’re on the road, but there are many conflicting characteristics inside the cabin. The infotainment system, for example: Its upmarket looks lift the cabin’s general low-budget ambience; the font on the buttons is classy, and have a quality feel when you push them, and the system itself is quite agreeable, until you have to utilise the satnav, or in this case, the sad-nav: The screen itself is as responsive to your touch as a scorned lover after a painful, drawn-out separation. After repeatedly pressing on the screen and accidentally accessing other menus and restarting the process a number of times, I eventually managed to successfully enter a destination. Soon thereafter I delved into my cupboards for my trusty old Tom-Tom GPS, since I’m not one who likes to faff needlessly (and I had already exhausted my data for the month).
When on the highway, the Pik Up has so much wind noise you can hardly hear the kids ask “Are we there yet?” from the back, so that’s a plus. The suspension is soft and gentle over bumps, but squeaks and rattles in the cabin are persistent. The vinyl that covers the 6-speed manual box’s gear lever has a tendency to vibrate noisily, depending on how it’s positioned. Gear changes are slick, but the first and reverse gears are placed too close to each other, and it did happen once or twice that I reversed when I meant to go forward.
As for storage binnacles; the door cards in front don’t offer much room, and there’s hardly enough space between the seat and your arm to reach for whatever you stowed in there. There is a central, non-slip binnacle atop the centre tunnel for two bottles or other objects for the rear passengers, as well as bottle holders in the doors, and rear air-vents are a welcome standard feature. The USB port is hidden underneath the centre fascia, but at least it’s there - but the plugging and unplugging of devices should rather take place when the bakkie is stationary. Another issue is the interesting placement of the hoses that spray suds onto your windscreen - it is aimed directly at the centre of the windshield, and as a result, the wipers fail to clean the area in the driver’s field of vision, which becomes covered in bug juice after a certain amount of highway driving, and stays that way until you reach the petrol station.
Mahindra’s build quality and design niggles have let the Pik-Up down completely, despite its decent engine and road manners. The entire cabin, apart from the infotainment system and its surrounding switchgear, is compiled from the budget-parts bin. The quality of the locks in the inner door-handles and the rotary dial (to go from 2H to 4H and 4L) are especially pitiful. Even the rear step and the entire rear bumper it is placed upon - which would be subjected to a man’s full weight and the heavy object he is lifting from the load bay - seems a bit on the soft and flimsy side. The bottom of the loading bay itself has been sealed in the corners and sides by none other than industrial-grade silicone, in matching silver.
There was so much more that Mahindra could have done to make the entire product look and feel more durable without making it that much more expensive. What do useful standard specs such as cornering headlamps help you if the interior should start to fall apart?
Let’s compare the Mahindra to the humble Renault Kwid - also one of the cheapest cars in its segment, but the interior is simple and quite robust, even though it’s all hard plastics.
While the Mahindra’s mHAWK powertrain has a reputation for reliability, unfortunately, we can’t drive just the engine, and in this case, I would have to recommend another bakkie altogether, such as Nissan’s rear-wheel-driven NP300 Hardbody 2.5 TDI Double Cab Hi-Rider (R378 100 new). If you want the NP300 Hardbody 2.4 double cab 4x4 (petrol), you’ll have to fork out a much heftier R430,900.
If you absolutely must have a 4x4 double cab bakkie, I’d recommend a used Isuzu KB 2.5D-Teq Double Cab 4x4 LE. 2016-models with under 90,000 km on the odo can be had for just under 300K.
The Pik Up has a 4-year /120,000 km warranty and roadside assistance, and a 5-year / 90,000 km Service Plan. Services are at 20,000 km intervals or every 12 months, whichever comes first.
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