2019-10-01_CAR_UK

OCTOBER 2019 | CARMAGAZINE.CO.UK 135

Our cars

The story so far

Our family-friendly, badge

snob-approved pick-up meets

the buying public

+Reliable; has a Mercedes

badge; goes well

• A bit bling for country folk,
  outside and in

Price £47,405 (£56,484 as tested)

Performance 2987cc turbodiesel

V6, 253bhp, 7.9sec 0-62mph,

127mph Efficiency 31.3mpg

(official) 24.3mpg (tested),

237g/km CO2 Energy cost 24.6p

per mile Miles this month 1244

Total miles 4845

Logbook

ANDREW WOODWARD

A tree surgeon, Andy has had a

Toyota Hilux for five years, carrying

chainsaws and other equipment.

It never goes wrong.

STEVE MOODY

Contributing editor and trainee
country bumpkin Steve has run
the X-Class for five months.
Enjoys leaning on things.

One of the problems with the

X-Class is trying to explain to

people exactly where it fits in the

grand scheme of things. These

double-cab pick-ups are often used

for transporting dead sheep to

pits, transporting asbestos sheets

to pits, transporting cement to fill

in pits. In all those scenarios and

more, a leather-lined cabin and

lovely razor-sharp alloy wheels don’t

seem quite the tools for the job. And

the best part of £50k seems a lot of

money for pit-centred activity. So

we’ve roped in a few likely types who

might fit the bill for such a vehicle.

Farmers, as we know, have

mattresses stuffed with £50 notes

(and €50 notes too for the next few

weeks, perhaps) and so could easily

afford an X-Class. Especially if

you’re like John Parry, who seems

to own every blade of grass in my

neck of the woods and four Land

Rover Discoverys in various states

of distress, for jobs ranging from

pulling horseboxes to the pony club

to wading through fields of foetid,

sticky mud.

His first thought is the X is a bit

too bling: ‘I think if I turned up at a

shoot in this, the guns would think

I’m a chav. It’s a great big German

tank and it gets noticed. At least in

my old Discovery I can chug about

happily under the radar, but I do

like the fact that, as a Merc, it’ll go

wrong a lot less.’

Surgeons also earn a lot of

money and could afford an X-Class,

and Andrew Woodward is a tree

surgeon. I don’t know if tree

surgeons are on the same day rate

as their medical equivalents, but

he’s got a Toyota Hilux and carries

a vast array of chainsaws, ladders ⊲

Mercedes-Benz

X350d 4Matic

Month 5

‘This just has

everything, and the

quality is superb’

ANDREW, TREE SURGEON

Trained

engineer

sniffs out

the... engine