In message ,
writes
"Andrew Heenan" wrote in message
...
wrote ...
Mercedes - Benz Vito Taxi approved earlier this year & widely reported
in I don't see what merits the TX4 has over it - other than Britain
manufacturing jobs perhaps.
I thought that the Benz Vito was simply an option, and that there are no
plans to get rid of the standard designs.

Quite right; it's a free market.
Just the Mercedes is probably better, and certainly better value than the
TX4 unless they drop their prices to planet Earth. Which they may well do,
when faced with competition.

The new Mercedes is not priced significantly lower than the TX4. It is a
new vehicle which has yet to have some serious mileages so there is not
yet any data of the longer term, higher mileage statistics for this
vehicle.


A friend of mine had a Merc Vito fitted as a taxi in Brighton about 6
years ago. It was not the present model and did not have the
electrically operated doors, steering, etc so it is not possible to make
a direct comparison. However, his experience was that when the vehicle
was new it was brilliant but after about 2 years he found that it just
wouldn't stand up to the kind of service that Brighton taxi users
subjected it to (Brighton's hills and the out of town jobs along the M23
combine to really test vehicles!) and cost him a lot of money and down
time.

The Mercedes can make U-turns better, one driver told me. IIRC, it is
because the rear wheels can also turn to a degree.

But you have to stop to engage the rear steering and be travelling at
less than 5 mph for it to work - not so useful when you want to get out
of the way quickly to avoid traffic coming towards you in some
instances.

How much is the Mercedes compared to the TX4? I heard that the latter in a
brand new state costs around £50,000, whereas second-hand is about £35,000.

New TX4 around £38k (depending on spec) and a Merc only slightly less.

FWIW I write every month for Taxi "talk" magazine (www.taxitalk.co.uk
for an example) and am often made aware of problems before they become
common knowledge. As far as the Merc is concerned I am reserving my
judgement as there are several items which have mechanical or electronic
operation (electric step, electric doors, rear steering) which have not
seen heavy duty yet. I always have this fear that mechanical things can
go wrong and the ore complicated they are the more time and money they
take to repair.

--
Mike Hughes
A Taxi driver licensed for London and Brighton
at home in Tarring, West Sussex, England
Interested in American trains real and model?
Look here http://mikehughes627.fotopic.net/