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Foden has worked very hard in recent years to increase its driver appeal.
Page 32
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Being told you are spending the night in a Foden makes you feel hard done by—after all, the marque is hardly synonymous with driver comfort. Climbing into the cab, our test-sleeper expected memories of family caravanning holidays from hell in North Wales to come flooding back to him—but was soon proved very wrong!
Foden has worked hard in recent years to increase its driver appeal—the Daf CF-based XL cab being proof of this. It has been well accepted by drivers and operators alike, accounting for a significant proportion of Foden's sales.
Stepping into the cab, the first thing you notice is the smell of fibre-glass resin, which is apparently common to all new XL cabs. It seemed to be aggravated by the heat—a sweltering 37/ Great for long nights out in Siberia—but not quite as well suited to a surprisingly warm March evening in the Midlands. Our tester sat there for five minutes with the windows and roof vent open, waiting for the cab to cool down.
The Alpha cab is very well appointed, with a definite air of quality to it. It's spacious too, with decent crosscab access and more than enough headroom to stand up straight. There two sets of curtains, one for the bed area and one for the windows. The material is attached to the wall of the cab with the help of a few Velcro stickers.
Storage is superb, with overhead lockers running the length of the front of the cab. There is a pull-out tray under the bunk, with two large stowage bins either side of it. A narrow shelf appears to run around the perimeter of the bed, but it slopes downwards, making it pretty useless. It's actually part of the cab's structure and supports the optional second bunk. The one-piece mattress is thick and very comfortable, both for sitting and lying on.
Having sampled a few seconds of all five CDs which the Foden test driver had left in the stereo, and quickly deciding against them, our tester opted to read instead. The overhead lighting is excellent, and can be turned on and off by either a dashboard switch or one at the end of the bunk. There is another light directly above the bed and a small night lamp by the heater controls, Having cooled down sufficiently, the heater's thermostat was turned on, but at the lowest level— which was almost inaudible. There's just a slight rumbling in the background—but certainly not enough to stop you from getting to sleep.
Locating the light switch for an unscheduled comfort break was the first challenge--it isn't luminous or backlit. Back in the cab the heater was working overtime— possibly the result of accidentally touching the control when trying to locate the light switch. Lying awake, waiting for it to quieten down, we pondered how many brown plastic trees Paccar must fell each year to make the Alpha's fake wooden dash!
A 5am wake-up saw the sun streaming into the cab— the curtains do their job, but unfortunately the Velcro does not. The nocturnal manoeuvres caused one of the stickers to come adrift causing a gap. Other than this niggle, it's hard to criticise the XL. While you wouldn't want to spend a week in it, the odd few nights wouldn't be a problem at all, All it really lacks is an inside boo!