THE SHERPA chassis may not at first appear to be
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ideal for psv use because its overall width is only 1.8m (70in). But the Deansgate conversion of the diesel Sherpa Bus just tested by CM is to full psv standard : it is a very impressive vehicle and extremely good value at £3,245 complete. The petrol version comes even £304 cheaper than this.
To find room for 12 passenger seats while conforming to psv seat-spacing regulations did mean that Deansgate had to do quite a bit of " shoehorning " to get them all in. The front passenger seats were skewed so that the passengers face slightly towards the centre of the vehicle. The passengers in these slanted seats can be reasonably comfortable, but the seat behind has rather limited clearance between the front of the cushion and the rear of the front seat. This space varies from 9iin by the centre gangway to 13in at the offside.
The 12 seats—starting at the rear-entrance doors—are arranged so that the first two are single seats, one on each side, with their backs to the sides of the bus. These passengers have• ample leg room, but a passenger around my height (5ft 9in) would find his head resting on the moulded black rubber strip that goes around the inside of the bus above the windows.
On the offside there are three forward-facing double seats with one seat next to the driver while on the offside there are three forward-facing single seats.
The Williams Motor Company of Manchester, manufacturer of Deansgate, has the sole right to manufacture a psv Sherpa. So we will not see the proliferation of Sherpa models that has happened with the Ford Transit and A-Series.
My first impressions on collecting the bus at the Motor Industry Research Association were not too good. First, the driver's seat is pinned in the forward position to give the necessary clearance for passengers sitting behind. I soon got used to this, but much taller drivers might be severely cramped. Although the bus had been checked over by the Leyland preparation centre before the test, every time I took my foot off the accelerator the engine stalled. Other faults in the electrical system made the emergency flasher, horn and interior light inoperative.
The brakes, although producing very good stopping distances, rapidly developed excessive travel once the braking tests had been completed. Other small faults should also have been spotted by Leyland. The heater air flow would not turn off, but blew either hot or cold air into the interior, and the fire extinguisher between the front passenger seats rattled. Also annoying was the constant quivering of the bonnet during the test. Rust spots began to show on the interior welds and in the window frames. Nevertheless, I still found the minibus very attrac On the brake tests at 20, 30 and 40mph, all four wheels locked up on full-pressure stops, but a peak deceleration of 0.9g was still achieved. A tendency for both the front and rear wheels to tramp showed up as a series of peaks and troughs on the Motometer chart.
The minibus coped very well with the potholes, reverse cambers and the simulated level crossing on the MIRA ride and handling course. I particularly appreciated the ability of the five-leaf front springs and eight-leaf rear springs to absorb the usual jolts felt on passing over the 18in diameter pot-holes, On the second day of the test I took the van over the CM Midlands test route to assess the performance on both motorway and country roads.
The fuel economy of the 1,800cc engine fell from an outstanding 40mpg over the easier low-speed road section to below 20mpg at speed on the motorway.
On these public roads one iisadvantage of the Deansgate Sherpa was a lack of rear vision. It was impossible to see iirectly behind the van through the interior mirror because of the frames at the centres of the opening rear doors. Neither could I see behind by using the large, door-mounted ex terior mirrors. The nearside mirror was mounted in a par ticularly awkward place, which meant that if the front seat passenger lent slightly forward then he obscured the side view as well. The sun visors also were badly designed. When pulled down completely they entirely obscured the driver's view of the road ahead.
The clutch was light and progressive as were the brakes before they started to give trouble.
The steering was excellent and never tended to wander at all even at speed in rough weather. But I thought that the positioning of the accelerator did give room for improvement.
It was convenient enough for high-speed cruising with my foot flat on the floor, but for driving at a steady 40mph or so one needed a double-jointed ankle to be able to hold the accelerator in a position about two inches off the floor.
As is unavoidable with frontmounted diesel engines, a con siderable amount of engine noise was transmitted to the passenger compartment at high speeds and during hard accel eration. But at low cruising speeds only a quiet murmur could be heard from the en gine. Wind noise was virtually non-existent and, apart from any occasional squeak from the rear doors, the body was free from rattles and squeaks.
I must give credit to the Sherpa for the flexibility of its engine. It could if pushed pull away in top gear from as low as 20mph and it also had bags of power for hill climbing.
Road works and heavy traffic made a timed ascent of the road test hill at Broadway unrepresentative, but even so speed never fell below 25mph in third gear.
Starting from cold was immediate if the pre-heat device on the ignition switch was used—but impossible otherwise.
To sum up : the Sherpa appears to be good value for money, with outstanding ec onomy at below 50mph. But on our test vehicle many small faults tended to spoil the otherwise good impression given by the Sherpa.