Delica veterans! I need your brains!

[Craig]

OK not your brains, just the benefit of your experience. What is a Delica like as a daily driver, and on the highway? It will be our only car (Me, Wife, 18mo.old child, Border Collie and Blue Heeler) serving as a commuter to West Van from Deep Cove, as well as the getaway road-tripper. We had a test-drive, but it was hard to form much of an opinion beyond the strangeness of right-hand-drive. How does your van handle on the highway? In cross-winds? I'm not expecting it to be a Lotus Elan, but I need some reassurance that the Delica will be a safe companion for us all. Thanks in advance for your help!

[northvanmatt]

hey hey welcome to the site. I had the same thoughts as you before we bought ours as well. we bought in january and have used ours as a daily driver since feb when we got it on the road. I have two kids and they love it. I also road trip alot for surfing down south as well as trips to whistler and it is great. you don't go anywhere in a hurry as top speed is about 100-110km per hour but do you really need to go faster anyway. I have also taken a few trips with 3 of my buddies and all our snowboard gear lots of room, captin seats in the back are great honestly I love our delica. I used to be a VW van driver but would never go back. Oh also my wife used to not be such a fan but once she got used it now I hardly ever get to drive it. the delica is great in traffic and has excellent turning alittle hard to parralle park but you get used to it. we try to avoid that anyhow because the sliding do then opens in to traffic hopes this helps
Also i see you live in the cove I live buy super store on the parkway if you want to checkout a delica let me know

cheers
matthew

[Green1]

The Delica does cruise at 120 with no problem (have been slightly higher, but not much) but it does loose a lot of speed on hills (don't be surprised if you can't get it to stay over 70 going up a mountain pass) on the bright side though, it doesn't seem to matter how much weight you put in it, it behaves exactly the same.

[Adrock]

green1 drives an automatic. the 5 speed will cruise at 90kmh no problem. Mine is an 89 though, i think newer 5 speeds are cool around 100, add 31 inch tired for a 10%ish increase in speed. I can finally do the speed limit.

Seriously, the tires changed a 14 hour trip i nthe winter into 11.5 hours today. could partly have been some of the snow and ice, but i wasnt babying the van that much in the winter.