INDIVIDUALLY heated front seats, Bluetooth connectivity, leather seats and steering wheel mounted audio controls are some of the equipment you would expect to find on a mid to high end family car, but perhaps not on a pick-up.
However, you will find them as standard on the Great Wall Steed – and all for a lot less than £20,000.
The what? I hear you ask, and I must admit that my knowledge of the Great Wall was limited to what I had read while trawling through motoring websites on the internet.
So let me enlighten you. As you may have guessed from the name, Great Wall is indeed a Chinese manufacturer – the country's largest producer of pick-up and SUV cars that has been making vehicles since 1976.
Great Wall is exporting the Steed to more than 120 countries worldwide including South Africa, Italy and Australia, where it has sold more than 20,000 vehicles alone.
The Steed is backed by an unequivocal six-year 125,000-mile warranty operated and guaranteed by International Motors, who have been the sole distributor of both Subaru and Isuzu since the late 1970s.
Now I must admit that my previous driving experience of pick-ups is pretty limited. I once took a Mitsubishi L200 to the Lake District for a weekend, and a friend of mine has a Nissan Navara which came in very handy last year for throwing things in the back of when our respective families spent a week's holidaying on the Isle of Wight.
But I have to say that I really enjoyed the few days I had with the Great Wall Steed, and it certainly came in handy during the recent wintry weather that we had.
It's a very well made, sturdy, no-nonsense vehicle that I think looks as good as other pick-ups on the market. It's got good pedigree too, finishing sixth in the 2013 Dakar Rally clearly demonstrates its reliability on some of the world's toughest terrain. The accompanying brochure described the Great Wall Steed as 'a real grafter' and it's easy to see why.
I drove the top-of-the-range Steed SE, which also added a body coloured hard top canopy with black roof rails, chrome trim to the daytime running lights, a chrome rear lamp surround, rear parking sensors, side bars and an under rail road liner to the already generous amount of kit.The first thing that struck me about the cab was how spacious it was, with plenty of room in the back for children's car seats or a couple of adults. The leather interior was surprising comfortable, and the heated seats were definitely put to good use.
The overall feeling of the interior matched that of the exterior – solid and practical – and the higher than usual ride made the driver's seat a good place to be.
I thoroughly enjoyed driving the Steed over the few days that I had it. Despite its overall length of more than five metres it was really manoeuvrable, and the steering was extremely light. It handled well around corners. Gear changing was smooth and responsive as well, making the Steed a really fun pick-up to drive. And I'm glad that we had a heavy snow shower on one of the evenings that I had the vehicle because it meant I could put it into four-wheel drive mode to test it in adverse weather. This was done simply by pressing a button on the dashboard at low speed, and I'm pleased to say that it stuck to the road and passed with flying colours.
Statistics such as 0-62 or the top speed of a vehicle such as this aren't really important, but those interested it is 17 seconds and 87mph respectively. However, what is important in this economic climate is the fuel consumption. Far from being a gas guzzler the Steed SE can officially do 32.8miles to the gallon combined and 29.1mpg urban according to EU test figures, which is not bad at all for the two-litre engine. CO2 emissions are 250g/km urban, 206g/km extra urban and 222g/km combined.
The SE model I drove costs just short of £17,000, with optional extras available including an Alpine audio sat nav, rubber or luxury carpet mats and a tow bar.
Great Wall says it is aiming to dominate the pick-up and SUV market in the UK with a few launches planned over the next 12 months, just like it does in China and is beginning to do Australia. If it does then just remember where you read about it first. For more information, call Hepworth Motor Company on 01484 683172. 208 Huddersfield Road, Holmfirth, HD9 3JL.
