Renault has announced that it is to manufacture Fiat’s next medium panel van, due in 2016. Its current medium panel van, the Scudo, has been manufactured by French manufacturer PSA Peugeot Citroen since 1996 and shares the same design as the Citroen Dispatch and Peugeot Expert.
Heavy Van production not affected
A new venture between Renault and Fiat sees the two major automotive companies tied into a manufacturing agreement for the very first time. It’s understood that Fiat will continue to manufacture the recently updated Citroen Relay and Peugeot Boxer at its Val di Sangro plant in Northern Italy until 2019, however.
The new Fiat will share the same platform as the Trafic and will be manufactured at Sandouville, northern France, along with the Renault Trafic, Vauxhall/Opel Vivaro and the Nissan NV300. It has been reported that Renault has allocated itself approximately 50% of the 150,000 production capacity, with Fiat 20%, Opel/GM 10% and Nissan 7%.
Distinctive Look
Fiat and Renault have been sketchy thus far about the appearance of the van, but a spokesman for Fiat announced that, “the styling of the Fiat vehicle will be developed by Fiat and will feature unique and distinctive elements on the model, branded Fiat Professional”.
It has been suggested that these ‘distinctive elements’ could include the fitting of Fiat’s own headlights, grille and bonnet which will give the van its own unique styling, as Volkswagen has done with the Crafter and Nissan has done with the NV400.
It’s likely, though, that the Fiat will inherit many of the Trafic’s loading attributes. This includes the two nominal gross vehicles weights of 2.7 and 2.9 tonnes, payloads of between 1,000kg and 1,300kg, and load volumes of between 5.4 and 8.6m³.
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