Day Test | 31
The Chinese-built LDV is a modern and good looking base vehicle, while Kea’s new Breeze motorhome body has a streamlined nose leading to a conventional, boxy body. How well the LDV stands up to the rental market remains to be seen, but Kea is a dab hand at building durable bodies.
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p until the latter part of last year there had been few surprises from the Kea motorhome stable; owners Tourism Holdings Ltd (THL) apparently happy to run with the status quo. That all changed with the arrival of Kea’s Breeze, built on a Chinese LDV V80 cab-chassis. If that wasn’t enough it’s also Kea’s first design with a drop down bed, while at 6.3 m (20’ 8”) it’s one of the shortest Kea coachbuilts ever. Before passing judgement on the Breeze it's probably good to understand Kea's design thinking. Mostly built for their rental fleet, it had to be small to mid-sized while price matching the more basic motorhomes coming out of Britain and Europe. And of course it still had to be be suitable for New Zealand conditions. Hence the choice of the LDV cab-chassis. In case you’re wondering LDV stands for Leyland DAF Vehicles. Dutch manufacturer DAF took over what was left of the Leyland empire in Thatcherite Britain
to form LDV, which via several subsequent owners has ended up with the Chinese SAIC group.
The Vehicle
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lthough the LDV is Chinese built it does have a few non-Chinese items, like the Italian VM Motori-designed 2.5 litre turbo diesel engine, the Bosch fuel injection systems and the Euro designed automated manual transmission (AMT). It's no Fiat Ducato, though, so apart from anything else it doesn’t have swivelling cab seats. In fact the LDV comes with a bench seat that Kea has replaced with two bucket seats. Apart from being more comfortable they allow easy through-cab access. I have to say the fibreglass composite body shape is a contrast in style. From the front it looks quite streamlined, with a slight cab overhang, yet still very low profile. Looking