nissan/toyota 4wd van opinions

[sig]

Hi guys .need to upgrade my work van.one of my contracts requires access to gravel/farm rds to service cell sites .Pain in the arse swapping my gear from my 2wd super custom van to the 80 for a day so i,m looking at a new (to me) van .am looking at turbo diesels in either toyota or nissan .the nissans seem to be about 5-8k cheaper than the toyotas (in the range i,m looking) looking at newer than 2003 ish on .the 4wd toyotas have the 2.5 turbo motor (2kd) which go great but the nissan caravans have a 3.0 intercooled turbo (more power ho ho ho ).would possably use it to tow my 40 every so often as well .does any body run these vans and what is there opinion off each one .your thoughts would be much appreciated cheers sig

[skid]

4wd supercustom

[juz]

My old man has had both and both have cracked heads at low kms, If your loading them up with gear all the time, like he does, a 2.5" exhaust seems to help resolve the problem.the Nissans do go bloody well too.

[sig]

want something newer skid. just done a bit of googleing on the nissan zd 30 (think thats what is in the vans) and man they seek to have fuel pump issues .no wonder they are cheaper than the toyotas

[tweake]

the last time i look at a 3 litre turbo nissan caravan it was not intercooled and rather low powered (100kw?). of course it the infamous ZD30 "grenade" motor.

i would check if they low range. i know the a lot of the earlier ones never had low range which was a pain.

how bad are the tracks?
the trouble with vans is front heavy (even with gear in the back) . ditto 4x4 light trucks.
also check what size tires you can fit, that can be a big limit for traction and if you can fit lockers.

one of the small 4x4 trucks we have used got stuck very easly due to no LSD. one of the other guys got one stuck in a paddock, to much weight on the front and small tires. towed him out with the ute.

it may be better to get a ute.

[sig]

the one i,m interested in (at the moment ) says on demand 4wd .Tracks are graded farm tracks ,normally some gravel on them so all wheel drive instead of 4wd would possably be all i needhttp://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Lis ... =207328651 .

[tweake]

yeah i know what those "graded farm tracks" are like. we used to use a cell site track to get into some of the back paddocks. rutted and severely overgrown with gorse !
some are rather steep ! low range was handy, mind you we where towing a few ton.