Faults:

No problems so far.

General Comments:

This car does everything we've asked of it in a very civilized package.

Let's start with the bad news; As I have heard for other Jumpy owners, the car wasn't delivered as ordered. Apparently this is quite common. Nine seats rather than the eight ordered and no reversing aid beepers.

The only negatives to come out of the driving experience are the noisy suspension (for a car, but excellent for a van) and the lack of bottom end torque. The rest of the power band is fine, but the car is easy to stall as a result of there being no significant power below about 1800 revs, especially as the engine is so willing higher up the range.

Having got rid of the negatives, there are a lot of very positive things to be said; the car is really a van, but drives much more like a car.

Having owned a Renault Espace, I'd say this drives as well as, if not better than that, high praise. There is almost no body roll until you start getting silly, and in any case, this is not supposed to be a sports car!

Pitching is also totally absent, something that was not true of the Espace.

Noise, vibration and harshness are almost all totally absent, with the exception of the suspension noise from the rear that has already been mentioned. This really is a very smooth performer.

Performance in the upper rev range is surprising for such a large vehicle. You are very aware of the turbo coming on boost and the car can be punted along at a good clip. Motorway driving is tremendously relaxed and a 600km journey left all involved relaxed and fresh. The cruise control was very useful and we were able to maintain 140kph into a headwind in top, in spite of top gear being an overdrive. Maybe the engine isn't that gutless after all.

The seats may appear to be very hard in the showroom, but on the open road they proved to be near perfect. Some might complain of a lack of side support, but that would be missing the point. If you need more side support you really need a different vehicle!

Accommodation for the passengers has proven to be more than enough. We have been able to carry our child's motocross bike and luggage in the boot, the same child asleep across one set of seats, a friend in the middle seats with our baby in her seat, my wife and myself, all at the same time. And we still had 2 spare seats! With all the rear seats out you then have a 6000lt(6m3) carrying space.

In conclusion then, we're very pleased with our purchase so far, especially as all the other large MPVs are either a lot smaller (C4 Grand Picasso/Espace and the like), a lot more expensive (Vito/Caravelle/Espace) or not as refined (Vito/Hyundai H1) or a combination of all the above.