Revealed: South Africa’s fastest double cab bakkies

I have been testing cars, SUVs, MPVs and SAVs … basically anything with wheels for as many years as I can remember. But funny enough, nowhere has the debate been more furious than when it comes to double cab bakkies.

The things that started out as ugly, slow, unsafe, utilitarian vessels to cart rubbish around are now the most popular family vehicles on our roads.

Just as bakkies have evolved from ugly and unsafe, so has the quest from the manufacturers ramped up exponentially to build and offer the most powerful family and cargo movers on planet earth.

Now bragging rights in the double cab space comes in the form of how fast your bakkie is. Today we bring you the fastest five off the showroom floor bakkies we have ever tested.

Two decades ago, the top-of-the-range double cabs produced around 80 kW of power, ran notchy old manual gearboxes and would take over 15 seconds to hit 100 km/h from a standstill. And well over 20 seconds to get to the national speed limit of 120 km/h.

Fast forward to present day and now top-of-the-range five-seaters use smooth shifting automatic transmission and produce nothing less than double the power they did back then.

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In fifth place on our list of fastest bakkies we have the Toyota Hilux 2.8 GD-6 Legend RS Double Cab with a 0 to 100 km/h time of 12.38 seconds. This double cab recently underwent a bit of a spec change and inherited some extra power courtesy of a bigger turbocharger.

It now produces 150 kW of power and 500 Nm of torque and this bottom of our top five log position is a bit of a misnomer, because it’s only a bit of turbo lag that hinders it off the line. Once it gets going, it is quicker than all the others, bar the 3.0-litre V6 models.

In fourth place is the arch nemesis of the Toyota Hilux, the Ford Ranger. But not in 2.0-litre bi-turbo guise like you might think, but in the tried and tested 147kW/470Nm 3.2-litre format. This Wildtrak gets to 100 km/h in 12.34 seconds, while running to a decent 155 km/h in 1 000m of tarmac.

In third place on our fastest bakkies list is a bit of a dark horse in the old, and very much forgotten, original big boy Nissan Navara 3.0 dCi.

Way ahead of its time with 170 kW of power and 550 Nm of torque back in 2010. It got to 100 km/h in 11.51 seconds, and there was nothing on the road that could catch it. Actually there still isn’t anything catching it unless it has a V6 turbodiesel powerplant.

Our runner-up is another 3.0-litre V6, and this time it is the much more modern and German powered Mercedes-Benz X350d 4Matic that produces 190kW/550Nm. This double cab was one of the first bakkies to break into the under 10-second club with a 0 to 100 km/h time of 9.43 seconds.

It also blasted through the 60 to 140 km/h roll on in a mere 12.60 seconds, a time that is substantially quicker than most.

Top of the pops of the fastest bakkies is VW’s giant killing 190 kW / 580 Nm Amarok. Nothing on the market now comes close.

A 0 to 100 km/h time of 8.14 seconds puts it more in hot hatch than bakkie territory, and 1 000 m speed of almost 180 km/h is about as fast as you would want to go in a two-ton double cab.

Click on the link below to see out listed of fastest double cabs as tested by The Citizen Motoring.

In conclusion to our little archive of SA’s fastest bakkies, it is clear that there is still no replacement for displacement. The bigger 3.0-litre V6 double cabs rule the roost.

Speaking of which, there is an incoming Ranger and Amarok that will offer 184kW/600Nm from its all-new 3.0-V6 turbodiesel.

The even bigger news, and guaranteed future chart topper, is that the new Ford Raptor will run a 292kW/583Nm 3.0-litre V6 twin-turbo petrol EcoBoost powerplant to end this debate once and for all.

For more information on this beast, click here.