Is this the cleverest six-metre motorhome on the market?
THE Chausson X650 Exclusive Line might be our Motorhome of the Year 2024 but its little brother came first, in 2021, and was so successful that Chausson stopped promoting it for a while in order to catch up with delivering the ’vans it had already sold. Our video of the X550 has had nearly 800,000 views – see it at motorhome.ma/review220 Here then is a low-profile motorhome with a unique look – all in black and white. Despite the ubiquitous Fiat Ducato cab, you’d never mistake it for anything else. Nor is it like anything else. It’s barely wider than a panel van and only 5.99m long, but it has a large lounge and a drop-down bed, plus a washroom that belies the ’van’s size. Almost TARDIS-like, this is perhaps the cleverest motorhome – or is it a campervan? – ever to come from this most innovative of all mainstream motorhome makers.
But. There’s always a ‘but’ isn’t there? The one thing that the X550 lacked at launch was sufficient windows. Where there should have been glazing on the offside it had a pinboard and mirror. The YouTube comments weren’t at all kind but the French firm hadn’t come over totally perverse and a bit (shrugs shoulders) Gallic – there were genuine technical reasons for the absence of that window. Reasons that took time to overcome. But overcome them they have, so – ta-da! – here’s the 2024 model year X550 Exclusive Line. With that extra window!
To be honest, Chausson hasn’t changed much else in this one-of-a-kind vehicle, but then it didn’t need to. So, you’ll spot a new ‘X’ motif inside the door and an X-shaped light on the underside of the drop-down bed but that’s about it for the changes. All the winning features of the model remain intact.
Technically, this is a low-profile with the usual sandwich construction of GRP skinned walls and Styrofoam insulation. The exterior also has a bit of the off-roader about its aesthetics, although the 140hp engine drives only the front wheels. Like Swift’s new Trekker, this is a ’van that seems to be chasing a younger audience. Unlike the longer, newer X650, there’s no garage but a tall exterior locker on the nearside caters for outdoor chairs and the like.
As it’s sold only as an Exclusive Line model, the X550 gets plenty of kit as standard, including black alloy wheels (an alternative, part-polished design on automatic versions, which have a different axle), ESP, Traction Plus, stop/start and an overcab sunroof, but you migh
