The final, and biggest, piece in the re-making of the Transit range falls into place. This is the big beast in the new pack
Ford Transit LWB Hi-Roof Trend 125bhp
What is it?
When it comes to launches they simply don’t get any bigger than this. A new Transit – and we are not just talking facelifts here. Oh no!
It’s fresh from the nuts and bolts upwards
It’s fresh from the nuts and bolts upwards and after driving this van in Barcelona before the official spring launch we can only say: “Wow!” This new model blows away the opposition in terms of frugality, drivability, loadspace and maintenance costs.
Ford is primarily a fleet manufacturer – some 80% of its sales go to the big boys.
But that doesn’t mean smaller trade users are left out in the cold and the manufacturer is in the process of setting up 110 Transit Centres across the UK to deal with the special needs of people like you. As there are some 450 different variants including panels vans, chassis-cabs, box vans, lutons and minibuses it’s highly unlikely that you won’t find one to suit your particular needs.
One of the problems with the old Transit was that it had to cover two different sectors right from 2.6 tonnes to 4.7 tonnes gross vehicle weight, whereas all the other rivals have two different offerings (eg Volkswagen Transporter/Crafter and Citroen Dispatch/Relay).
That’s all changed now as Ford has split Transit into two distinct vans. The smaller Transit Custom was launched last year to rave reviews and now there’s the bigger version (2.9-4.7 tonnes).
It’s just miles to expensive: 28k plus vat that is seriously overpriced, they really have priced themselves out of the market.
Editor’s comment
Don’t forget Des this is for the larger 2 tonne model: the first time Ford has split its Transit range into 1 tonne (Transit Custom) and 2 tonne (Transit). The Transit’s price range is below that of the VW Crafter and Mercedes Sprinter panel vans which offer the same package.
Ralph Morton, editor