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| ▲ | bluGill 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | The transit has 3060-5110lbs cargo capacity. The pacifica minivan 1700 (that seems to be the most though I didn't look them all up). maybe you think they are under powered but the ratings allow it and they seem to have no problem when I see them. Winning races isn't the point. | | |
| ▲ | potato3732842 2 days ago | parent [-] | | From bumper to bumper these euro vans are designed with stereotypical european "well if anything outside of spec happens the customer will bring it to the dealer/call a tow truck/solve it immediately" and "the customer will never exceed any rating" set of assumptions. This is bad for the american customer because these assumptions run counter to and are in conflict with the American customer's assumptions for how much fudge factor is built into commercial products. The OEM of course pockets the difference. >The transit has 3060-5110lbs cargo capacity. I assume that's half ton through 1-ton single rear wheel (because 5k would be comically low for a DRW). The axle they put in the half ton (ford 9.75 semi float) isn't gonna live a long life at 3k + vehicle weight. The bearing just isn't up to it. They use the same assembly on the E-150 so lateral move there. The full float is good, but they nerf'd it by spec'ing the bare minimum for tube diameter/thickness so you're one "oops that's a way bigger pothole than I thought" away from expensive problems though they did a very good job on the spindle and hubs. I don't think anyone even knows what the realistic capacity of a single rear wheel E-350 is. The axle tube, hubs, bearings, spindles, etc, are solidly in the 10k ballpark, but you literally can't buy a single 16" tire that'll get you there. The front suspension is also way more maintenance intensive and less stupid proof over its life than the I beam system in the E-series though I'd say the GMC is comparable. Brakes are probably a lateral move but the general unibody construction is just gonna have less margin for stupidity/error when operating at/above rated capacity. Do that habitually and you'll eventually break something that you're not supposed to break whereas the legacy van with it's body on frame construction will just wear out parts fast. Like imagine you get a little sideways in an icey parking lot at 10mph. In the old van that's just a bump and a scare. In the new van that could be a replacement subframe. The customer is expecting the former. >maybe you think they are under powered It's not that they're under powered so much as they're unnecessarily high strung and over-engineered in the name of fuel economy for whatever power level they do have. On the Fords you're gonna deal with stupid ecoboost problems, wet belts and that stupid valve that makes the transmission warm up faster (probably doesn't even pay for itself over its life) that you have to drop the transmission to replace and the 9.75 rear axle being generally unsuited to hauling (though maybe they've fixed that at this point, all they needed to do was spec a different bearing with more smaller rollers) and unnecessarily expensive brake jobs. Ironically, if you embrace the low end (which most buyers don't because on paper the ecoboost options will save you enough fuel to be worth it) Ford's NA V6 is actually really good. Then on the Mercedes side everything is typical german engineering. Tons of "gotta replace X before Y or it will Z" gotchas on the 07+ sprinter platforms. You basically wind up replacing everything outside the engine but in the engine bay over 200k. And everything inside it likes to fall apart. Mercedes loves to use over-engineered plastic for everything so it works great for the design life until the 1-millionth slam after which the door won't shut or whatever. Typical "Klaus got a bonus for reducing part count or labor operations" type behavior that the germans are stereotyped for. They generally buy decent transmission from ZF so those are solid >when I see them When was the last time you saw an 00s Sprinter? They're probably outnumbered by the Dodge vans they replaced at this point. When was the last time you saw a Transit that wasn't in "new enough to still be kinda nice" condition. There's a reason you see old E-series and not old Transits despite the overlapping production years putting the last of the E-series and first of the Transit right about what should be perfect "old work van" age. The problem with these Euro vans is that every maintenance event has one more digit in front of the decimal than the more well rounded north american vans they replaced and they don't require any less maintenance so they're a money suck to own unless you're turning your fleet over rapidly (like swanky airport shuttles and property management companies and whatnot do). This obviously doesn't matter if you expect your average customer to trade in a 5yr due to MOT nitpicking and the trade in will be sold to Africa where any work it needs can be done for peanuts. In conclusion, I'm not talking about a categorical difference, but European vans are just not properly engineered for the North American customer. Yes, the customer can make do, but they're making do with something that's a little worse across the board and will spend a little more time in the shop over its life and with higher bills for marginally better fuel economy they don't benefit from and interior space they weren't constrained by. This is why GM still sells the Savannah and Ford still doesn't consider the Transit a replacement for the E-series when it comes to selling cab and chassis vehicles. | | |
| ▲ | bluGill 2 days ago | parent [-] | | > When was the last time you saw an 00s Sprinter? Commercial vehicles are used hard and long. They wear out much faster than private cars. Sure they tend to go a lot more miles, but the time is not long. I don't see many vehicles from the 00s - the ones you do are either rusty (road salt gets them where I live), or they are collector vehicles that are rarely driven. I almost never see Dodge cans either - and when I do they don't look roadworthy. |
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| ▲ | bradyd 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | A GMC Savannah is not a mini-van. | |
| ▲ | jorvi 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | > They're all crap that will be run circles around by a GMC Savannah in every category except fuel economy. Well, when gasoline is nearly $10 a gallon a good fuel economy kind of becomes the primary goal. Its like complaining European and Japanese cars are bad at everything except being small. Good luck finding parking in Paris or Tokyo with a Ford F150 or Dodge Ram. | |
| ▲ | fragmede 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Explain how to fit a GMC Savannah into a compact car parking space that's 5 feet shorter than it, with vehicles on both ends of that parking space and also the GMC is two feet two wide for, and I'll listen to how the Nissan NV200 or the Ford Transit van isn't a two ton truck. Obviously if you're hauling a 4 ft cube of depleted uranium, it's not going up be up to the task. But getting 25 mpg vs a two-ton work truck's eight mpg adds up. A lot if you're driving 300 miles a day. If you're a locksmith in a city your hauling needs are different than the general contractor or someone more specialized, that actually has one ton of equipment and a trailer generator to bring to the job site. The argument that light work vans are small and underpowered so no one should use them is the same argument as big pickups are big and stupid and no one should use them, just from the other direction. Different strokes, as appropriate, for different folk who have different needs than you. | | |
| ▲ | potato3732842 2 days ago | parent [-] | | >Explain how to fit a GMC Savannah into a compact car parking space that's 5 feet shorter than it The same way you do a Sprinter. <eyeroll> You are confusing the Transit and the Transit Connect. I actually really love the Transit Connect. I am complaining about the Transit, Sprinter and their ilk. As an aside, the Ducato is ironically actually best in North American markets because none of their the diesel engine options are great in terms of ownership cost or frequency of downtime but the Pentastar they got when they bought Chrysler is ok, if over-taxed to the point of lesser reliability in such an application. | | |
| ▲ | fragmede 2 days ago | parent [-] | | > I am complaining about the Transit, Sprinter and their ilk. Good thing you specified that in your comment [1] then, where you wrote > Fiat, Mercedes or Ford and never used the word Sprinter once, so of course I should deduce that was the vehicle you were talking about, along with the full size Transit, especially since the linked Road and Track article was discussing the Transit Custom, which has never reached the states and is of the smaller NV200 size class, so please forgive me for the confusion. The great thing about the Sprinter is that it's big and tall and spacious inside. Unfortunately, the problem with the Sprinter is that it's big and tall, which is a real problem in high wind conditions. Yeah it could stand to have a bigger engine and beefier chassis, no argument from me there, but I have a carpenter friend who uses it to haul around his tools and lumber and he loves his so much that he bought a second one. The Sprinter's not got the powertrain of a GMC Savannah or RAM 2500 or F-250 Super Duty, but saying it's only good for moving boxes full of air is hyperbole. As far as vehicle turnover goes, given the stronger union protections that workers in the trades in Europe get, not having to drive a busted 15 year old work truck that veers to the left because the suspension is shot and gets eight miles to the gallon doesn't seem like, to me, a bad thing! The most brilliant electrician I know owns his own business, but is driving a 15-year work truck that should have been replaced 10 years ago, but he can't afford to replace it. IMO, the real question is who's going to be first to come out with a work truck/van that's comma.ai compatible. That thing makes driving long distances so much more stomachable. Not going to hold my breath for Waymo or Tesla or anybody else to compete there. Well except Mercedes, but that still likely to be a premium Mercedes car feature for a long time and not something on any of their brands work vehicles. Supposedly some F-150's can take it, but afaik those ones are the premium package, already have Blue Cruise, and aren't fleet vehicles anywhere (I'd love to be wrong though!). [1] https://archive.is/8X2MD | | |
| ▲ | potato3732842 2 days ago | parent [-] | | The opinion that these vans are too light for the uses into which they are sold is not a novel one. It is probably the predominant one among people who turn wrenches on both the old ones and the new ones. | | |
| ▲ | VBprogrammer 2 days ago | parent [-] | | This is just hubris. These vans are used hard every day by people all over Europe. It's not unusual for one to be caught loaded to double it's GVWR. Mechanics like what they know. The fact that the US manufacturers are building vans designed in the 90s using engines designed in the 50s undoubtedly means they are easier to work on. | | |
| ▲ | potato3732842 2 days ago | parent [-] | | I didn't say you couldn't screw them. I said they screw you back in terms of repair/maintenance costs (and don't save enough fuel along the way to make it worth it). By the late 90s the domestics had refreshed their vans to use engine architectures designed in the early 90s. They all have a bunch of tasks that are shit to do depending on the model and options. 6.0 Ford head gaskets are legendary in that regard. Ford is generally bad since so much stuff is a "pull the cab" problem which is a much bigger problem on a vehicle with a box truck body that extends over the cab and their infatuation with OHC engines makes things naturally more cramped. But it's just a lot less of a problem when you're not shitting out turbos every now and then or dicking with all the potential leak points of an cooling system that has 3x the components it needs to (looking at you Mercedes) or R&Ring a rear cylinder head in a transverse application (Fiat obviously). I'm not saying they're unreliable, but if you have a fleet of 5/10/20 there's always gonna be something that needs fixing and "needs fixing" is generally more expensive on the euro designs. And it's not really the engines. It's the whole chassis that has stupid stuff randomly distributed around it. The Mercedes door tracks and tearing a suspension mount off on a minor sideways slide/bump that should've just required a change of underwear and maybe a tire/rim weren't things I made up, those were examples I've cleaned up after. Another example that comes to mind is how the Front of a Transit is 10lb of shit in a 5lb bag. That doesn't leave a lot of room for oopsies. Can't really bump them into anything without causing problems. I've seen a GMC van (Uhaul truck specifically) eat a deer at highway speed without even popping a leak because they had the foresight to put a whole bunch of dead space there. Imagine not having to incur $$$ downtime in that situation. They're fine vehicles when new, have a lot of space, are as ergonomic as anything else out there but if you aren't buying a huge fleet that will be strictly managed so nothing gets routinely abused/overloaded, can't afford to pay games depreciating over 3yr and then trading in can't easily use rentals to cover downtime (<cough> Amazon <cough>), walk into your local Chevy dealer and say "I want what Uhaul has". Sure, none of this matters if you're paying the mechanic/autobody rates in Turkey or Lithuania to keep them going or trading in every 3yr before MOT starts screwing you at every pass through but we can't all be that lucky. |
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