Ford Transit Connect

[Six Fiend]

RS Grant said:

Six Fiend said:

Mine was ace, banged 100K on it in about 14 months. Loved the handling Was a great versatile van.

That's a lot of miles in a short space of time... I think that I've covered about 3500 miles in the time I've had it.


Cheers,
Grant

I was a courier on call 24/7 and frequently ended up the wrong end of the country and having to sleep in it. Had a Blue Fin thingy to give it a boost from, 75 to 90ps. Much improved, along with the removal of the 70mph British Gas speed limiter. Prior to that it could be outdragged by HGVs in a headwind!

[Heaveho]

Never seen better than 34 mg in mine ( 110 brake ), might be due to the fact it tends to spend most of it's life with the driver trying to kick the throttle pedal through the bulkhead though!

[RS Grant]

Heaveho said:

That blue one looks like the same colour as mine, ocean blue met, don't see it often.

The FRS head unit is bluetooth, yes. I think you'll have to get a fascia adaptor to fit it to the earlier van, but no big deal. It gets very good DAB reception, and the bluetooth seems excellent. Got mine on ebay for £125 for the head unit and £25 for the aerial.

Yeah it does seem like a pretty rare colour... his one is kept in great condition, it puts mine to shame actually!!

Good news about the BT on the FRS headunit, however, I hadn't thought about the actual fitting of it to my van. I'd forgotten that there was a facelift dashboard on the later Connects, so I'm not sure if it would actually be possible to fit to my van without a bit of cocking around... but I'm sure that google will have the answer.

bungz said:

I used to do about 50K a year in these, wonderful little van!

As mentioned they scream out for a 6th gear for distance work but other than that they are a hoot.

Engines seem fairly hardy too but weren't particularly economical due to the short ratio 5th gear from memory. And that fact everyone in our fleet drove them flat out, everywhere.

I'd have another if they didn't hold money stupidly well.

I'm sure that I read somewhere that a 6-spd conversion from a Focus TDCi would be possible on my van.. but to be honest, I'm never really in 5th gear for long periods of time and the cost of that conversion would probably be a bit too much for me to justify on this anyway.

You're right, I think that I'd get back quite a lot of what I paid for the van if I was to sell it just now. They really do seem to be good news on the used market.


Cheers,
Grant

[RS Grant]

Six Fiend said:

I was a courier on call 24/7 and frequently ended up the wrong end of the country and having to sleep in it. Had a Blue Fin thingy to give it a boost from, 75 to 90ps. Much improved, along with the removal of the 70mph British Gas speed limiter. Prior to that it could be outdragged by HGVs in a headwind!

Funny you should mention the outdragged by an HGV... I filled mine up with diesel on the way to the tip/unit yesterday (four chests of drawers for the tip and a set of wheels for my unit), pulled out onto the dual carriageway with PLENTY of distance (20+ car lengths) between myself the HGV which had just exited the roundabout... welded my foot to the floor and he very nearly had to pull out to overtake me.

Heaveho said:

Never seen better than 34 mg in mine ( 110 brake ), might be due to the fact it tends to spend most of it's life with the driver trying to kick the throttle pedal through the bulkhead though!

The 110bhp model must actually nip along quite swiftly?? I'd be interesting in finding out what parts are different between the models because if it was easy enough, retrofitting those 110 parts and then getting a remap should give you quite a potent wee van.


Cheers,
Grant

[RS Grant]

An update which I forgot to stick on here.

I bought some replacement seats for the van a wee while ago, they will require fabrication of some suitable mounts/runners but should improve the comfort and interior massively once fitted.






Cheers,
Grant

[Heaveho]

Don't think fitting the 110 parts would be financially viable, vn turbo and different pistons for a start........same goes with the 6 speed box, I enquired about it, too many difficulties to overcome to make it worth the effort. They reckon a remap on a 75 is money well spent. Cagey about doing it to mine, the clutches on the 110's are a bit marginal, shame as a remap on that gives about 135 brake and more torque, obviously.

I've had a 75, a 90 and now this, and in Connect terms it is quite quick, especially before I filled it up with all my work tat. It's been the best on fuel out of the 3, despite having roof bars and a raging lunatic wringing it's neck from Southampton to Newcastle and back regularly, but this is the only one I've had that's been run exclusively on proper fuel, and I think it's all the better for it.

By comparison to the above probs, I reckon fitting the FRS head unit would be a walk in the park. There'll be fascia and loom adaptor kits to buy, obviously. The proper Connect freaks on the Connect forum would sharp steer you right about exactly what's involved, better than I can, never did it to my earlier ones.