Vans with Sliding Front Doors
Discussion
In my youth it was quiet common to have vans with sliding front doors, that were often driven with the doors open.
eg:
They disappeared from the market many years ago, I assumed for safety reasons.
However, I was driving today in the sunshine and there was a chap driving a UPS Mercedes van with his sliding front door wide open.
(Example Photo whilst parked)
Now my actual question, were sliding doors actually banned or was it just too expensive or didn't work well with sliding rear doors, or is it just that the UPS bespoke vans aren't type approved so can get away with such things?
eg:
They disappeared from the market many years ago, I assumed for safety reasons.
However, I was driving today in the sunshine and there was a chap driving a UPS Mercedes van with his sliding front door wide open.
(Example Photo whilst parked)
Now my actual question, were sliding doors actually banned or was it just too expensive or didn't work well with sliding rear doors, or is it just that the UPS bespoke vans aren't type approved so can get away with such things?
I used to drive the Sherpa/ Freight Rover vans up to 1992. The sliding doors were great for multi drops and we only had to wear our seat belts when on route to the first drop. I covered 3 Birmingham postcodes so once on my patch it was great for jumping in and out. We were allowed to drive back with the door open as long as seatbelt was worn. They were very insecure though. A swift kick with the bottom of your boot on the leading edge the catch would give way and the door would slide open even when locked.
Amazon's purpose-built electric van in the States has then:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivian_EDV
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivian_EDV
As does Arrival's electric van:
https://arrival.com/topic/van
Although I'm not sure they'll be around for long enough to see it in production, despite the Royal Mail order...
https://arrival.com/topic/van
Although I'm not sure they'll be around for long enough to see it in production, despite the Royal Mail order...
So far as I'm aware there's nothing in UK that prevent anyone removing the doors from their car. IIRC some Jeeps and Land Rovers were specifically built with doors that are easy to remove.
The only exemption I can think of for delivery drivers is they don't have to wear a seatbelt if only driving very short distances between each delivery (<50m).
MOT? Doors must open and close properly if they are fitted. But if they've been removed that may, like missing passenger seats, not be a problem for the test.
The only exemption I can think of for delivery drivers is they don't have to wear a seatbelt if only driving very short distances between each delivery (<50m).
MOT? Doors must open and close properly if they are fitted. But if they've been removed that may, like missing passenger seats, not be a problem for the test.
Maybe they are problematic for meeting crash regulations. I can see them possibly not easily providing any rigidity to the passenger cabin by transferring impact energy, possibly difficult to engineer proper side impact protection including fit anti-burst locks so the doors stay closed providing protection in tension between the a and b pillar. And they probably are more expensive to build / fit, all of this possible complication for something that people live without anyway. Whereas side sliding cargo doors are much more useful, with fewer requirements.
Mikebentley said:
I used to drive the Sherpa/ Freight Rover vans up to 1992. The sliding doors were great for multi drops and we only had to wear our seat belts when on route to the first drop. I covered 3 Birmingham postcodes so once on my patch it was great for jumping in and out. We were allowed to drive back with the door open as long as seatbelt was worn. They were very insecure though. A swift kick with the bottom of your boot on the leading edge the catch would give way and the door would slide open even when locked.
FedEx? I used to drive these too, all around west country and SW Wales in the early 90s. The vans were utter s
te but sliding doors made the job a lot easier. dxg said:
As does Arrival's electric van:
https://arrival.com/topic/van
Although I'm not sure they'll be around for long enough to see it in production, despite the Royal Mail order...
The original was charming:https://arrival.com/topic/van
Although I'm not sure they'll be around for long enough to see it in production, despite the Royal Mail order...
Then maths got in the way. Presumably. And the people at Arrival introduced a second design:
The original design caused a small commotion over here. People on US forums were begging for the US Mail to buy it. Even the second version, just above, is reasonably acceptable.
Whatever you do, don't google the phrase:
next generation delivery vehicle usps
A plague! My eyes!
Sliding door vans were great in the city, very easy to jump in/out of on narrow streets
Great for keeping cool (posing) on hot days in a tin box
Not great in the winter or when it rained though as they’d freeze you and/or water would poor in through the gap between the body and the door
The heater on the Sherpa was on/off and didn’t really make much difference .. in the winter you’d be driving them with thick coat, gloves, scarf, hat etc just to try to keep warm
But on the plus side you could make them backfire for fun and slide the back round like a rally driver
Great for keeping cool (posing) on hot days in a tin box
Not great in the winter or when it rained though as they’d freeze you and/or water would poor in through the gap between the body and the door
The heater on the Sherpa was on/off and didn’t really make much difference .. in the winter you’d be driving them with thick coat, gloves, scarf, hat etc just to try to keep warm
But on the plus side you could make them backfire for fun and slide the back round like a rally driver
unsprung said:
The original was charming:
That design would have wiped out a cohort of pensioners who assumed it was their bus 500 yards out, stepped out to flag only to notice it was in fact the postman 5 yards out. 
The 'last mile' industry was throwing up some cool EV ideas for a while.
The core issue with sliding front doors is that it's just yet another thing to have to run safety videos on, specialist training, increased insurance, more paperwork on and deep down you know that whatever effort you go to you will still have the unavoidable idiot employee who genuinely believes he is the genius, the bloke who gobs off about all the usual f
ktard pseudo science and pulled from arse facts about stuff, who Brian Harvey's himself and then wants a load of compo. So you soon decide it's best to have normal doors and the 99% of your normal staff inconvenienced or robbed of fun because of the 1% of unavoidable moron hire. Just like you have to ban cake from the office, punishing 99% of the staff because 1% is comprised of fat, needy, useless Janet who hurls cake into her imploding face of lard while screaming they they only eat salad before sobbing uncontrollably, blaming everyone in society and heading to HR (turning the heating up to 30 on the way past the thermostat because she's chilly and it's all about her) for their compo winnings. We are all controlled by the 1%
unsprung said:
The original was charming:
Then maths got in the way. Presumably. And the people at Arrival introduced a second design:
The original design caused a small commotion over here. People on US forums were begging for the US Mail to buy it. Even the second version, just above, is reasonably acceptable.
Whatever you do, don't google the phrase:
next generation delivery vehicle usps
A plague! My eyes!
ReushesofftogooglenextgenerationdeliveryvehicleuspsThen maths got in the way. Presumably. And the people at Arrival introduced a second design:
The original design caused a small commotion over here. People on US forums were begging for the US Mail to buy it. Even the second version, just above, is reasonably acceptable.
Whatever you do, don't google the phrase:
next generation delivery vehicle usps
A plague! My eyes!
Oh my! Not even its mother could love that face.
PomBstard said:
Mikebentley said:
I used to drive the Sherpa/ Freight Rover vans up to 1992. The sliding doors were great for multi drops and we only had to wear our seat belts when on route to the first drop. I covered 3 Birmingham postcodes so once on my patch it was great for jumping in and out. We were allowed to drive back with the door open as long as seatbelt was worn. They were very insecure though. A swift kick with the bottom of your boot on the leading edge the catch would give way and the door would slide open even when locked.
FedEx? I used to drive these too, all around west country and SW Wales in the early 90s. The vans were utter ste but sliding doors made the job a lot easier. 
Panamax said:
So far as I'm aware there's nothing in UK that prevent anyone removing the doors from their car. IIRC some Jeeps and Land Rovers were specifically built with doors that are easy to remove.
The only exemption I can think of for delivery drivers is they don't have to wear a seatbelt if only driving very short distances between each delivery (<50m).
MOT? Doors must open and close properly if they are fitted. But if they've been removed that may, like missing passenger seats, not be a problem for the test.
I used to have a lightweight Landrover that I drove without doors and windscreen. I was never told off by the BiBs. Pretty similar to this one. It was great in the summer. Drove it like that through a snow storm too one winter. The only exemption I can think of for delivery drivers is they don't have to wear a seatbelt if only driving very short distances between each delivery (<50m).
MOT? Doors must open and close properly if they are fitted. But if they've been removed that may, like missing passenger seats, not be a problem for the test.
Blib said:
unsprung said:
The original was charming:
Then maths got in the way. Presumably. And the people at Arrival introduced a second design:
The original design caused a small commotion over here. People on US forums were begging for the US Mail to buy it. Even the second version, just above, is reasonably acceptable.
Whatever you do, don't google the phrase:
next generation delivery vehicle usps
A plague! My eyes!
ReushesofftogooglenextgenerationdeliveryvehicleuspsThen maths got in the way. Presumably. And the people at Arrival introduced a second design:
The original design caused a small commotion over here. People on US forums were begging for the US Mail to buy it. Even the second version, just above, is reasonably acceptable.
Whatever you do, don't google the phrase:
next generation delivery vehicle usps
A plague! My eyes!
Oh my! Not even its mother could love that face.
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