I made a slight mistake in this video. At 08:51 when talking about the supply cables to the air conditioning compressor, I said "AC power", when I was meant to say "12V DC power".
I bought one of these for less than half price at auction recently, with very low mileage. Clearly the previous owner, a specialist window company that operated nationwide, hadn't done their research or had been missold. It's just not suitable for long distance work, where time is money and public charging during working hours is money down the drain. The all-new rear suspension and motor are an engineering marvel. The van is great to drive and fairly economical (just over 2 miles per kWh if driven like a diesel). I'm somewhat disappointed that Ford didn't go further in embracing EVs by getting rid of some of the ICE legacy compromises. For example, as we saw in the video, a huge amount of space is wasted under the bonnet. Yet if you look under the vehicle there is a lot of places that things like the AC unit could have been mounted, leaving the engine bay free for something really useful, like a tool safe. In the cab, we still have the transmission tunnel, that means the centre seat is still only suitable for a small crippled lad with one leg longer than the other. The gear stick housing, which intrudes uncomfortably of the leg room for the middle passenger is surely no longer required. Ford should have been braver and designed an all-new EV-centred platform, a MK9 if you like, and then retrofitted an ICE or hybrid drive train. They could have achieved lower load height, lower centre of gravity and 50:50 weight distribution. If you can live with the range it is a great van, but be sure you can live with the range before buying one.
Nice look around. I thought the 69kWh was gross. Good to know it nett. That gives it the same pack as my e-Expert. I'm looking to see if these are my next Camper build. They are reasonably priced now. Not many with the pro-power around though.
Another informative video. I think the preoccupation of range should be changed to the savings per mile (exc other costs). My Kona ev costs 1.5p per mile vs 15p for a petrol car. (Charging at night on an EV tariff)
While I agree. If you can charge at home, the cost of running an EV feels almost nothing. Our two private EVs are costing only about £150 a year to fuel. But when it comes to vans, especially big vans like this, they are typically charged at a workplace but would still cheaper to fuel than a diesel. However, its the range of EVs that is putting many off. But many will be thinking about this wrong as they'll be comparing it to a tank of diesel which only gets refilled over week or two.
@@GoGreenAutos I'm tempted by an E-transit after the mechnical nightmre the last one i had was with a diesel engine and modern diesels are made of chocolate
But that’s only half the story (conveniently) On longer journeys, when I have to charge my EV at public chargers, it costs over twice as much as it would to fuel my petrol car. 75p a kW gets me 3 miles. 75p worth of unleaded gets me 6.8 miles People need to know the whole picture, not just some out of date narrow minded narrative
@@AndyC2_ Not all chargers are 75p and Tesla ones are amongst the cheapest at about half of that or there abouts albeit I seldom rarely use any. Also not all EV's are equal and there are EV's that can do over 5 miles to the Kw. my over 2 ton 4.2 sec 0-60 EV will easily do 4 miles per Kw. It can go down to 3 when I wear my lead shoes! The other thing is that if you can charge at home or at work you blend the two rates together.
I have a question, when you touch the brake to start regeneration braking does the brake lights come on and stay on while you are breaking and go off when this braking finishes or does the brake lights just flash on & off?
I didn't check on this van, which is now sold so I can't check. However, with most EVs, the brake lights come on at a certain level of deceleration. So if the regen is light, no brake lights. But if the vehicle is slowing down more, it puts the brake lights on even if the brake pedal isn't touched. On the e-Transit, the first level of regen wouldn't be strong enough to keep the brake lights on, so you would just get a flash initially when the driver touched the brakes. But the second level is probably strong enough to trigger the lights. There's an EU rule to set the level at which the brake lights come on.
Thanks for the upload, very informative. Unfortunately, range is still not where it needs to be. Driving in winter, getting in and out and opening the doors to get stuff in and out means your going to need the heaters. On the plus side, it doesn't have a wet belt. Cheers 🍻
@@thinfourth Maybe. I've been ignoring them until I bought this one, which happened to be a 198kW one. I must admit, it wasn't as lively as I was expecting, but then its a huge van, so maybe I was expecting too much. But as always, EVs hide the speed because they are so quiet and smooth and there's no noise and vibration giving you the feeling of speed.
Sorry to be negative but real world driving in winter will likely be little more than 100 miles. Add to that the fact it has such an inefficient heater, that would bring it down to 75 miles. I know people say to use seat and steering wheel heating, but then how would you keep all the windows clear ? Yes it has a heated element in the windscreen but they only stay on for 4 minutes at a time and use massive power consumption. It’s just too much compromise, it’s like using a van from the 1970s with sub standard heating and technology. People should be calling it out as simply being not good enough, yet all I hear is you making excuses for the poor range, poor heating and de misting capabilities. In a vehicle that size and weight, it should have a battery twice the size I’d love to see you load it up and do some real world range testing in the winter months
Unfortunately I didn't have the vehicle long enough to do any testing as it sold within a few days. But my tests on other electric vans show that weight doesn't make the difference people assume. See www.youtube.com/@GoGreenAutos/search?query=weight But yes I would agree, a larger battery would be better on such a large van. But that will only add cost and probably not sell. The cost of batteries are reducing rapidly, so I would expect the next model to have a much larger battery and probably a lower list price as well. It was a very different time (in terms of battery cell prices) back in 2021 when this van production was getting ready.
@@GoGreenAutosYes I wasn’t very clear but it wasn’t so much the weight, it would have been great to see the real world range and how it’s affected by using the heater etc Thanks
The heat pump in my 2014 LEAF works really well and has minimal effect on the range. With a big battery such as this vehicle has, and only heating the cab, I think a heat pump is the way to go.
I made a slight mistake in this video. At 08:51 when talking about the supply cables to the air conditioning compressor, I said "AC power", when I was meant to say "12V DC power".
I don't think you showed the location of the 12v battery in the video?
I bought one of these for less than half price at auction recently, with very low mileage. Clearly the previous owner, a specialist window company that operated nationwide, hadn't done their research or had been missold. It's just not suitable for long distance work, where time is money and public charging during working hours is money down the drain.
The all-new rear suspension and motor are an engineering marvel. The van is great to drive and fairly economical (just over 2 miles per kWh if driven like a diesel).
I'm somewhat disappointed that Ford didn't go further in embracing EVs by getting rid of some of the ICE legacy compromises. For example, as we saw in the video, a huge amount of space is wasted under the bonnet. Yet if you look under the vehicle there is a lot of places that things like the AC unit could have been mounted, leaving the engine bay free for something really useful, like a tool safe.
In the cab, we still have the transmission tunnel, that means the centre seat is still only suitable for a small crippled lad with one leg longer than the other. The gear stick housing, which intrudes uncomfortably of the leg room for the middle passenger is surely no longer required.
Ford should have been braver and designed an all-new EV-centred platform, a MK9 if you like, and then retrofitted an ICE or hybrid drive train. They could have achieved lower load height, lower centre of gravity and 50:50 weight distribution.
If you can live with the range it is a great van, but be sure you can live with the range before buying one.
Got to be the most informative video, thank you for taking the time to make this. Very useful (about to buy one of these…)
Thanks. You're welcome.
That was interesting.
Smart looking and well equipped with enough range for many local applications rather than motorway munching.
Exactly. There's plenty of trades that only work locally.
Will make great camper conversions
That looks like any easy vehicle to work on . Battery pack easy to drop down and motor also
Nice look around. I thought the 69kWh was gross. Good to know it nett. That gives it the same pack as my e-Expert.
I'm looking to see if these are my next Camper build. They are reasonably priced now. Not many with the pro-power around though.
Yes finding one with pro-power (V2L) would make an excellent camper.
Another informative video. I think the preoccupation of range should be changed to the savings per mile (exc other costs). My Kona ev costs 1.5p per mile vs 15p for a petrol car. (Charging at night on an EV tariff)
While I agree. If you can charge at home, the cost of running an EV feels almost nothing. Our two private EVs are costing only about £150 a year to fuel.
But when it comes to vans, especially big vans like this, they are typically charged at a workplace but would still cheaper to fuel than a diesel. However, its the range of EVs that is putting many off. But many will be thinking about this wrong as they'll be comparing it to a tank of diesel which only gets refilled over week or two.
@@GoGreenAutos I'm tempted by an E-transit after the mechnical nightmre the last one i had was with a diesel engine
and modern diesels are made of chocolate
@@thinfourth Yep, DPFs, Adblu, wet timing belts are all things that have made combusion engines even more unreliable.
But that’s only half the story (conveniently)
On longer journeys, when I have to charge my EV at public chargers, it costs over twice as much as it would to fuel my petrol car.
75p a kW gets me 3 miles.
75p worth of unleaded gets me 6.8 miles
People need to know the whole picture, not just some out of date narrow minded narrative
@@AndyC2_ Not all chargers are 75p and Tesla ones are amongst the cheapest at about half of that or there abouts albeit I seldom rarely use any. Also not all EV's are equal and there are EV's that can do over 5 miles to the Kw. my over 2 ton 4.2 sec 0-60 EV will easily do 4 miles per Kw. It can go down to 3 when I wear my lead shoes!
The other thing is that if you can charge at home or at work you blend the two rates together.
I have a question, when you touch the brake to start regeneration braking does the brake lights come on and stay on while you are breaking and go off when this braking finishes or does the brake lights just flash on & off?
I didn't check on this van, which is now sold so I can't check. However, with most EVs, the brake lights come on at a certain level of deceleration. So if the regen is light, no brake lights. But if the vehicle is slowing down more, it puts the brake lights on even if the brake pedal isn't touched.
On the e-Transit, the first level of regen wouldn't be strong enough to keep the brake lights on, so you would just get a flash initially when the driver touched the brakes. But the second level is probably strong enough to trigger the lights.
There's an EU rule to set the level at which the brake lights come on.
@@GoGreenAutos Thank you for your clarification, I hoped that would be the case
Thanks for the upload, very informative.
Unfortunately, range is still not where it needs to be. Driving in winter, getting in and out and opening the doors to get stuff in and out means your going to need the heaters.
On the plus side, it doesn't have a wet belt.
Cheers 🍻
Can you imagine pulling up at the pumps in an old transit and taking 3 hours to fill the tank.
But it doesn't take 3 hours. Typically ~30 mins when DC charging.
Can you imagine an old Transit that starts every morning with a full tank!
Owww you have the rare 198kW one
Are they?
@@GoGreenAutos I'm sure most i have seen are the smaller motor
well
It's probably th same motor but with different mapping
@@thinfourth Maybe. I've been ignoring them until I bought this one, which happened to be a 198kW one.
I must admit, it wasn't as lively as I was expecting, but then its a huge van, so maybe I was expecting too much. But as always, EVs hide the speed because they are so quiet and smooth and there's no noise and vibration giving you the feeling of speed.
DPD are dropping them because of dire range when loaded. Less than 80 miles in winter.
Did you notice the excellent modification to the brake vacuum sensor on the servo? Watch the vid again and you will see it.
Yes the foam tabs stuck on the top? I was going to question that to see if anyone knew the purpose?
@GoGreenAutos was a recall , water dripped onto sensor causing sensor failure. That's fords way of a fix. 😂😂
Surely the button at the charge port could be used by someone else, to unplug early & stop a charge...I don't understand the use case
Not when the van is locked.
Sorry to be negative but real world driving in winter will likely be little more than 100 miles.
Add to that the fact it has such an inefficient heater, that would bring it down to 75 miles.
I know people say to use seat and steering wheel heating, but then how would you keep all the windows clear ?
Yes it has a heated element in the windscreen but they only stay on for 4 minutes at a time and use massive power consumption.
It’s just too much compromise, it’s like using a van from the 1970s with sub standard heating and technology.
People should be calling it out as simply being not good enough, yet all I hear is you making excuses for the poor range, poor heating and de misting capabilities.
In a vehicle that size and weight, it should have a battery twice the size
I’d love to see you load it up and do some real world range testing in the winter months
Unfortunately I didn't have the vehicle long enough to do any testing as it sold within a few days. But my tests on other electric vans show that weight doesn't make the difference people assume. See www.youtube.com/@GoGreenAutos/search?query=weight
But yes I would agree, a larger battery would be better on such a large van. But that will only add cost and probably not sell. The cost of batteries are reducing rapidly, so I would expect the next model to have a much larger battery and probably a lower list price as well. It was a very different time (in terms of battery cell prices) back in 2021 when this van production was getting ready.
@@GoGreenAutosYes I wasn’t very clear but it wasn’t so much the weight, it would have been great to see the real world range and how it’s affected by using the heater etc
Thanks
The heat pump in my 2014 LEAF works really well and has minimal effect on the range. With a big battery such as this vehicle has, and only heating the cab, I think a heat pump is the way to go.
seems like a lot of rust on the pack
It looks like it on camera, but it's just mud.