by potato3732842 | 2025-11-04 18:38:21+00:00
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.