MK6 LWB mid-roof minibus '02 (camper to-be?) from Finland

[Finn_Timo]

Hello folks! It has been nearly five years time without Transit, I have been driving mainly with MK4 Mondeos in the between. Last Saturday things changed, our family collected an minibus from year 2002 which have been in taxi use. It has nine seats, but when I went to register it to my name it was MOT'd to six persons... That's fine, because in my plans for this van is to convert it to a camper van, sort of. Mainly to get it going with cheaper tax... This van is 2.0 TDDi 100 PS.

It has been an one owner vehicle from new and it has an respectable mileage: 674000 kilometres and it has it's original engine running! In last week the temperature was as low as -34 celcius, at Saturday it was only -12 degrees and the fired up immedeately after using glow plugs...

The body is in pretty good shape, the visible rust is mainly surface rust and cosmetic. But for the next MOT some welding is needed, the worst places are in the back section of the chassis rails. I dont't have any pictures from underneath the van, but I will take them when I have chance for it. Luckily it's not white, colour is Medium Steel Blue. Some pictures:



There are some alloys with, but they are in summer tyres:



And some surface rust:







Not so bad, when you think of age and mileage:





But there are some faults in it: error codes P0409 and P0404, which are from EGR? It seems that there is already a little ball bearing in the tube, but correct if I am wrong that EGR is not blocked off? The glow plug light flashes on, even if you empty the codes it comes right back. There was also code P0149, but it didn't show anymore after emptying. Van is struggling to get speed and rounds up, even 3000 rpm is hard to achieve.

What to do, take the EGR off and clean it (manifold also?), after that put a blanking plate on and everything should be working? Or what?! Thanks already!

[Finn_Timo]

As many of you know, buying an old vehicle can be very interesting sometimes. At least in that point, when you have to start repairing something in it... I took the EGR off and cleaned & blanked it off, somehow my eyes saw something strange in the turbo. I took an closer look and noticed that the hose which was leaving from wastegate bell was hanging loose. I started look where it has to be, I didn't figure it out so I called to my big brother who checked his own TDDi Transit. So, the verdict was to take the turbo off from the van... This is what I found:





Well, the turbo was vans original and the former owner told that it has never been maintenanced. There is very clear play on the bearings, so I ordered an second hand unit from Estonia. The prices in Finnish scrap yards or even private sellers are so high, that it was best to buy the turbo from Estonia (120€ + postage). Seller told that it has been in Mondeo MK3 and the mileage was 223000 km, so it is almost 450000 km less used than original unit

Story will continue after I get the turbo in my hands...

[Finn_Timo]

Oh, here are couple of pics from the interior what it looks like at the moment. Most of Finnish minibuses which are in professional use look pretty much this from inside, the interiors are made in Finland.





To mention some of the body shops who make these interiors to Transit (and also other brands):

http://www.lectica.com/project/bussit-taksit/

http://www.prostyleerikoisajoneuvot.fi/ ... -mallisto/

http://www.profilevehicles.com/fi/tuotteet/fordtransit (only ambulances)

[transitandy]

An interesting read m8y

[Finn_Timo]

Thanks transitandy!

I made my first purchase from Ebay, I ordered new EGR valve for Transit:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/AGR-Ventil-FO ... #vi-ilComp

I don't have a clue of the quality about this parts, but it has 1 month return right and the cheapest new EGR that I found from Finland was 160€... So even with postage price paid, I still can save about 100€!

Just waiting that turbo to come from Estonia... I already bought new gaskets from local Ford's spare parts store.

[nokivasara]

674k km is pretty impressive, is the gearbox still ok?

I have been thinking of buying an old taxi like yours and making a camper/fishing van, but they all seem to rust quite badly here. The road tax is also putting me off.
Lots of road salt and lots of miles = lots of welding needed

[Finn_Timo]

Thanks nokivasara! Are you originally from Finland and moved to Sweden at some point?

Gearbox is OK, it has been off at some point because earlier owner thought that it is broken, because gears 2-4-R didn't work like they should. Well, he repaired the original box (new synchros to gears 2-4-R and bearings?!) and second hand box was assembled. It had the same problem with these gears!

So, the original problem was worn out gear stick cable and at this point the repaired original box was putted back to van It wines a bit at 80 - 90 km/h, but when you drive 100 - 120 km/h it is silent.

Well, road tax is as a personal car (ike now it is) about 874€ / year and if I MOT it as a camper van, the tax will be 570€ / year... But at this moment the van is too heavy and in camper van I would lose one sitting place (6 -> 5), so I have to wait some warmer weather or do some magic tricks to it!

This is not badly rusted, as you can see from the pics. I have looked sometimes Blocket.se that is it possible to find an cheap MK7 from Sweden for spares / facelift + engine donor. The body can be rusted, the wings and bonnet are in reasonably priced items as a spare parts in German webshops so mostly I need dash and some other bits and bobs. Actually there are some camper vans in Blocket at this moment, what I have seen.

[nokivasara]

No I'm born in Sweden but both parents immigrated from Finland so finnish is my mothertongue. I've lived in Haparanda though, that's pretty close to Finland

There's one LWB highroof for sale close to me, a 4 passenger cab with empty rear. It should be a good project but the timing is wrong, moneywise. Only 520000km, not even close to yours!

If you need help finding parts in Sweden maybe I can help, I'm 200km north of Stockholm.

[Finn_Timo]

Hi again!

The van has been officially camper about a month, well it's not that kind of camper what you members in UK are used to. This Finnish transformation is purely for avoiding to pay high annual taxes, in this case this change dropped taxes from 874€ to 336€ per year! And the modification costs were only about 100€

What it takes to make camper from this kind of old taxi / minibus in Finland:

- 2 beds which has to be 60X180 cm or one 120X180 cm bed, mounted some how solidly to vans body
- cooking place
- space for clothes, lining etc.
- table for eating purposes

In some cases there has to be free inside height 190 cm, in this case it wasn't needed. Don't ask me why it is so! But here are some pictures.

I changed those alloys in winter tyres in local tyre shop, van looks much better with the alloys on:



The 120X180 cm bed in the back section of the camper:



Cooking place, power needs to taking with cable (no inverted added):



Foldable table (always in taxis, the original table was removed at some point by previous owner):



Also I bought an second Transit today







Yes, you guessed it right. I am planning to do MK7 facelift at some point, this van has some good bits and bobs for that. My van is rotted from the back x-member and chassis, also the floor in the back is rotted a little. So this MK7 will be the donor vehicle for them. All this in bargain price at 350€... I bought it from Finland's biggest scrap yard called Autovahinkokeskus www.avk.fi .

Everyone can take a look at those pics and calculate, what parts are the most valuable in this scrap body. It has for example whole wiring loom for MK7, in higher spec!

To be continued at some point...

[BigMonty]

Love the wheels on your bus. Keep up the good work

[Finn_Timo]

Thanks Monty! Actually those wheels are in pretty rough shape, I will post a picture later.

So the MK7 facelift has started, I assembled newer tail lights at last weekend, yesterday an MK7 steering column (including airbag contact roll + steering wheel without airbag + swich gear) arrived from UK. Retail price was cheap (£20) from ebay, but the Freight to Finland was £27 Still, a lot cheaper than in Finnish breakers, cheapest steering column I found was 120€... Without those mentioned items.

Also I bought MK7 dashboard yesterday, expecting it to arrive due to Saturday. And thinking of getting that MK7 scrap body to be collected tomorrow, at least heater matrix + floor matt + frame bar etc. for dash if I can't get the whole body collected at once. So I think it will be a busy weekend

[Finn_Timo]

Yesterday I looked at what's behind the foot step tray in drivers side. Not so bad, that scrap body is nearly in same condition and it is five years younger + it has almost 500000 kilometres less under it's belt...



Floor panel seems quite good, at least in this quick look:



BigMonty: here is the pic from the wheel, it is pretty rough when you take a closer look...

[Finn_Timo]

Question for you who have already made MK7 conversion: when using aftermarket parts, what brand is the best? There's no sense using used units in here, because the prices are so ridiculous in Finnish breakers... For example used, many times already little rusted and dented wing is between 50 - 120 € / pce

Meanwhile in Germany: http://www.autonvaraosat24.fi/ford/tran ... asuoja-etu

NEW aftermarket ones start about 32€ and in my case, even the used units has to painted (there wasn't this colour available in MK7)... But there are so many brands offered (BLIC, Van Wezel, Diederichs, Prasco etc.) and I don't have a clue what might be the best quality & also fits with less modification / work needed.

I would be very grateful, if you can help me with this!

[Finn_Timo]

Happy Easter to everyone!

I started my vans MK7 conversion from inside, so started swapping the dash. For outside parts I have managed for example to buy front doors, but drivers side (left here in Finland, LHD...) has taken some damage from moose! So that middle bar needs to be changed.



I think that this is very familiar looks to most of us...





After 1½ days, the first try out of MK7 dash! At this point the the modified MK6 selector and gear cables are already in place. I had to change heater matrix, because it was leaking and getting very nasty smell in the cab, also there was " a few" things to make which were very time consuming jobs



Like Punto wrote in some post, take your time with this conversion... Yep, that is also my advise!

Oh, that modified MK6 selector. It was tried in spare box which I have with stick and cables, now it is in own place in van and seems to work OK. The costs were 6€ for this modification, time will tell if it will work!



I will continue this, after we are back in home, right now we are in little holiday at Helsinki. Going to American car show today

[Finn_Timo]

Nearly there...



Still to do:

- change the steering column
- sort out the wiring for switch gear
- get the right type of light switch + other swithes near the radio and assembly them
- get column for radio
- sort out the wiring and switches for lightning, roof ventilation etc. which has been added in body shop during the bus transformation
- etc.

By the way, that 6€ modification for gear selector seems to work OK!