Ford Transit Forum

by **Coakers** » Tue Jul 22, 2025 7:16 pm

After recently going full time with my reselling buisness and recently moving into a 800sq ft unit, getting a van was long overdue. Several people attempted to rip me off by attempting to sell me utter rot boxes. Anyway I saw this former school minibus with 185,000 miles on it locally and I thought why not. It was up for £1800. Managed to buy it for £1500 - mot until November. No service history. The only thing wrong at first glance was the middle windows are stuck shut and the airbag light is on.

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I buy, refurbish vintage tech and furniture and sell on for a profit so a van is essential at this point. The idea is to take out all but 6 seats, I can use it as a part time camper as well as a work van. I dont have to worry about buying a 7 seater too.

My trusty Mk1 VW Tiguan has been the daily since 2018, put 120k on it and never let me down. Just not big enough now.

(I did have a discovery 3 last year which bled me dry - never again).

Wife's first drive of the minibus (or any vehicle larger than a modern SUV for that matter).

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My main complaint of this thing is the noise! Anything above 50 and it gets obscenely loud. I've just bought a decibel meter and I will upload what the reading is. (I know i could use an app but it was only a tenner and bound to me more accurate) I've got dodomat already, I really need to get the noise level down.

Service itinerary : Oil and filters change inc fuel, cabin and air.

Timing belt and water pump

There is an occasional clunking on the passenger side front (most likely a control arm or drop link)

One other thing I need to look for is the brown stuff because it's a transit of course. Inner sills have been advisory for a few years. It was a school minibus for 14 years so I'm sure it's been maintained to a reasonable standard.

Front seat needs replacing, wonder if the mk7 seats are a straight swap?

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by **Coakers** » Tue Jul 22, 2025 7:33 pm

Admittedly I did have an issue on my second day of ownership. I left my lights on and drained the battery. After I jumped the battery the central locking stopped working. I only got 2 basic keys with this (no fob) there is one key hole in the drivers door (none anywhere else). So I was flapping as both front doors and rear doors were unlocked and the side door was stuck shut.

With the help of this forum I discovered that the central locking needed resetting. This was done by cycling the ignition on and off 8 times in quick succession. Voila I heard all the locks cycle a few times and then I had working locks again.

by **Coakers** » Thu Jul 24, 2025 8:17 pm

First big run today, from Garswood St Helens to Burnley and then to York to drop a technics stack system off. Customer
said he'd pay extra for me to drop off in person.

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Trip completed without a beat missed I'm happy to say. The more I drive it the more I like it. Completed 500 miles in 3 days. However its time to discuss the less attractive aspects of the minibus.

It's a 22 year old transit so there is corrosion, which I was expecting to find. The rot is located in the front and rear passenger wheel wells. The chassis rails and pretty much all of the underside looks pretty good.

by **Redvee** » Thu Jul 24, 2025 10:44 pm

My Mk7 was a schoolbus and failed the recent MOT cause of 'ventilation by the wheel arches :shock:

Currently it's with a local welder but he's in high demand so the work is taking a little longer but when I stripped the interior out I found numerous sweet wrappers etc from it's previous life. Sgtripping it down was a steep learning curve for me but when I'm rebuilding it I can make a few changes to suit our needs better.