Ford Transit Forum

I'm after a mk1 swb panel van or bodyshell. Condition not too important but must have slam side doors not sliding ones. I want to restore it as a van my mate had way back when I was an apprentice . I can collect from anywhere.

someone else on the trail

join the maaaaaaaassssssive que!

Germany calling

mick wit' van. wrote:Germany calling

that'll take the restore bit out of it

mick wit' van. wrote:Germany calling

But it's more difficult to find a SWB here than in Britain!

and they have windows

Probably way too rusty to consider but I have a Mk1 SWB Panel Van that I am about to dismember with a petrol disc cutter next week. If you are really really desperate and/or insane ring me on 07821 419505
Anywhere the paint has blistered you can push a thumb through and thats 20% of the total about. Been stored 20 years in woodland on edge of reclaimed land above a swamp. It would need every panel replaced so is beyond saving in my opinion and I am someone who considers even the most horrible wrecks to be saveable.
Not tax exempt either, about 1977 i think, but it is a proper diesel one. York engine said to be a good one till someone pinched the head off it and birds nested in the pots but its there for spares if anyone wants anything. I will be salvaging front grille and horrible rusty bonnet and the one side of good roof gutters, and the surviving tops of headlamp bit of wings as these are useful to repair bottom halves when put upside down screen is bust cloth seats are rotted
Anyway its dark blue with crude signwriting about WELDING ironically I will get some photos before demolition begins and post them on .org

mate she sounds like its well shot most are around that year ,thats when you look at a german fire van and think wow if it was in england it would of rotted away!

Madmark says

mate she sounds like its well shot most are around that year

Yeah come to think of it the earlier vans don't seem to get so bad, thicker metal maybe or just better quality steel ??

tranorak wrote:Probably way too rusty to consider but I have a Mk1 SWB Panel Van that I am about to dismember with a petrol disc cutter next week. If you are really really desperate and/or insane ring me on 07821 419505
Anywhere the paint has blistered you can push a thumb through and thats 20% of the total about. Been stored 20 years in woodland on edge of reclaimed land above a swamp. It would need every panel replaced so is beyond saving in my opinion and I am someone who considers even the most horrible wrecks to be saveable.
Not tax exempt either, about 1977 i think, but it is a proper diesel one. York engine said to be a good one till someone pinched the head off it and birds nested in the pots but its there for spares if anyone wants anything. I will be salvaging front grille and horrible rusty bonnet and the one side of good roof gutters, and the surviving tops of headlamp bit of wings as these are useful to repair bottom halves when put upside down screen is bust cloth seats are rotted
Anyway its dark blue with crude signwriting about WELDING ironically I will get some photos before demolition begins and post them on .org

1976/77 was a bad year for the Mk1, first time round when we had a Mk1 in the 80s we took loads of parts off P regs in scrap yards. I was later told it was to do with the steel strikes in the mid 70s, and Ford got steel from whereecver they could, some of it not too good a quality. This van sounds like a good donor for a RHD job on a German Fire Van.

Good idea Fred, hadn't thought of that. I quess thats all the steering gear and the whole dash panel then?? front right chassis leg too?

That's about what you need, but to be sure ask madmark . If you or anyubody else wants to go this route with your bits, try to hang on to the van if you can as there is aways some tiny bit you want but can't get off anything but a scrapper.

I agree but in this case I've been giving the van a stay of execution for 4 years and its time has now come, its on someone elses land you understand and they want their swamp back
The characters who bought my 68 Feuerwehr minter were talking of RHD conversion but it seemed like a criminal act to cut and shut a van which had not got dirty never mind rusty It had spent every day and night of its life in a clean dry warm Feuerwehr building from 1968 till we drove it to the ferry

Was past a breakers yard in Kngs Lynn today noticed a swb van among the cars etc it did have a sliding door on drivers side but I could'nt actualy see if it was a MK1 or MK2 Cant say I've actualy seen a MK2 with sliding doors did they do them someone will put me right