Vans: Interior Size, Things to Inspect?

[bajajoaquin]

I'm thinking of selling my F-350 (and my '67 Imperial, for that matter), and getting a van. One of the things that's holding me up is interior size. I'm going to be having to put a second baby seat in my vehicle, so I want to keep the front bench in place, and remove the back. Will a regular-length van fit two dirt bikes behind the front bench (or, if you don't know about dirt bikes, a 4x8 sheet of plywood), or would I need to get an extended van for that?

I'm primarily interested in an Econoline, because of 4x4 convertibility, but would also consider others if the right deal came along. I know U-Joint makes parts for 92-up, right? Are there other years where things changed for the better or worse? What should I look out for, or am I buying primarily on mileage and condition. I'll probably buy a gas v-8.

Thanks!

 

[tookstar154]

If you want to keep your ability for seating and retain the stock bench seat I would go with and extended body van. I have regular body and am planning on being able to fit two bikes inside, but I am doing an entire interior/seating remodel. When I'm done I will have room to take 3 passengers comfortably, and 5 if people want to squeeze, but hopefully enough room for two bikes inside if I need to. From what I remember, to fit a bike behind the bench, you need to move the rear of the bike some, similar to a 6' or 6 1/2" bed pickup. I only tried it once, right when I got my van.

I have a 2006 E350 with the 5.4 Triton motor. I love it. It has Camburg's "Baja" kit on it which yields about 6" of lift, on 285's. I am getting about 11mpg around town, and 13-14 on the highway, depending on how heavy my foot is. The speedo isn't calibrated for the tires, so that might throw mileage off a hair, and I plan on re-gearing the rear end to better cope with the tires, so that may help too. All in all, not terrible considering all the room I'm driving a small room around. If it were me and I had the funds, I would ave gone with a 7.3 4x4 van but that was too much $ at the time. I would look out for rust, and mileage. Those 7.3 motors go forever, but everything ends up having a breaking point and the diesel's can be expensive to fix. The 6.0 diesel's have horror stories behind them, but I believe there are ways to bulletproof them, I know U-Joint has done that to quite a few. I've heard good things about the V10 gas motors, but don't know much about them. Stay away of smaller motors as they will end up getting worse mileage, especially if you intend to be loaded down.

Be wary of anything that looks like bad rust spots on the roof or the gutters of the van, those are notorious spots on these vans. I had the roof of my van Line-X'd to deal with the rust, so hopefully that will last a few years. It's a lot of info to take in, and I went back and forth for a while about having a diesel 4x4 truck with a cab-over camper, or a van. But, I've always wanted to have a van, so I figure'd that I would give it a go, and hopefully it works out. So far I am absolutely loving it, and I think I will far into the future. Hope this helps some. There are lots and lots of very knowledgeable people on here who I know have far more info than I do, but I hopefully this steers you in the right direction. Good luck and have fun searching!

 

[Bbasso]

Two motorcycles all the gear and people inside the van, you'll want an extended body. You also want the largest motor you can find because you live in California and you have real mountains nearby.

 

[Petrolburner]

Get the extended body. They're not hard to find and there is no reason to make life more difficult. I have the EB and I often carry two bikes. I don't think you could fit the second row of seats with two bikes in the van. I would also suggest a wheelchair van or something with a fiberglass top installed already. I know plenty of people haul bikes in a standard height van but the additional PITA of having the handlebars pinned against the roof all the time is not worth it. I had a regular body, regular height E150 for a few weeks and it sucked.

 

[Petrolburner]

You can see where the roof would be hitting the bars if it had a regular roof. If you don't push the bike in perfectly lined up with the wheel chock, you will have to drag the wheel side to side since as soon as you turn the bars they will be jammed into the roof. Or you could just put a ratchet strap from the bars to the axle to compress the front wheel. I didn't want to deal with that so I bought a tall van, and with tall rear doors so I didn't bust my knuckles trying to get in (or using a strap to compress the suspension.)

 

[bajajoaquin]

I had never considered height. I'm so used to road bikes, where clearance isn't an issue that it never occurred to me.

Hmmm. High roof, passenger, with no wheelchair lift is hard to find.

Good advice all around, though. Thank you.