Van Tale-In': The Ford Transit Has a Longer History Than You Realized - Car and Driver (blog)
Its name, actually, is derived from the German-market Taunus Transit van, a last-minute change. The first Transit, a rear-wheel-drive van, was launched in 1965 with a basic design that carried on for more than twenty years. The box shape was fitted with a different nose for the diesel engine and high-performance V-6 engines. Another facelift came in 1984. Engine size grew up to 4. 1 liters in Australia, a high-performance market until recently. The first complete redesign came in 1986, and it saw the Transit adopt a more aerodynamic style. A fitting companion to forward-looking passenger cars like the Ford Sierra and Scorpio, it remained on a rear-wheel-drive platform. Fourteen years later, for 2000, the Transit was redesigned yet again—and for the first time, the rear-wheel-drive model was complemented with a front-wheel-drive derivative. Our favorite Transit of this era is the rear-wheel-drive version with the 200-hp 3. 2-liter Duratorq diesel—a capable drifter, as it turns out. In 2012, the front-wheel-drive Transit was replaced by the Transit Custom. the rear-wheel-drive models received a larger replacement in 2014, the “real” Transit, which serves up a modern-day interpretation of the first diesel’s “pig snout. Source: blog.caranddriver.com
