By Jeff Glucker
“Supervan 1 is lost to the sands of time”… is a sad sentence to hear, but that’s what Alex Goy says of Ford’s legendary grocery-getter/ass-hauler extraordinaire. In a new short film from Carfection, Goy examines a brief bit of Ford’s extreme van adventures. The first, dubbed Supervan, was built in 1971 and featured a first-generation Transit body plopped atop a GT40 chassis.
Yes, that’s right. This was a van with Le Mans winning power under its pumped up skin. And it was amazing.
Ford continued to tinker with its super vans. Supervan 2 arrived in 1984, wearing the suit of a MkII Transit and Group C racing bits underneath. Cosworth supplied an engine. Silverstone supplied a top-speed run of 174 miles per hour. In a god damned van.
Supervan 3 landed in the mid 1990s. With the arrival of an updated MkIII Transit, some go-fast engineering went into the creation of a wild new hauler of things. This one went even crazier though, as Ford UK fashioned a body that was actually a 7/8 scale of the full-size Transit. Channeling their best Smokey Yunick impression, the slightly down-sized van packed more Cosworth power.
Today, you can buy a Ford Transit Connect ST if you’re reading this across the pond. A few years back, they produced a Focus RS-powered Transit Connect as well.
Hopefully Ford pays attention to my video on the full-size Transit, and allows me to create a Transit ST for American BBV fans.
I watched the video on the Transit RS and the Transit ST yesterday because it popped up in my suggested videos. I really wish I had the means to make one, that thing would be rad
Make it the 350/350 2.3 AWD drivetrain from the current Focus RS, and I’d be all over that. The Mk1 212-hp mill doesn’t quite make all of that work worth the effort.
I’m not sure what “350/350” you mean?
AWD drivetrain seems like a pain in the ass. A Modern ST would be fine
350 hp / 350 lb-ft.
Even a modern ST engine swap would be a PITA, in my opinion. I just don’t like FWD dynamics, so the AWD would be worth the extra effort for me.
I remember a few years back some car magazine crew (
Motor Trend, maybe?Car and Driver) was attempting to put MazdaSpeed 3 running gear into the Mazda5, butI thinkthey ran into difficulty mating up the electronics of the two. I’m not sure they ever finished it. Edit: They did, but with underwhelming results. Here’s the story: https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a15391593/return-of-the-boss-wagon-mazdaspeed-5/