I’m selling my Vito as I need a bigger van. I’m leaning towards the new shape ford transit, long wheel base but I’ve seen an xlwb for sale that is within budget. Just wondering if anyone on here has a similar length vehicle and what your experiences are with them in terms of driving etc the one I’ve seen has front and rear parking sensors as well as a rear view camera .

Easier to reverse and judge distance than a car due to superior mirrors and the tail swing.

No point in parking in cities.    Need to live in a quiet street if parking at home and you dont have a drive.

Keep left hand turns wide and avoid the  street furniture.

I have a 7.2m Iveco daily camper it’s about as big as you get on a 3.5t plate .

If I didn’t have off-road out the way not in neighbours view daily parking I would not own it.

It’s a big red anti social bugger – and I love it.

Biggest issue with parking is when the distances between rows of cars are not big enough to let you come out to account for tail swing.

I would not run it as my daily car if I had to commute with it. Simple things like rushhour round abouts are much more stressful due to gaps you need to get out in being much bigger.

On trips away the space cannot be beat though bikes safe and sound out of prying eyes and minds. .

When it’s pishing Rain and the small van crew are standing outside rearranging their interiors for bed time it’s worth the downsides.

Yep everything said above.

Watch the back end swinging out on turns, especially on rights, as fekers try to go down your nearside!  I make a point of not allowing enough room for them to get through.

Be wary of cockwombles pulling out on you as there appears to be a common preconception that vans don’t go all that fast 😉   Def get a dashcam.

Get dead locks fitted and a Cat 1 alarm and possibly a tracker!!  Every van I have ever owned has been broken into using a device that by-passes the STD lock and ignition.  Although it doesn’t give me a discount on insurance, I bought a cheap tracker from Oxford products, that will notify me on my phone every time the van moves.

Not sure if it quite counts as jumbo but I drive my LWB vivaro anywhere I would take a car without a second thought. Two exceptions: some car parks have height limits (though actually the threatened 6ft or so usually has enough extra clearance for me) and there is a local narrow bridge with corner where I very nearly got stuck and won’t try again.

Car parks are often tight but I’m a parking God and haven’t found anything I can’t handle. Visibility around front and sides is great and sensors handle the rear.

“Not sure if it quite counts as jumbo but I drive my LWB vivaro ”

Not even close. They are tiny compared to a xlwb transit

Been looking at LWB Ducatos/Boxers/Relays for conversion but worried they are a bit too big for narrow lanes getting to costal spots around the devon and cornish coastline

LWB hitop Ducato here (6m long give or take and 1.9m wide.

It’s not too bad. Car parks are sometimes a pain and I’ve been ticketed once for not buying two tickets. In Devon/Cornwall I’ve got myself on to roads when both sides are brushing hedges at the same time. But then again I seem to be in a tiny minority of people who thik much of Devon and Cornwall suck so not a biggie for me.

I used my parent’s hymer style motorhome for a bit and that was a lot more hard work – you needed to think about where you were going to park before you set off and needed 4 spaces in a typical car park.

I’d rethink the purchasing of a transit more than it’s wheelbase tbh. My Mk7 is rusting in the most random of places despite copious waxoyl and not being used commercially for the last 6 years and I don’t think the new ones are built any different. I’m going to replace it with a Fiat Ducato as they are galvanised and have the strong Iveco engine.

Re. Lwb Vs Jumbo’s – I don’t think there is much difference in driving once you step up to full size 3.5t Vans. We used to hire Sprinter xlwb that my Mrs drove whilst I drove our lwb Transhit and she never killed anyone or lost our deposits!

Echoing some of the above.. if its your only vehicle then some parking options are closed to you. For me to make the jump from a SWB sprinter to a XLWB sprinter I need to:

Move from a city centre flat with limited onstreet parking to a house in the countryside

and

Buy a car

Its a very big jump in size from a Vito – what are you currently unable to do that an XLWB will solve. Parking wise you need carparks where the spaces are arranged so you can park across two on the street you need two vacant spaces. Although when you find them – with metered parking you’re fine if you can get your wheels into one space – which you can. Doesn’t matter that the 4 ft overhang stops anyone using the space behind you 🙂

If parking isn’t a constraint then the general costs / hassles of bigger van ownership aren’t they much greater than small van ownership. Some hurdles are – you have a limited choice of garages for things like tyres / tracking / exhaust work as many places can’t accommodate taller/longer vans. Also you are going up a MOT category and there are fewer places doing that kind of testing

In terms of the XLWB Tranny specifically. It has quite a short wheelbase for that size of van – good for manoeuvring but theres a lot of load space overhanging the rear axle so your load distribution can be problematic. Big mirrors (which you will already have on the Vito) give you what you need for a lot of manoeveriung – being able to see you rear wheel is the key. However across the whole new transit range (the bigger vans and the custom) theres something weird with the mirrors – you get ok visibility to your sides but the blind spot directly behind you is huge for some reason – even with the smallest vans.

In most vans (even Vito size)  you have that blind spot in relatively close proximity but the fields of view do eventually converge. With transits though they don’t – you can’t see anything directly behind you pretty much all the way to the horizon. Parked at the roadside you wouldn’t know if another similar sized van was parked behind you without getting out to look. Where as with my same-sized sprinter thats not an issue.

If you’ve not driven one before the clutch is very tricksy on the new big transits – oddly sprung – light at the bottom of the stroke – very springy around the bite point then light again. Makes it very easy to stall. You get used to it but a lot of people find the first few drives difficult and my local van hire seems to be migrating its fleet way from transits to sprinters as the latter are a bit more first-time-friendly.

To be properly useful big vans need to be racked out inside – you can’t just reach in and grab stuff like you can with a Vito so you need to get stuff off the floor to keep a clear walk way through to get to stuff.

I drive a 6m citoen relay van with tow bar bike rack so over 7m in total. Drives so much like a car that I often forget I am in a van when doing 60mph on a windy ‘A’ road.

It goes anywhere a car will go, you do have to be aware on corners that the back swings out, that it is slower to stop when you have to brake quickly and turning in tight spaces can be a pain.

The first time i drove it i was terrified mind…