Most reliable van engine.

Hi,
Long term plan is to upgrade our T4 Transporter to something slightly bigger. I have been researching this for some time now and had sort of settled on the Renault Master as been one of the best options, but the more I dig into it it seems that the chain driven engines have a tendency to snap their chains before reaching service intervals. I personally know of a friend who has a Master with a snapped chain to make the point.
So my question is are all the Renault engines prone to this ? I was thinking about going back to the 2008 vintage Renault master as i was told they were more bulletproof.
It seems to me that the VW engines in the Crafter are just overly complex and prone to failure due to electrics and lack of regular oil changes. Also the bodywork seems to be shockingly prone to rust. LT35's, my preferred VW engine are just rare as hens teeth in Ireland so out of the question.
Fiat Ducato seem like a good reliable option - but again seem to be fairly hard to get hold of in Ireland.
IVECO Daily seem like a good bet but they are really to big for what I am looking for.

Fords, good reliable engines - bag of rust bodies makes them out of the question.


As I said, I thought I had it with the Renault Master but now think that there simply isn't a reliable engine available in the medium van class. Your thoughts are appreciated. I am spoiled by the 1.9D VW engine which is at 198K Miles and hasn't missed a beat yet and I expect to get at least another 100K out of it which at current usage would be 7 years.

Shoog

So you're looking for input on an engine upgrade you don't plan to need for another 7 years?

Deleted User

Deleted User wrote: »

So you're looking for input on an engine upgrade you don't plan to need for another 7 years?

Not really, the VW will be good for 7years baring unrelated tragedy, but I wont be keeping it that long when I decide to upgrade.


Shoog

Shoog

Shoog wrote: »

Not really, the VW will be good for 7years baring unrelated tragedy, but I wont be keeping it that long when I decide to upgrade.


Shoog

Any answers you might be given will be as outdated as signing posts in that case

Besides, in 7 years the first of the second hand EV vans will be coming on to the market. With their massive battery banks it'll make ICE vans redundant

Sorry your not getting my meaning here, it could be a year that I decided to replace the transporter, and when I do it will likely be a van around 10years old mark. The fact that I expect the Transporter to be good for another 7 years or more is frankly irrelevant to my question and only mentioned because it puts into perspective my high expectations for engine reliability.

So experience of current and older vans will be highly relevant to my decision.

Shoog

markmoto

Shoog wrote: »

Sorry your not getting my meaning here, it could be a year that I decided to replace the transporter, and when I do it will likely be a van around 10years old mark. The fact that I expect the Transporter to be good for another 7 years or more is frankly irrelevant to my question and only mentioned because it puts into perspective my high expectations for engine reliability.

So experience of current and older vans will be highly relevant to my decision.

Shoog

Are you looking to buy commercial van for conversion project or ready build campervan?

Markcheese

There's a lot of older masters still on the road - I assume several different engine types - older sprinters the same ... You'd probably get an older crafter too , it's tricky to get an older van with low milage ,
Roughly what age van are you thinking ?
Go on done deal ect and see are there many of them - and see are there many with wrecked engines as well .. should tell you what's available ...
Best engine would prob be a hi-ace - ,but it's no bigger than what you have - and it drives like a hi-ace ...

It will be commercial conversion. I don't want anything massive so medium wheelbase and medium height.
The main requirements will be enough height to satisfy insurance, enough length to fit a fixed toilet and an easily removable bulkhead to again satisfy insurance. Something like the big sprinters or masters are simply to big for what I want, but ultimately it will be engine reliability which will be the final arbiter of my decision.

Shoog

Markcheese

Markcheese wrote: »

There's a lot of older masters still on the road - I assume several different engine types - older sprinters the same ... You'd probably get an older crafter too , it's tricky to get an older van with low milage ,
Roughly what age van are you thinking ?
Go on done deal ect and see are there many of them - and see are there many with wrecked engines as well .. should tell you what's available ...
Best engine would prob be a hi-ace - ,but it's no bigger than what you have - and it drives like a hi-ace ...

A high roof LWB T4 transporter would be ideal - but you would pay a heavy premium and they are rare as hens teeth in that configuration.
A mechanic friend told me that the 2008 vintage Masters were the best they ever made and that would suit my needs perfectly in terms of age and lack electronic things to go wrong. They also went galvanized at about that time so they don't rot out.
Whats nice about my current transporter is that I can do just about every job on her - I did the timing belt on Friday. The only things i have sent her out for is the clutch and bearings/driveshafts because a ramp helps loads, and there's no ECU to go wrong.


Shoog

colm_mcm

Ducato 2.3 or even 3.0 is probably the best all rounder, particularly if you don’t want a huge van but want to pack a lot in. They’re not perfect but they’re quite reliable and you can easily get conversion stuff for them.
I wouldn’t get the 2.2 Peugeot or Citroen versions, they have the 2.2 Puma engine from the Transit, which can be a bit troublesome.

colm_mcm

colm_mcm wrote: »

Ducato 2.3 or even 3.0 is probably the best all rounder, particularly if you don’t want a huge van but want to pack a lot in. They’re not perfect but they’re quite reliable and you can easily get conversion stuff for them.
I wouldn’t get the 2.2 Peugeot or Citroen versions, they have the 2.2 Puma engine from the Transit, which can be a bit troublesome.

I had come to a similar conclusion myself regarding the Ducato - but have since read from fleet owners that the only reason that Camper companies prefer them is because they are cheap in a flatbed format, he also said that Fiat are terrible for supply parts for older models which can leave you off the road for weeks if not months.


Its a bloody minefield of bad choices.


Shoog

colm_mcm

Shoog wrote: »

I had come to a similar conclusion myself regarding the Ducato - but have since read from fleet owners that the only reason that Camper companies prefer them is because they are cheap in a flatbed format, he also said that Fiat are terrible for supply parts for older models which can leave you off the road for weeks if not months.


Its a bloody minefield of bad choices.


Shoog

The main reason the camper companies like them is that Fiat (and PSA) from the very start made the Ducato attractive to converters, on the current model the floors are lower than other vans, they do Al-Ko chassis versions and special camper spec versions for converters, they have wiring plugs pre terminated for converters too, the interior width is such that you can put a 1900mm mattress in sideways, which you can’t do in other vans.

They are very hard to get nowadays though.

markmoto

Shoog wrote: »

It will be commercial conversion. I don't want anything massive so medium wheelbase and medium height.
The main requirements will be enough height to satisfy insurance, enough length to fit a fixed toilet and an easily removable bulkhead to again satisfy insurance. Something like the big sprinters or masters are simply to big for what I want, but ultimately it will be engine reliability which will be the final arbiter of my decision.

Shoog

Vans the most abused commercial vehicles. Not sure 10 years old van would give you reliable travels. Unless you do engine rebuild etc.

Starting to think that maybe the solution is to stick to the T4. How to meet my needs - by adding a hightop and rearranging the internals. A hightop would allow standing room (for comfort and insurance purposes), a near doubling of available storage, introduce a captains chair on the passenger side for front to back access (insurance purposes), a rock and roll bed, enough room to leave toilet out at night.
This could all be achieved for about €2-3K which ultimately would be much cheaper than a whole new build and would allow me to see out that 7years of useful life in the 1.9D engine I have.

Shoog

markmoto

Looking 5-8 year onward the electric vehicles will take over the market perhaps keeping what you have is a wise decision.

autumnalcore

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117629070#Comment_117629070

EVS are not going to take over the commercial market in 5 to 8 years let alone 10 to 15 years.

Irelands target is 1 million vehicles by 2030 93.6% of those are cars.

That means 64,000 non car ev's by 2030 or only 10% of the current fleet.

Of those the majority will probably be car/ berlingo / traffic sized.

The market for a large high roof van with a range of only 200-300km is going to be much smaller.

I don't know where you go camping but our average 4-5 day trip in Ireland would be 500-750km in the back of beyonds in the west of ireland.

I wouldn't want to be looking for a charging spot in west kerry with 1,000,000 evs on the road during the holiday season.

On the continent you would easily do that mileage in a day you could easily spend a few days of your holidays in motorway services charging up.

The large long range e vans I have seen have basically most of the usable space under the floor taken up with batteries nowhere to put your water tanks

Then the question of longevity... My van is now 16 years old the engine probably has another 250k miles in it with a new set of injectors.

If it was electric I'd probably be looking for a second or third set of batteries and fiat wouldn't stock them so I'd probably be looking at a cobbled together reconditioned battery on unknown longevity still costing $$$$

As an engineer I hope that the some international standard for batteries emerges so that you can do a refurb swap and slot an ISO battery in when yours fails but we seem to be a long way off that happening.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117750319#Comment_117750319

A nice idea to get swap-able batteries but it seems that the reality is likely to be that more and more of the battery capacity will be built into the fabric of the vehicle (solid state batteries). This makes perfect sense in EV design but the reality for users is a 10year useful lifespan just as the manufacturers want it.

Shoog