I passed a couple of hours last night talking shop with a new acquaintance that has owned and operated a van service for fifteen years. His route is between the city I live in and Puebla, a distance of four leagues, eight leagues round trip, one round trip per chauffeur per day. He has eight units, all Econolines, a mixture of 15 passenger E-350s converted to 16 passenger and 8 passenger E-150s converted to 13 passenger. Apparently E-250s only exist in Mexico as grey market imports, which by definition prohibits them from being legally licensed for passenger service. All maintenance and nearly all repairs are done by him or his employees in his own shop, which is highly uncommon here.
He claims to have a 5.4 in service for more than 1,400,000 Km (868,000 miles) without ever dropping the pan or removing the heads or lower intake manifold. He exclusively uses Motorcraft non-synthetic oil (I didn't ask what viscosity, but I'll assume 20w-50) for 7,000 Km intervals. He only uses iridium plugs, changes them at 150,000 Km. He uses some sort of Napa branded brake pad that he purchases by the case of ten sets and cost about $12 a set. Although I didn't ask him out of politeness (I sell Bridgestone/Firestone tires), it would appear he only uses Michelin and BFGoodrich tires, judging by what all seven of his personal cars are shod with (an eclectic mix; 1969 factory 289/3 spd. Falcon, 1979 CJ5, 1993 Cherokee, Sunfire, Cavalier, late 90s Accord, Colorado crewcab).
For the transmissions he does a cooler line exchange along with a filter change and pan cleaning whenever the fluid "turns yellow", about every 150,000 Km. He only uses Motorcraft fluid, described by him as "for electronic transmissions". He couldn't tell me if it is Mercon V or Dexron IIIh, both of which Motorcraft sells here. He has fired a chauffeur for shifting manually before, but encourages the chauffeurs to use the "overdrive off" button when going up or down grades to limit shifting. When a transmission fails he pulls it and sends it to Tehuacán, where he knows an independent mechanic who was trained by Ford do rebuilds, who repairs them with about a three day turn around.
As axle lube he uses SAE 250 GL-1 oil with a ratio of two packets of extreme pressure additive to three liters of oil where the recommended dosing is one packet to fifteen liters. He claims to have never lost a ring and pinion set or pinion bearing. The half-ton vans in his fleet constantly go through rear wheel bearings, chewing up the half-shaft as they go. He was paying $8,500 pesos per shaft, but he found a dealership in Laredo, TX. that will ship them to him for $4,500 pesos. When the shaft is new he presses the Torrington bearing off and replaces it with a cheap new Federal bearing. For the first bearing change he also uses a Federal. For the second change he presses the original Torrington back on, which lasts much longer, but destroys the shaft once it goes bad.
He will only use Econolines because the only other van that has a similar ownership and operational cost is the Express, which he says when a balljoint breaks can tear a control arm apart and cause a deadly accident, while the Econoline's twin-I-beam suspension is constructed in such a way that if a balljoint breaks, the wheel won't separate from the vehicle. He mentioned the Toyota HiAce as having lower costs, but when configured for 16 passengers they drive away customers due their lack of space inside. Other lines use E-350s, G/3500s, Nissan Urvans, Toyota HiAces, Renault Trafics, Peugeot Experts, Mercedes or Dodge Sprinters and VW Crafters. He is the only one that uses half-tons.
He claims to have a 5.4 in service for more than 1,400,000 Km (868,000 miles) without ever dropping the pan or removing the heads or lower intake manifold. He exclusively uses Motorcraft non-synthetic oil (I didn't ask what viscosity, but I'll assume 20w-50) for 7,000 Km intervals. He only uses iridium plugs, changes them at 150,000 Km. He uses some sort of Napa branded brake pad that he purchases by the case of ten sets and cost about $12 a set. Although I didn't ask him out of politeness (I sell Bridgestone/Firestone tires), it would appear he only uses Michelin and BFGoodrich tires, judging by what all seven of his personal cars are shod with (an eclectic mix; 1969 factory 289/3 spd. Falcon, 1979 CJ5, 1993 Cherokee, Sunfire, Cavalier, late 90s Accord, Colorado crewcab).
For the transmissions he does a cooler line exchange along with a filter change and pan cleaning whenever the fluid "turns yellow", about every 150,000 Km. He only uses Motorcraft fluid, described by him as "for electronic transmissions". He couldn't tell me if it is Mercon V or Dexron IIIh, both of which Motorcraft sells here. He has fired a chauffeur for shifting manually before, but encourages the chauffeurs to use the "overdrive off" button when going up or down grades to limit shifting. When a transmission fails he pulls it and sends it to Tehuacán, where he knows an independent mechanic who was trained by Ford do rebuilds, who repairs them with about a three day turn around.
As axle lube he uses SAE 250 GL-1 oil with a ratio of two packets of extreme pressure additive to three liters of oil where the recommended dosing is one packet to fifteen liters. He claims to have never lost a ring and pinion set or pinion bearing. The half-ton vans in his fleet constantly go through rear wheel bearings, chewing up the half-shaft as they go. He was paying $8,500 pesos per shaft, but he found a dealership in Laredo, TX. that will ship them to him for $4,500 pesos. When the shaft is new he presses the Torrington bearing off and replaces it with a cheap new Federal bearing. For the first bearing change he also uses a Federal. For the second change he presses the original Torrington back on, which lasts much longer, but destroys the shaft once it goes bad.
He will only use Econolines because the only other van that has a similar ownership and operational cost is the Express, which he says when a balljoint breaks can tear a control arm apart and cause a deadly accident, while the Econoline's twin-I-beam suspension is constructed in such a way that if a balljoint breaks, the wheel won't separate from the vehicle. He mentioned the Toyota HiAce as having lower costs, but when configured for 16 passengers they drive away customers due their lack of space inside. Other lines use E-350s, G/3500s, Nissan Urvans, Toyota HiAces, Renault Trafics, Peugeot Experts, Mercedes or Dodge Sprinters and VW Crafters. He is the only one that uses half-tons.
