[jcp123]

Little-known indeed! I had no idea. Those are fantastic numbers though.

Back in the day I drove E150s hauling auto parts to regional stores, to replenish stock and give same-day store delivery of customer orders. I had to push speed limits to make my time (PSL+4, lots of high RR chip-seal roads too), but with the 4.6l it was nearly always around 21mpg. The van was sometimes empty, other times well-loaded. I'd have to guesstimate weight, but I don't see much over a ton at max; we'd run out of volume before we ran out of weight capacity, since we might have totes filled with air fresheners or gaskets as likely as with brake rotors, alternators, and starters. It looks like they are using Transits now, but with numbers like that, times three vans at around 300 miles each per day, looks like the company would have been well-advised to try some of these. Maybe maintenance is the buggaboo, they kept the vans (at that time, anyway) til around 150k.