Help selecting the right van

[tommymsw]

Hi all. I currently have a 45ft Winnebago but I want to jump over to the camper van area (too hard to park and store the large one). [font=Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]I have watched a ton of videos b[/font]ut I am not up on the van specs lingo. I am looking for a van I can stand in (I am 5'9") and as long of a van as I can get and still fit in a parking spot. So I have no idea what the difference is between high roof and medium, or what wheel base I need to still fit in a parking space. And are there any great places to look for used cargo vans online? I have not been very fortunate when googling.  :dodgy:

 

[user 37446]

Read up on the 3 Euro style vans. The Sprinter, Ford Transit and FCA's Promaster. If you go to automotive review sites like Edmunds or Car n Driver, Motor Trend etc you can find articles on them.

Each company makes different heights and lengths. You've likely seen these vans on the road for years now so you know there's short wheelbase ones and long ones. I see Amazon Prime delivering in long and tall sized Sprinters.

Anyway, just do some of your own reading/research. You'll also find that CarGurus and Craigslist have used listings for sale so you can get an idea on pricing.

Another place to read about them is Expediters Online forum, these are professional delivery drivers who use vans like this and pile on 100K or more miles a year. There's plenty of info about the older and newer Sprinter as well as the other two.

That's the only group of vans that are factory built to stand up in, if the proper roof height is selected.

 

[tommymsw]

Thank you, that certainly narrows my search. That is all I was looking for and it is good to know some of the better sites to look and that I only need to worry about those 3 vans. I did find that an average parking spot is 19.5 feet so that helps.
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[WayOutWest]

I have a Ford Transit cargo van so I can speak to those. If you are 5 ft 9 you probably can juuuuust barely stand up completely without having to stoop, in a "medium roof" version of this van. But you'd have to be conservative and minimalist on how you build or do your floor and ceiling in order to preserve van height, because I believe the maximum available space in the medium roof height is 5 ft 10 inches with a minimalist floor and ceiling covering. If you want more headroom, you'd need the high roof version which gives about 6 ft 4 inches of vertical space.

https://sportsmobile.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/vans-comparisons-side-by-side1.jpg

I find that with my "long wheelbase" Ford Transit, which is 148 inch wheelbase and 19 ft 8 inches total length, I can "just" fit into a standard parking space, albeit tightly and tending to protrude further than other vehicles. When I park in shopping center parking lots, I intentionally aim at parking further from the store in the more empty part of the lot, so that I have more room to negotiate when pulling in and out of a parking place. I avoid crowded parking areas, preferring to park in more open areas on the street further from my destination.

For the Ford Transit, the "long wheelbase" is the "middle" length van. The short wheelbase SWB is 130 inches and 18 ft 4 inches total length, the "extended wheelbase" is 22 ft 2 inches total length. The extended wheelbase van which is the longest Ford Transit, begins to be too long to fit into standard parking places, and is more like an RV at that length point.

 

[crofter]

Here is a link to the dimensions sticky for vans. Some vans are definitely taller and wider than others.
-crofter

https://vanlivingforum.com/showthread.php?tid=11392&highlight=Dimensions+sticky