On Tuesday, after leaving it safely locked down for a few weeks, I gingerly opened the gate to The Carchive, and out gushed a 1988 Ferrari Testarossa brochure. Well, it was lovely and everything, but it’s wasn’t really Hooniverse heartland stuff, now, was it? Today we’re heading back into our comfort zone with the 1971 Ford Transit. It’s a strange brochure, this one. By and large commercial vehicle brochures tend to be fact-heavy, information-strewn documents designed to please end users and their accountants alike. This one, concentrating on the Bus and Crewbus variants of Transit, comes over a little differently. The theme of the brochure portrays the various Transit bus variants providing transportation to cast-members in some hideous looking 1970’s made-for-TV costume drama. I couldn’t begin to tell you how they dreamt this idea up, which permeates through the entire publication, but I’m guessing the drugs they were using were very effective indeed. “The direction is firm, but easy, fluent and full of confidence.” Weird. Anyway, the Transit appeared as a pan-European production item in 1965 and it’s the first generation model we see in this ’71 brochure. By this time Ford’s medium van had already proven itself rather well, and at a stroke made the the outgoing Ford Thames look as relevant as papyrus scrolls in a world of e-ink. Van drivers were marvelling at the advances which had been made in terms of cabin comfort, speed and manoeuvrability, and no longer having to suffer for their art. In fact, the usefulness of the Transit and its long-term profitability as a saleable concern were strongly interlinked. The technology under the skin was closely related to Ford’s passenger car range of the time, which inherently made it a more car-like vehicle than the Thames was. That car-ishness was appreciated by drivers, but also made production much more simple. Ford no longer had to have so many van-specific parts available. Good news all round. “It has been produced with an almost shameless luxury- reminiscent of the good old days” Oh, I see; they’re making film-review references. Clever. Silly, though, because luxury would be a massive overstatement. If you had spent your formative years sitting on a rusty spike, in the rain, being force-fed gravel while listening to Justin Bieber on loop, your first time in a Transit could have been seen as a comfortable experience, but still some way short of luxurious. The list of comfort-oriented features runs to interior illumination, padding in the seats and a veritable cornucopia of ashtrays. Smoking was awesome in 1971. There was also cooling fan which was able to provide the cabin with air which was either heated or just pumped in from the outside. It would be years, though, until UK buyers could opt for air-conditioning; such an appointment was in the realms of hysterical fantasy in the ’70s. “But there are times when the glamour gives way to down-to-earth realism” What, like this brochure does? Nope, it’s mental all the way through. The Transit, though, could be made into a truly miserable mode of transportation if you insisted; specify the Crewbus versions and your passengers will be condemned to a fate of sliding fore and aft along varnished longitudinal wooden slatted benches which offered absolutely no relief from road bumps whatsoever. The Crewbus was a halfway house between freight-carrier and folk-forwarder. The van was all about carrying as many cubic yards of stuff as the chassis could handle; the Crewbus was similar aside from the awkward shape of its human occupants. The mechanical package didn’t really differ, either. Engines at this time were from Ford’s Essex V4 family in 1.7 and 2.0 litre capacity and ranging from 73 to 93 gross horsepower. Alternatively Ford’s 2.4 litre York diesel could be had with up to 61 rough, noisy horses. “A startling performance, promising a long, long run.” Finally, some sense. The MK1 Transit lasted until ’78, a thirteen year run, and its bones would continue to make up the majority of the MK2 model until 1986. The concept was certainly validated and the Transit remained unassailable in, er, saleability terms for years to come. (Disclaimer; All images are of original manufacturers publicity materials, photographed by me. Copyright remains property of Ford Motor Company. I’m sure I don’t remember the interior illumination being quite as bright as in that final picture…..)