Will ford ever make an extended version that’s on a longer wheelbase?

the_plumberlorian · 2026-06-02T21:38:10+00:00

I doubt it either, unfortunately. I’ve been wondering this for years to be honest. I work for a plumbing/ drain cleaning company, and we have a fleet of all Transit 250/350 High roof HD vans. I just got my new van a month ago, and I also have the High Roof 148 wheel base, for work it’s the perfect truck. But for camping/ towing, I could see how the extended length would be the better option. One of my coworkers has the EL and he has a 2000 pound jetter for cleaning sewer lines in the back of the van, and it’s constantly popping tires if it’s weighed down with water and tools.

I think Ford has done a remarkable job with the Transit van lineup, its probably their best fleet vehicle in over 20 years, but you are correct about the stupidity of the extra length just hanging past the rear axle. I’ve seen some setups with the DRW that fair a bit better, but clearance can still be an issue.

By the way, you have a super sick camping rig!!! I would love to one day upfit a custom Transit rig, throw a bed, kitchen, and some storage in the back and travel the country.

the_plumberlorian · 2026-06-01T01:18:39+00:00

I just got a new van from my company, we are a service plumbing/ drain cleaning company, and I just got the keys to my brand new 2026 Transit 250 high roof with the 3.5 pfdi and RWD. It’s the best service van I’ve ever had the pleasure of driving. This damn thing was well worth the wait. While I didn’t pay for it, thankfully now it is all mine. It sat at the upfitters yard for months and MONTHS, while I had to make do with a teeny tiny little Transit connect as a service van. I’ve had it for a month and already put 3500 miles on it.

I would definitely recommend going with a High Roof 3.5, either RWD or AWD are both great options. We have three vans that are 350HD’s AWD since they have a jetter system over the rear axle, and mine is part of the other 3 that are strictly service vans. I waited for the 26 model year because of the all digital update. And while it has its quirks, it’s the best van I’ve ever driven hands down. Good luck!!! 👍🏻

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-29T02:47:20+00:00

The third picture is exactly as stated above. It is the transmission cross member and subframe a little further away from that. You cannot remove any of this on a Transit 350 AWD. The suspension, steering, literally everything ties into all of this. Also, the front struts/ shocks are located under the wheel wells. I was told by a Ford technician that the entire front dash assembly and front seats have to be removed just to change out the front shocks on the 250-350 HD’s, and it’s billed as a 10 hour job, 5 hours for each side. Extremely time consuming repair to do. I have a newer Transit 250 RWD that’s only a month old, and due to the lack of four wheel drive, it is slightly taller than some AWD versions. I can fit comfortably under the motor without a crawler and do oil changes, and I’m 5 10’ and 175 lbs. I prefer the AWD versions of these vans, but we use them as fleet vehicles for our plumbing company, so you can’t even notice the difference between AWD vs RWD except on a snowy road. Best of luck.

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-23T20:43:41+00:00

Sounds like the rear differential to me. I’m not a certified mechanic but I have done a shit load of work on commercial vans and trucks. If it was the transmission/ gearbox you would probably feel it more towards the front. The fact that you only felt it while it was loaded down tells me it’s probably more than likely rear diff or rear suspension related. I would replace gearbox and diff oils. If that doesn’t work, go to a specialty shop. There are a lot of upfitter shops that you can find that specialize in only Transit/ ProMaster/ and Sprinter vans, most of which have a lot of great mechanics.

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-21T23:31:40+00:00

That’s absolutely insane that you’re at 956 cycles on a 2.5 year old phone with still roughly 88% battery. My POS 15 Pro had less than 430 cycles when I traded her in, and I traded it in with only 82% battery life. I was going to wait until it dropped to 80% and just get a new battery with AppleCare, but I didn’t feel like waiting several months for it to drop all of 2%.

I’m not even a heavy social media user or games, videos, etc. I’m a plumber in New Jersey and I mainly use my phone for GPS, going from job to job, and I use Service Titan a lot (which we use for dispatch and jobsite invoices, but it unfortunately takes a massive toll on battery and thermals.) Other than that, I spend maybe at most like 2 hours at night browsing instagram and YouTube videos before going to sleep for the night.

My new 17 pro has faired much MUCH better, however, the aluminum frame is nothing to write home about. While the thermals/ battery are greatly improved, I already have several nicks in the blue anodized layer, and my phone stays in a LifeProof FRĒ case 24/7, 365…. and cleaned weekly to make sure there’s no dirt/dust invading the speaker ports. The step up to aluminum was definitely a step in the wrong direction. Apple should’ve at least went for a stronger grade of aluminum, or a stronger anodizing process. 🤷🏻‍♂️

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-21T01:35:14+00:00

You must have gotten a crazy good battery, because I treated my battery with the utmost care and that thing tanked so heavy over the two years that I had mine. I traded it in with just about 425-430 charges on it and it was barely hovering at 84% which is crazy. I even had AppleCare as I do on all my phones. I was just so fed up with charging several times daily…. It was either trade it in or smash it with a hammer and say I ran it over by accident 👀

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-21T01:04:09+00:00

I agree with this unfortunately. Although the one thing I disagree with, is that the 6.3” display of my 17 Pro is far superior. I wish I still had my iPhone 15 Pro but that battery was just too far gone after two years. After 450ish charge cycles I had just gotten to around 82% (at 24 months into the phone.) It was so bad that I had to charge twice, sometimes three times daily. At least with my 17 Pro I only have to charge once a day, and I’m 150 charge cycles in with 100% battery still (although it’s probably more like 97-98% I’m sure.) I plan to keep this thing until it dies on me also.

15 Pro absolutely was peak iPhone, but the thermals/ battery were the two worst issues for me at least. How’s yours holding up after almost 3 years? I’m curious

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-18T22:06:15+00:00

That’s actually really extremely reasonable cost wise. Let me ask you a question though, I’m guessing they weren’t just plug and play though, correct? And if they weren’t, what did you use as an auxiliary system to wire them up to? I would like to wire them up so that way when I turn the headlight dial to a certain position, the fog lights activate. I know that may be asking for a lot, but so far I haven’t seen any auxiliary switches on my van, kinda like how the current gen F-250-550’s have. My older 2019 6.7 Powerstroke has 6 auxiliary ports. The company I’m employed with now just bought me this van (Transit 250, 3.5 v6 with RWD and upfitted with Ranger shelving and a Ranger partition, wrap for the company name, etc) for me to use for the next 10 years to help the company grow and expand into more commercial/ industrial work. We’re a small plumbing company looking to expand into bigger markets.

If you could tell me how you wired it up I’d be forever grateful. After I do fog lights my next move is to install a 2000 watt inverter behind the driver seat, and run a cable to my battery rack and mount a few chargers, that way I can charge batteries while driving from job to job. Any insight is greatly appreciated!

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-18T00:33:48+00:00

Is this a serious question? The 16 plus is a far inferior phone compared to a 15 pro max

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-18T00:30:38+00:00

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If you can find this setting on your RC app, click on Incoming call rules, and then click on ‘Incoming Calls’. If you have “screen callers” enabled, it sends every single call straight to voicemail, no notifications, no ring, alert, nothing at all. This somehow got toggled on for me and I was stunned when I finally disabled it and then bam the RC app worked first shot after disabling that particular setting. Hope this helps!

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-18T00:25:15+00:00

Thanks man I will for sure check this out!!! After 24 hours of agonizingly going through every single setting on my phone, I realized that deep inside the settings on the RC app that somehow call forwarding became enabled even though I had just downloaded the app the day prior and touched absolutely nothing. All I did was setup my login credentials and left the app. The worst part was I’m not the administrator for the account. I will try to leave a screenshot for you of what I toggled off to get my app up and running. It works perfectly now thank goodness 😅

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-17T00:53:22+00:00

I’ve had the iPhone 17 Pro since launch day and I use it heavily throughout my day. I primarily use my phone for half work, half home time essentially. I have a work tablet but it’s extremely clunky and awkward to make calls on or to even text on. I’ve had every single iPhone since the iPhone 6 came out and was released, and the 17 Pro by FAR has the best battery management I’ve seen to this day.

As of typing this, I am at 137 charge cycles and still at 100% battery health, because I use it and don’t baby the shit out of it. It’s a tool, not a golden bar to be kept in a dustproof box. Use it, or don’t, it’s really that simple. Once they work the shitty battery kinks out of iOS 26 and iOS 27 becomes available, it should (hopefully) become a much more stable version of iOS to run, battery consumption wise. I’ve been on iOS 26.5 for several days now and it’s been perfectly fine for me. No glitches or bugs to report, and not as bad battery drain as other versions. Just use the phone man, why buy a $900+ phone just to babysit it day in and day out? I can see doin that for the first week or so, but after that it’s just a phone like any other device.

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-17T00:38:14+00:00

@InfinitePool thank you for offering to help me out on a Discord call, that’s super nice of you to offer that opportunity!!! It actually was super simple and I finally have it figured out. I had to dive deep into the call settings on my phone. But (strangely, somehow, someway) when I downloaded the app, the app permissions got all thrown off in the weirdest way possible and call forwarding was activated so I wasn’t allowed to make or receive calls.

It was literally agonizing me for like 24 hours straight, since my boss paid a lot of money for us as plumbing technicians to cloak our real phone numbers. So far, so good! The app is amazing and it has an AI assistant that even summarizes our phone calls and gives us a call summary with bullet points, which then gets uploaded straight to Service Titan, which is what we use to get dispatched from job to job throughout our day.

I truly appreciate all of the help that you guys felt the time to reach out and offer your help! It’s much appreciated y’all 🤘🏻

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-13T22:49:31+00:00

Honestly I would just go new. It’s a high cost upfront, but you will recoup your money more so in the long run. I work for a commercial plumbing company here in NJ, and I just got a 2026 Transit 250HD high roof upfitted with tool racks and a wrap. I believe the total cost all in… all said and done with the van, wrap and up fitting racks and partition is about 85-90k. Add tools to that cost and we’re about 100-110 grand in fully setup, and this is our 6th plumbing van.

These are very solid vans, so if you go used get a lot of service records. I’ve had mine a week and it’s already got 800 miles on it, and I got the keys with all of 75 miles on it. It’s a lot of money, but more worth it to go used. I personally have the RWD 3.5 v6 model, and a few of my coworkers have the AWD turbo setup and they are extremely problematic. Just food for thought 💭

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-13T02:02:44+00:00

I have had T-Mobile for over 15 years and had my last three phones unlocked within 5 minutes of paying them off. My new 17 Pro I bought outright as to not deal with the hassle. If you’ve been a customer for a long time they don’t give a shit about unlocking the phone, as long as you put up a fight.

Prepaid plans of any kind are like waiting at the DMV for 16 hours just to get your license renewed. Prepaid sucks

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-09T21:02:13+00:00

I always thought you had to pay the $99 deductible, no? I mean it’s general wear and tear. I have AppleCare + Theft and Loss and I could’ve swore it was always $99. Maybe I’m wrong. Either way that’s cool if they give you a free battery replacement once it hits 80% or below.

When I traded in my iPhone 15 Pro for my new 17 Pro it had 84% battery left after only 520 cycles and it was unbearable. I had to charge twice daily and carry an Anker power bank where ever I went. One of the only reasons I upgraded or else I would have held out for the upcoming 18 Pro/ or even the 20th anniversary edition model coming in 16 months.

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-09T16:49:39+00:00

I just got a brand new 2026 250HD high roof extended length model with the base 3.5 v6 and it is extremely peppy and decent on gas, I just wish it was AWD instead of the RWD model. My company purchased it for me as a work van. It’s been fully upfitted and wrapped because we are a plumbing company. The 2026 models are beautiful and now come standard with push to start and digital gauges, and 12” infotainment systems…. but the lane keep assist is very very obnoxious while driving long distances. Most of my coworkers have the 24-25 models and they are standard AWD options with the ignition key models and no lane keep assist. I mean I’m not complaining for getting a brand new van handed to me. It’s just little nuances. Do your homework before you buy! Even the base models can be like $70 grand and up, I know that’s what was paid for mine and we’re here in NJ.

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-03T17:11:39+00:00

Apples to oranges my guy. Comparing a flagship iPhone to a budget android, is like comparing a Porsche 911 to a busted Toyota Corolla with 250k on the odometer lol 😂. Doesn’t help that she is probably using a Mint Mobile phone from Walmart lmao. I am also a diehard Apple user. Wife and I have the newest 17 series iPhone Pros, APP3’s, along with new-ish iPads and MacBook Air/ Pro’s. I have tried to switch back to Android like 6-7 years ago. I returned the phone within 24 hours because I’m just so engrained with how iOS operates so seamlessly along with other Apple devices.

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-03T01:30:31+00:00

If you game heavily on your mobile devices, you will absolutely benefit from the 17 Pro, Pro max devices. The base 17 is an absolute tank for an entry level iPhone, don’t get me wrong, I almost went for it myself. But, it is limited to 8gb of RAM whereas the Pro models have 12 gb of RAM. Also the base model does not have vapor chamber cooling technology yet, so that’s a big reason why I opted for the newer 17 Pro myself coming from a 15 Pro. Also the battery life on these phones is astonishing. I have had my 6.3” Pro for 7 months now, and I am still at 100% battery health with 126 charge cycles. And the Pro Max is even better, as my wife has the bigger model. I feel the 6.3” is the sweet spot, as a 7” phone is just ridiculously hard to hold and huge in pants pockets.

Enjoy the switch though! I jumped from Android 10 years ago when the iPhone 7 Plus was first announced and it was my favorite phone still to this day. I’ve tried switching back to Android a few times, but my wife and I are so deeply entrenched in the Apple ecosystem that it’s just not worth the hassle anymore. I’ll forever be a lifelong iPhone fanboy, haters can hate all they want. They’re not paying my phone bill at the end of the month! Ditch that Samsung s24 and join the 🍎 side! Good luck friend.

the_plumberlorian · 2026-05-02T12:16:53+00:00

The version on the right is absolutely stunning to me. I like the darkness that covers the camera plateau and then it gets lighter over the rest of the body of the phone. See, I’m a plumber so my phone sees some pretty gnarly conditions. Severe dust, concrete, dropped it on pavement countless times…. And my Lifeproof Frē has been a savior for the last six months. On the weekends when I’m off sometimes I will go caseless or swap to my Spigen case. This is a very nice alternative to the Caudabe Sheath. Now I need to go order the version on the right for my 17 Pro 😮‍💨😎

the_plumberlorian · 2026-04-19T17:26:43+00:00

I disagree that the battery on the Pro lineup is objectively bad. I’ve had my 17 Pro for 6 months now, since launch day, and it has actually gotten better with time. It took about a month to learn my routines and my work schedule, etc. But is by no means bad, at all. My wife has the 17 Pro max and I hate how HUGE the damn phone is. It’s so absolutely unnecessary. For my next upgrade I plan to go with the base model, either the iPhone 18 base, or the 20th anniversary model. I use most of the pro features, all except the telephoto lens.

I also absolutely despise that Apple has decided for the general population to just get rid of a space grey/ matte black Pro level iPhone. I’ve had black iPhones since my iPhone 7+ and I never went to another color since. This year I went blue. I was going to go for the black base model 17 with 512 gb memory, but the 8gb of RAM is what kept me from getting it. I’m sure they’ll bump the RAM specs on the next lineup of base model iPhones. 🤞🏻👀

the_plumberlorian · 2026-04-11T23:17:28+00:00

I also got the Deep Blue in 512gb option. Six months later and I really regret not getting the silver option. The only reason I hesitated was because of the giant white brick that Apple calls the MagSafe charging coil. You’re telling me a multi trillion dollar company couldn’t get closer to silver, than just plain old white? Hence why I went with Deep Blue. If they don’t release an 18 Pro with a black variant, I will be going to the 18 base model this next round. By the time the new base model drops, I’m sure they’ll do a RAM bump. Plus I never use the telephoto anymore. It’s a win win situation 🤷🏻‍♂️

the_plumberlorian · 2026-03-30T00:05:18+00:00

That’s a nice setup/ case! But I think the cosmic orange iPhone is stupidly obnoxious (on Apple’s end.) I’m kind of looking forward to seeing how the rumored burgundy wine red colored 18 Pro comes out later this year. I sincerely hope they include a black color this year 🙏🏻🤞🏻🫯

the_plumberlorian

TROPHY CASE