Full size van
Encyclopedia
A full size van is a marketing
Marketing
Marketing is the process used to determine what products or services may be of interest to customers, and the strategy to use in sales, communications and business development. It generates the strategy that underlies sales techniques, business communication, and business developments...

 term used in North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

 for a van
Van
A van is a kind of vehicle used for transporting goods or groups of people.In British English usage, it can be either specially designed or based on a saloon or sedan car, the latter type often including derivatives with open backs...

 larger than a minivan
Minivan
Minivan is a type of van designed for personal use. Minivans are typically either two-box or one box designs for maximum interior volume – and are taller than a sedan, hatchback, or a station wagon....

, that is characterized by a large boxy appearance, a short hood, and very heavy cargo/passenger hauling capacity. In recent times they consistently feature a powertrain
Powertrain
In a motor vehicle, the term powertrain or powerplant refers to the group of components that generate power and deliver it to the road surface, water, or air. This includes the engine, transmission, drive shafts, differentials, and the final drive...

 of a V8 engine
V8 engine
A V8 engine is a V engine with eight cylinders mounted on the crankcase in two banks of four cylinders, in most cases set at a right angle to each other but sometimes at a narrower angle, with all eight pistons driving a common crankshaft....

, automatic transmission
Automatic transmission
An automatic transmission is one type of motor vehicle transmission that can automatically change gear ratios as the vehicle moves, freeing the driver from having to shift gears manually...

 and rear wheel drive.

They largely replaced the compact van
Compact van
A compact van is a type of van characterized by a flat front design, mechanicals based on a compact car, an engine placed either at the rear or between and behind the front seats and were roughly the same size as the VW Bus. Popular in the United States during the early 1960s, they were replaced by...

s which were introduced in the early 1960s to compete with the Volkswagen bus
Volkswagen Bus
-Light commercial vehicles:One of five generations of Volkswagen vans:*Volkswagen Type 2 , generation T1 *Volkswagen Type 2 , generation T2 *Volkswagen Type 2 , generation T3...

, based on compact car components.

The first full size van was the 1969 Ford Econoline
Ford E-Series
The Ford E-Series, formerly known as the Econoline or Club Wagon, is a line of full-size vans and truck chassis from the Ford Motor Company. The E-Series is related to the Ford F-Series line of pickup trucks. The line was introduced in 1961 as a compact van and its descendants are still produced...

, which used components from the F-Series
Ford F-Series
The F-Series is a series of full-size pickup trucks from Ford Motor Company which has been sold continuously for over six decades. The most popular variant of the F-Series is the F-150...

 pickups. General Motors and Dodge
Dodge Ram Van
The Dodge B-Series was a full-size van marketed under the Dodge brand by the Chrysler Corporation and later DaimlerChrysler...

 would follow suit with designs with the engines placed even farther forward, and succeeding generations of the Econoline would also introduce longer hoods.

The market is entirely dominated nowadays by the Ford E-Series
Ford E-Series
The Ford E-Series, formerly known as the Econoline or Club Wagon, is a line of full-size vans and truck chassis from the Ford Motor Company. The E-Series is related to the Ford F-Series line of pickup trucks. The line was introduced in 1961 as a compact van and its descendants are still produced...

 and Chevrolet Express
Chevrolet Express
The Chevrolet Express and GMC Savana are full-size vans from General Motors. They replaced the Chevrolet Van and GMC Vandura in 1996. The Express and Savana currently hold 44.8% of the full-size van market in the United States, just behind rival Ford's E-Series...

/ GMC Savana.
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK