Old Ford Transit still refreshed

In May, Ford released the first photos and information of the E-Transit, an all-electric version of the new-generation Transit Custom that will undoubtedly populate many industrial estates from the second half of next year. The new Transit Custom is clearly recognizable as a member of the Transit Custom family, but it is still completely new. The practical bus will have, among other things, a muzzle with flat headlights placed high above the grille. No more taillights placed high in the buttocks at the rear, but units housed lower in the whole. Photos of a very different Transit have surfaced in the database of the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

Ford E-Transit Custom (2023)

In these two photos you see the current Transit Custom – in fact the Tourneo, after all, it is the passenger car variant – but with a front that, to a certain extent, resembles the face of the new Transit. The side mirrors cannot hide the fact that this is just the current generation Transit/Tourneo Custom that came on the market in 2012 and was heavily facelifted more than five years ago. The same goes for the rear lights, although they have a different layout, they are just the ones that go way up.

JMC Teshun

This Transit, to be produced under license by Chinese Jiangling Motors (JMC), will certainly not be the only old Transit that Ford has in its range in China. For example, it sells a pre-facelift model of the current generation as New Transit (photos 3 and 4) – yes – and you can knock on the door of the Chinese equivalent of Ford Pro/Vehicles for the Transit New Era Pro (photos 5 and 6). Despite its name, this is in fact a third-generation Transit as it was introduced in 2000, but with the modified front that that Transit generation was fitted in Europe in 2006 during its facelift. Since 2017, JMC has even been selling a modernized version of the second-generation Transit introduced in 1986 under its own brand name in China: the JMC Teshun (photos 7 and 8).