Since my Sprinter is getting higher up in age and mileage (11 years old and 678,000 miles) I have been thinking: What will I replace it with if something major happens to it? There are 3 choices: Sprinter, Transit and ProMaster. I eliminated the ProMaster based on looks alone, so for me, there are two options in the ‘new’ category: Sprinter with the 2.1 liter 4 cylinder engine and 7 speed transmission, or the Transit with the 3.5 liter V6 EcoBoost and 6 speed transmission, or another good ol’ 2004-2006 5 cylinder Sprinter in the ‘used’ category. I would consider the Transit diesel, but there is no info out there on it, so, for now, I will skip it. If money was of no concern, I would just go out and buy the Sprinter since I just like a lot of things about it: looks, range per tank of fuel, torque at lower rpms with no downshifts, and most of all, the awesome diesel sound. But unfortunately, I am a cheap a$$ so I wanted to know how much these two vehicles cost to operate long term.
To find the fuel mileage of these vehicles I tried to find owners that use them the same as me, with the majority of the miles on the highway. I had to discard some of these mileage figures since they were not reliable (I talked with a Transit owner a few months ago and when I asked him what his mileage was, he responded: ‘About 25 mpg since I drove from Cleveland, OH to Detroit, MI on half a tank of gas.’) Enough said. Anyway, there were many more very informative people that I talked to. Thanks go out to all the people that took their time to chat with me about their vehicles.
I looked at these two vehicles from the point of view of a guy that buys a vehicle from the stealership, ie, dealership, drives it as fast away from there as possible, and keeps it away from them as much as possible. I have experience with various dealerships, Ford, Dodge, Honda, VW, and all are about the same. They all try to make as much money off of us as possible, throwing parts at the vehicle that don’t need replacing. So, in my calculations I only included the prices of parts, since I would be the one doing the maintenance. Parts were priced at various local and online parts places that supply original parts or manufacturer approved. I followed what the manufacturer recommends for maintenance intervals.
A few words about the price of fuel. I know that there are gas stations today that sell a gallon of diesel for $1+ more than a gallon of gas, but I don’t buy my fuel there. In my experience, in average, I buy diesel that is only $0.50 more expensive than gas. The extra range of the Sprinter coupled with GasBuddy app help tremendously here. So, I ran the numbers for cheap fuel (diesel $2.50/gallon vs. gas $2.00/gallon) and also expensive fuel (diesel $4.50/gallon vs. gas $4.00/gallon).
So, this is what I came up with, given that both vehicles will be driven 200,000 miles, which is only about 2 years for an expediter.
Sprinter:
Oil Changes every 15,000 miles: 13*$104=$1,352
Transmission Service every 60,000 miles: 3*$150=$450
Fuel Filter every 30,000 miles: 6*$83=$498
Air Filter every 60,000 miles: 3*$18=$54
Rear End every 100,000 miles: 2*$32=$64
Coolant every 150,000 miles: 1*$30=$30
DEF $10 every 3000 miles: 66*$10=$660
Fuel: 23 mpg, $2.50/gallon: $21,739
Fuel: 23 mpg, $4.50/gallon: $39,130
Total cheap fuel: $24,847 or $0.124235 per mile.
Total expensive fuel: $42,238 or $0.21119 per mile.
Transit:
Oil Changes every 10,000 miles: 20*$55=$1,100
Transmission Service every 150,000 miles: 1*$100=$100 –I am assuming here, since all I could find about the transmission is that it doesn’t have the dipstick and to take it to the dealer to deal with it.
Air Filter every 30,000 miles: 6*$16=$96
Rear End every 150,000 miles: 1*$30=$30
Coolant every 100,000 miles: 2*$30=$60
Spark Plugs every 100,000 miles: 2*$36=$72
Fuel: 17 mpg, $2.00/gallon: $23,529
Fuel:17 mpg, $4.00/gallon: $47,058
Total cheap fuel: $24,987 or $0.124935 per mile.
Total expensive fuel: $48,516 or $0.24258 per mile.
So, with the cheap fuel prices we have now, over 200,000 miles a Sprinter will save $140 over the Transit. If the fuel prices go up to $4.00 for gas and $4.50 for diesel, then the Sprinter will save $6,278 in 2 years, or about $261 a month.
The 4 cylinder sprinter owners that I talked to haven’t had DPF/DEF issues yet, so hopefully MB solved some of the issues that plagued the earlier models. Also unknown is how reliable Ford’s twin turbo system is. I am pretty sure that if issues arise, it will not be cheap to fix. Both of these vehicles/engine combos are pretty new so it remains to be seen how reliable they are and how expensive they will be to fix.
My conclusion? I will keep squeezing every penny out of my current Sprinter and revisit the issue when I actually need to buy something. Most probably I will look for a used 2004-2006 Sprinter with its excellent fuel mileage and no DPF/DEF to worry about.
To find the fuel mileage of these vehicles I tried to find owners that use them the same as me, with the majority of the miles on the highway. I had to discard some of these mileage figures since they were not reliable (I talked with a Transit owner a few months ago and when I asked him what his mileage was, he responded: ‘About 25 mpg since I drove from Cleveland, OH to Detroit, MI on half a tank of gas.’) Enough said. Anyway, there were many more very informative people that I talked to. Thanks go out to all the people that took their time to chat with me about their vehicles.
I looked at these two vehicles from the point of view of a guy that buys a vehicle from the stealership, ie, dealership, drives it as fast away from there as possible, and keeps it away from them as much as possible. I have experience with various dealerships, Ford, Dodge, Honda, VW, and all are about the same. They all try to make as much money off of us as possible, throwing parts at the vehicle that don’t need replacing. So, in my calculations I only included the prices of parts, since I would be the one doing the maintenance. Parts were priced at various local and online parts places that supply original parts or manufacturer approved. I followed what the manufacturer recommends for maintenance intervals.
A few words about the price of fuel. I know that there are gas stations today that sell a gallon of diesel for $1+ more than a gallon of gas, but I don’t buy my fuel there. In my experience, in average, I buy diesel that is only $0.50 more expensive than gas. The extra range of the Sprinter coupled with GasBuddy app help tremendously here. So, I ran the numbers for cheap fuel (diesel $2.50/gallon vs. gas $2.00/gallon) and also expensive fuel (diesel $4.50/gallon vs. gas $4.00/gallon).
So, this is what I came up with, given that both vehicles will be driven 200,000 miles, which is only about 2 years for an expediter.
Sprinter:
Oil Changes every 15,000 miles: 13*$104=$1,352
Transmission Service every 60,000 miles: 3*$150=$450
Fuel Filter every 30,000 miles: 6*$83=$498
Air Filter every 60,000 miles: 3*$18=$54
Rear End every 100,000 miles: 2*$32=$64
Coolant every 150,000 miles: 1*$30=$30
DEF $10 every 3000 miles: 66*$10=$660
Fuel: 23 mpg, $2.50/gallon: $21,739
Fuel: 23 mpg, $4.50/gallon: $39,130
Total cheap fuel: $24,847 or $0.124235 per mile.
Total expensive fuel: $42,238 or $0.21119 per mile.
Transit:
Oil Changes every 10,000 miles: 20*$55=$1,100
Transmission Service every 150,000 miles: 1*$100=$100 –I am assuming here, since all I could find about the transmission is that it doesn’t have the dipstick and to take it to the dealer to deal with it.
Air Filter every 30,000 miles: 6*$16=$96
Rear End every 150,000 miles: 1*$30=$30
Coolant every 100,000 miles: 2*$30=$60
Spark Plugs every 100,000 miles: 2*$36=$72
Fuel: 17 mpg, $2.00/gallon: $23,529
Fuel:17 mpg, $4.00/gallon: $47,058
Total cheap fuel: $24,987 or $0.124935 per mile.
Total expensive fuel: $48,516 or $0.24258 per mile.
So, with the cheap fuel prices we have now, over 200,000 miles a Sprinter will save $140 over the Transit. If the fuel prices go up to $4.00 for gas and $4.50 for diesel, then the Sprinter will save $6,278 in 2 years, or about $261 a month.
The 4 cylinder sprinter owners that I talked to haven’t had DPF/DEF issues yet, so hopefully MB solved some of the issues that plagued the earlier models. Also unknown is how reliable Ford’s twin turbo system is. I am pretty sure that if issues arise, it will not be cheap to fix. Both of these vehicles/engine combos are pretty new so it remains to be seen how reliable they are and how expensive they will be to fix.
My conclusion? I will keep squeezing every penny out of my current Sprinter and revisit the issue when I actually need to buy something. Most probably I will look for a used 2004-2006 Sprinter with its excellent fuel mileage and no DPF/DEF to worry about.
