Ford’s latest Transit Custom is proving a hit, and there’s a new all-electric E-Transit Custom on the way. The people carrier spin-off is called the Tourneo Custom, which you can also have as a full zero-emissions vehicle if you want, or alternatively with a turbodiesel or plug-in hybrid petrol-electric drivetrain - the latter of which we’ve tried here. Does it make a convincing alternative to other large, van-derived MPVs, or is it still a bit too commercial at heart?
In the metal
Looking just like you’d expect a highly modernised Transit with an emphasis on passenger duties to, there’s something appealing about the Ford Tourneo Custom. With the LED light clusters of the latest Transit Custom carried over, it looks anything but a rough-and-tumble commercial vehicle with some windows and seats shoehorned into it. And that classy appearance is helped by the Active specification which gives the Tourneo Custom MPV a little off-road glamour. You’ll notice this in the silver ‘skid plates’ mounted low and centrally in both bumpers, as well as the black cladding over the wheel arches and eye-catching 17-inch alloy wheels. It even does the clever trick of masking its stretched wheelbase as this longer L2 variant, a clever trick considering it’s a whopping 5.45 metres from tip to tail. Sumptuous Artisan Red paint almost certainly plays its part in adding to this particular Tourneo’s undoubted kerb appeal, too.
Stepping inside, the quality levels are night and day from the previous Tourneo Custom, and indeed many of the Ford’s obvious rivals today. The company has done great work in making the interior far more versatile too, as four of the six folding seats in the rear of the passenger compartment - arrayed in a 3-3 formation - can slide individually on a neat system of rails (in the third row, two seats move together), while all of them can be removed entirely so you can configure the interior through a multitude of different arrangements to best suit your cargo/passenger needs.
Various family-friendly touches, such as climate controls, cupholders and USB-C sockets, abound in the cabin and it should be obvious that the space onboard is vast. OK, the boot figures are a little misleading, as they’re up to the roof of the Tourneo Custom, but you still shouldn’t struggle to get eight adults and a boatload of clobber into the back of the Ford if you need to. It’s truly cavernous within.
Yet it’s the quality of the seating and the fixtures in the back which impresses most, and that goes hand-in-hand with the superb, high-tech dashboard of the latest Transit and Tourneo Custom family that you’ll find up front. This MPV has the full, glitzy, 5G-connected, 13-inch SYNC 4 touchscreen infotainment in the centre of the dashboard, along with an 8-inch digital instrument cluster, and while it perhaps places a tad too many functions on the main display for some people’s liking, in general it works intuitively and looks great.
The Tourneo Custom PHEV also maintains the practicality up front in what would otherwise be the ‘cab’ of the related commercial version, as it - equipped with a CVT automatic - has the column-mounted shifter and completely flat floor between the front seats, which means moving around inside the Ford when it is parked is easy. There’s also a goodly array of storage compartments, ledges and cubbies dotted around the front two seats. Overall, it looks and feels like a high-quality item, outside and in, which puts occupants in a good mood long before they’ve started travelling in the Tourneo.
Driving it
We’ve found many plug-in hybrids over the years to be too much of a compromise to convince when in operation, and rarely able to justify their gobsmacking on-paper eco-figures. We were expecting much the same from this Tourneo Custom PHEV, given it’s a 2.5-tonne vehicle even when unladen in this specification, and also considering that there are such impressive turbodiesel and full electric drivetrain options available in the range as alternatives.
Furthermore, Ford has been coy in giving out specifics pertaining to the hybrid powertrain’s make-up, so all we know is that the peak output of petrol and electric motors together is 233hp, while the peak torque figure of 209Nm only relates to the 2.5-litre combustion engine. We don’t even know top speed or acceleration numbers for it, either - not that those are massively important, granted.
And then we drove it. And, frankly, it might well be the best powertrain of the lot for the Transit/Tourneo Custom family. Remembering this is essentially a van underneath, the cultured and thoroughly civilised way this large people carrier drove took us, delightfully, quite by surprise.
Like any of the current Custom mob, the Tourneo’s strength is that it blends all the finest attributes of being behind the wheel of a car - smooth ride, excellent rolling refinement, notably quick steering and remarkable body control - with the things that make a van so enjoyable, such as the upright driving position with the sense you’re sitting a long way above other traffic on the roads, along with unparalleled visibility through the glasshouse. There’s a strangely gratifying feelgood factor to piloting the Tourneo Custom around.
Something which is bolstered no end by the excellence of this particular drivetrain. Now, admittedly, we clambered into the Tourneo Custom’s plush cabin with a full tank of petrol and a completely topped-up battery pack ready and waiting for us, and then we drove it largely in urban areas - where it spent a huge proportion of its time whirring around in that near-silent opulence of a PHEV’s full-electric mode. But there were some sections of motorway included with speeds reaching 110km/h and more, which allowed us to ascertain that the engine is not a particularly noisy operator when it’s asked to help out with forward motion, while even the CVT gearbox - normally, a transmission type that is such a hindrance to refinement - operated slickly and unobtrusively. The performance wasn’t bad either, 233hp proving to be ample for this large vehicle (driving, as it admittedly was, just one-up).
After 38km of knocking around city suburbs and scooting along orbital motorways, we climbed back out of the van to see it showing a consumption figure of 2.4 litres/100km on its trip computer. That’s right in the heart of its official economy returns and, even better, there was apparently still 8km of battery juice left remaining at that point. So, if owners can charge the van up from the mains, even only infrequently, it certainly doesn’t look like it will cost the Earth to run.
What you get for your money
A bit of a grey area here, as pricing for the PHEV variant of the Tourneo Custom has not yet been released. Bought as passenger vehicles, the diesel models are around €75,500, while the E-Tourneo Custom is considerably cheaper thanks to its zero CO2 output, meaning it starts from €66,500. The PHEV should be between the two, which perhaps isn’t inexpensive, but then similar-sized MPVs with a luxury bent from other manufacturers are often even more costly again.
Another consideration is whether the Active trim will make it to Ireland, although we hope it does - it’s based on the Titanium specification and adds the bespoke styling (inside and out; the seat fabric has capital ‘A’ logos on it, for instance), twin powered sliding side doors, tri-zone climate control and the 17-inch alloys specific to this model.
Summary
Now that Ford has killed off its aged S-Max and Galaxy MPVs, the company’s last big people mover is this Tourneo Custom. But if you’re thinking this is going to be some unrefined, noisy, van-like driving experience, think again. Aside from the Volkswagen Multivan, we’ve not had the pleasure of piloting any large people carrier that is any more accomplished, comfortable and downright likeable than this Ford. If the PHEV pricing is right once confirmed for Ireland, this is one of the very first things we’d be recommending to anyone who needs a super-practical vehicle to cart a larger family around.
