Scottish Sierra pickup
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• Ford's long-awaited Sierrabased one-tonne pickup will make its first public appearance at next month's Scottish Motor Show -but production models are not expected to go on sale in Britain before the start of 1988.
Ford is characteristically tight-lipped about its P100 pickup replacement, but Commercial Motor can report that it will be built in Europe and, according to Ford sources, "will have an improved power train", compared to the old P100 which has only been available with a 1.6-litre petrol engine.
The Sierra-based pickup is likely to be available with either a two-litre petrol engine, or the 2.3-litre indirectinjection diesel unit that powers some Sierra cars. This would clearly extend the vehicle's appeal to many UK oper ators who have been expressing growing preference for diesel pickups. Li Among the other light commercial vehicle projects believed to be currently occupying Ford's development engineers are an all-new 1.8-litre direct-injection diesel engine — based on the current 1.6-litre indirect-injection diesel fitted to the Escort and Fiesta vans — and a new five-speed gearbox for the Transit, expected sometime in 1989.
Last month Ford introduced an uprated version of the M27 Transit five-speed transmission. This is now standard on all 2.5-litre diesel Transit vans, incuding twin-rear wheel longwheel base models, but diesel Transit chassis-cabs will continue to be fitted with a fourspeed gear box with the Laycock overdrive on third and fourth ratios.