Ford Thames 400E
The Ford Thames 400E is a commercial vehicle that was made by Ford UK and introduced in 1957. Production of the range continued until September 1965, by which time a total of 187,000 had been built.
History
By the mid 1950s, Ford lagged well behind the competition in the light commercial market. The model still on offer until 1957 was the trusty but antiquated Fordson E83W, released in 1938. Studies were therefore made of the competition in this sector, with the Morris Commercial 10 cwt and 15/20 cwt models, of prewar design; Austin 10 cwt, and later their 25 cwt; Trojan 15 cwt van; and the Bedford 10/12 cwt model all coming in for scrutiny.
Taking a design lead from the US parent, a well overdue new 10/12/15 cwt range was therefore decided upon, to be of the forward control type all based on the same 'outrigger' chassis. With regard to this 'outrigger chassis', Cab and chassis windscreen variants, (subsequently described as 'open' back) differed from the van, estate car, and express bus body models, (subsequently described as 'closed' back) models by the addition of an extra rear crossmember to support the spare wheel carrier and to close the rear ends of the chassis horns. On the 'closed' back models the nature of the rear bodywork meant the rear crossmember could be omitted for this purpose.