Rugged occupations require rugged vehicles. And there are few jobs more hardcore than firefighting — saving lives by striding into burning buildings is a formidable endeavour, and in the early 1980s the German fire service received a fleet of trusty companions in the form of the SIRA-Transit. The name is a portmanteau of Sinpar and Rau GmbH, the former being a French 4WD transmission specialist and the latter a German Ford dealer; these hardy machines took the Mk2 Transit and added a robust all-wheel-drive system, jacked-up stance and twin-wheels, and in recent times they’ve become something of a cult collectible.
The Triplex Transit we have here was originally a German fire SIRA, having been imported to the UK in 2011 at which point its 2-litre Pinto was swapped out for a 2.5 Turbo Di from a Mk5 Transit. It then passed through a few owners, including a landscape gardener
