10 years old + Motability

[Burgerman]

Yes. Theres 2 sensible options. I Iisted both!

[salixfire]

Yes. The GM one you listed looks wonderful. I was more asking for the event tomorrow (who might not have these in). I've never used a WAV nor been inside one to know what would be sensible design versus somethings that looks spiffy but not usable in the long run. The demos will be set up to make all of them look great, hence why I 'm asking if there is anything I should be on the lookout for.

[Burgerman]

Many have inadequate floor space to turn, or a channel you must drive down and reverse out of (casters jam etc) and headroom. You need about 57 inches inside. Many have less meaning a special powerchair thats got about 30 yards range...

[salixfire]

Thanks, I'll check those when I do the test drives. Anything else you can think of?

[Burgerman]

Not off hand. The stuff I aam talking about is for drive from wheelchair vehicles. Because non of the alternatives will work for me. At least easily. So never really looked at that.

[snaker]

I remember the year 2009 when my family decided to buy a car no matter used or new. All we need was just a 4-wheels vehicle that could run and transport me. My uncle lived in a big city, had much 'relations' and he knew a taxi company selling an used Innova (a 7-seats Toyota). It costs about $15.000 (1/4 -1/3 comparing to the new one at that time). We payed and my uncle came to that company to receive the car. He knew nothing about cars so he asked a garageman come with him. After having a slight look on the car, that guy immediately called to my dad and said "do not buy it, it already ran more than 300.000km". Eventually, the taxi company was fair enough, they refunded 100%.

[Burgerman]

Mines done 10k. Miles. 16K Km. Using a chair is too easy here!

[wheelinghome]

Total cost so far 30,150 over 10 years, and its as good as new. Thats 3k per year. With a perfect van remaining. So 15k for 5 years use.

Now... Tell me again why people do notability?
30K down up front give or take a bit, and then pay £55 per week, then after 5 short years you get to give it back and start over??? Thats a cost of 14.7k (mobility allowance 5 years) plus 30k deposit, so total is 47k and its still not yours.
And to cover my 10 years thats 94k paid, and its STILL not yours!

I paid 30k and its still as new, pics from yesterday, and its mine from day 1. So I am baffled by all the rich people that can afford motability scheme leased vehicles.
10 year = 94k pounds compared to 30k buying from the US/Canada. And then its still not yours!

I totally agree, I've never used motability. Such bad value. I've got a friend who always gets an Astra, so ends up paying £7500 ish to lease it for three years... which you could buy a 3/4 year old one for.

Something you didn't list on your comparison is insurance which is included on motability which might make a significant difference for people with no no-claims etc. I have a policy which covers any driver over 25 on my van for £400 which gives me flexibility on drivers without hassle whereas I believe with motability you're limited to two named drivers with a certain number of free changes per year.

[Burgerman]

fish do special insurance for these. Mine costs around 320 per year.

And I damaged a few laws and bikes and cars over the years! Banned 5 times. Few bike write offs etc. My license was a special one with extra pages with all the nasty bits added. The consequence of a lifetime drag racing street turbo bikes and V8 cars/nitrous etc and the mental speed corruption it causes!

https://www.fishinsurance.co.uk/products/car-insurance/ get a quote!

[Mark]

As far as I can tell, most of the drive-from-wheelchair vehicles from motability have a very large chunk of the advance payment (if not all) covered by the grants department. That wasn't an option for me.

I now have a drive-from-wheelchair Mercedes Sprinter van (low roof, short wheelbase) which I am very pleased with. In the end I opted for a rear tail lift rather than side entry because it works better for most of the places I need to get in and out. However for a smaller vehicle rear access does involve domestic problems when you reverse over the shopping. I have repeated experience of this. However rear entry isn't such a problem with the Sprinter van because it is so roomy the shopping etc isn't in your way. I can carry a second wheelchair and get out past it easily. Also it is easy to turn around inside (in my F55) and drive out forwards, which I prefer. Even though I have the low roof version and it has a standard floor (i.e. not lowered) my wife can stand up and walk around inside.

Only downside is it uses more fuel than a smaller van. Approx 30 mpg diesel.

[Burgerman]

Lots of pictures needed!

Cost? Dealer?

[motoman]

Boy....I wish I got 30 mpg

And yes, some pics would be dandy.

[Burgerman]

One thing you may have missed is that ours are real gallons. Yours are shrunken gallons!

You have 3.78 litres to a gallon. We have 4.546 litres. So all our cars get more miles per gallon.

And our gallon is 5.36 pounds. Or 7 dollars. which may upset you! It does us. Diesel is more.

[Mark]

Can't keep the mileage down like BM; we've done over 9000 miles in the 8 months we've had the Sprinter. Note the privacy glass in side windows; very useful when sorting out "personal accidents".

Just tried to attach photos but it says max attachment size is 256 kB. I'll get Sally to reduce the size so I can attach them. Probably later today.

[Burgerman]

You realize that sprinters are transformed with a set of off road style rim/tyres and a 3 inch jackup kit?



Question. Is yours lowered floor?
Is it reardrive?
Where from?
How much?

I was looking at these. And want a 4x4 one similar to the pic. For muddy flying fields... Drive from wheelchair. Ricon side door lift. Is it possible?

[Mark]

OK, tried to take some more photos with phone set to lowest resolution but they still came out at 294kB, so still waiting for Sally to covert to lower resolution.

Note: The following is very UK specific.

Question answers:
No, it doesn't need the whole floor lowering, but it does need a lift (not ramp) because the floor is fairly high. This gives the advantage of excellent ground clearance which was a problem in my previous two drive-from-wheelchair (dfw) vehicles. There is a small area where the driver's seat used to be that has been flattened rather than rising slightly but that is the only floor mod apart from lock-down points and wooden boarding under the carpet. I don't bang my head when entering in my wheelchair and Sally can stand up in the Sprinter even though it is the low roof model.

There are two flip-down seats in the rear and we usually have one down and the other up, giving plenty of room for an F55 to pass. Also the Sprinter is quite a lot wider than the VW caravelle series and gives enough room to easily turn my F55 around for socialising in the rear or driving out onto the ramp forwards.
As far as I'm concerned the less structural mods to the vehicle the better for longevity although I have to say that Sirus did an excellent job with their conversions of my previous two dfw vehicles.

It is rear-wheel drive not four-wheel drive.

Obtained from Motability because it was no more expensive over 5 years than my estimates of the cheapest alternative method that was practical for me.

Choices:
(1) Buy a new or s/h Sprinter and pay to have it converted including further lightened power steering as per my previous vehicle, plus powered hand controls and all the other adaptions I now need. Rejected as far too expensive compared to the following options:

(2) Buy s/h a Sprinter that was already converted to the specs I need or close enough to make the numbers add up when brought up to that spec. I located a dealer who tendered for the ex mobility dfw vehicles and then it was a question of waiting until one came up with a close enough spec. These tended to be 5-7 years old with the odd exception. Cost of this option depended on the residual value when I (or someone else) needed to sell the vehicle but not likely to be a quick sale when the time came.

(3) Lease from Motability. There was not a chance of me leasing a new vehicle because of the very high advance payment and I wouldn't get a grant, however I did manage to (eventually) access the Motability second-hand dfw system. This involved a similar long wait until a Sprinter with enough adaptations for me came back to Motability. This eventually happened and the spec was close enough for me with a few extra mods added. Essentially you are waiting for someone who already has similar needs to you to lose the ability to drive for whatever reason before the vehicle is too old for Motability to be prepared to re-lease it.

Because I do a high-mileage this option was likely to be the cheapest for me but this did depend on the resale price that could be obtained after 5 years of owning option 2 above. It could therefore end up more expensive than option 2 but the lack of hassle when doing a high mileage meant it made sense for us. However it isn't a quick or straightforward option, so option 2 could be an alternative although less-attractive for a high mileage driver.

There was another option that could potentially be cheaper still and that would be if you could buy an ex-Motability dfw vehicle at auction, cutting out the middle-man of option 2. However, although I have bought cars at auction before, and written up how to do it for a magazine (more ££ income) that is no longer practical for me. I also heard, but didn't double-check, that Motability sell the ex-lease dfw vehicles by tender, not auction, and won't sell directly to an end user. I've sold all my companies, so would have had to set one up specially, just to buy one vehicle. I don't have the mental energy these days to do that. Life is too short.

My choice of option 3 cost me a total of £4.5k up front plus the full UK HRMC which I consider the most sensible option for us given that we don't know what the future holds health-wise. Hope for the best but be prepared for the worst.

Its taken so long to write this that Sally has now converted the photos to low resolution:

Shows flattened section of front floor on drivers side.

showing the detachable "normal" driver's seat

showing the detachable "normal" driver seat

[Mark]

More photos:

[Mark]

Final 2 photos:

Turning around in F55, and pouring the coffee

[Mark]

Question. Is yours lowered floor?
Is it reardrive?
Where from?
How much?

I was looking at these. And want a 4x4 one similar to the pic. For muddy flying fields... Drive from wheelchair. Ricon side door lift. Is it possible?

Yes Drive from Wheelchair is not too big a conversion - the company that did this van is quite near you BM and they produce ambulances, hence the @ambulance-grade" privacy windows in this Sprinter.

Yes I have seen a dfw Sprinter that had the lift in the side. Can't remember whether it was a Ricon or Braun lift. My Sprinter has a Braun lift, and the first thing I did when the vehicle was delivered was get the manual operation demonstrated and practiced in case the control system ever has a breakdown. Fairly simple to do, just like a hydraulic trolley jack.

The thing that I really like about the Sprinter is that there is a lot less to change than smaller vehicles where the whole floor is lowered and doors extended. You end up with a much more standard vehicle.

[Burgerman]

Thanks for the info, write up. This has me worried.

download/file.php?id=6874&mode=view

The step, where your feet go. My footplate / feet would hit that?

[Mark]

That particular photo was when I was experimenting with the seating position before the lockdown bolt position was finalised. What I was trying to see at that stage was how much room there was for my long legs and boots. I don't drive with the wheelchair in that position. I have 2 F55's that I can drive from, in the purple one shown I have to flip up the footrest in the green one (in some of the other photos but not behind the wheel in the photos) I don't have to flip up the footrest. Both F55s have centre footrests just like the eBay one you painted with hammer finish paint that hinge upwards as standard. I have a long bootlace tied to the footrest so I can pull it up if needed. This allows me to get closer to the table in pubs etc if they have a table leg in the way. My actual legs can go either side of a table leg, the footplate can't.

The red wheelchair in one pic isn't an F55. It's one of my back up chairs and I used it for a couple of days to check the lock down worked ok and driving was ok from it.

If you really think a Sprinter might be a solution for you, I'm quite happy to drive over one day and you can try it for size. The spacious interior is more useful and practical than I ever imagined.

I've just received some new seat brackets from Lasermaster to raise the seat on the purple F55 so its like the green F55 but I've not been able to fit them yet as I'm still rather delicate from a hospital procedure in the urology day case unit last Friday. Should then have two identical seating positions.

[Swan T.W.]

What is the inside floor to roof height? And if possible your sitting height,foor to top of your head?

[Mark]

What is the inside floor to roof height? And if possible your sitting height,foor to top of your head?

I'll need help to measure that while I sit in two different F55s, but the floor to roof height in my Sprinter (It is a low-roof one) must be around 5foot 4 inches because Sally can stand up in it and I don't think she bends her head. I'll try to measure more accurately. Note that the height at the rear doors is likely to be less than this. I have my seat high because I have long legs but I don't have to duck to get in.

I notice you are in Canada. One thing to note about the Sprinter is that there is some electronics equipment under the front LEFT seat that would have to be relocated if you wanted a left-hand-drive wheelchair position. I have seen one Sprinter that had Ricon 6-way transfer seats in both sides and the electronics had to be relocated into a large separate box between the driver and pax positions; not a small job I would have thought. For a rhd wheelchair position the electronics under the left-hand passenger seat can stay in situ making a much easier conversion.

As far as I can see the Mercedes Sprinter converts to a drive from wheelchair vehicle without major modification to the base vehicle. After driving over 9000 miles in it I'm very impressed with it. There are numerous varients; at least 3 different lengths and 2 roof heights. Mine is the shortest + low roof and still very spacious.

[Burgerman]

Thanx for the offer but I am a long way from this yet. Equity release, new boiler, new floor, new skirting, decorating, carpets, fix BM3, finish BM2 green, get rid of my garden flood (drainage) etc etc... And currently on bed with a minor mark on backside! To name a few issues lined up! And currently on a diet to lose 4 stone.

What about the wheels? Will a lift drop another 6 inches?
If you want a set of those, you need Duratrac 265/70/17's on the Method 17x7.5 rims. And raise the suspension 3 inches. Makes it look a lot tougher!

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/73 ... ersion.jpg

[Mark]

Not too many outstanding jobs at the moment then....

Just a thought:
If you need to install drainage in rear garden and your boiler needs replacing, have you played around with the sums for a heat pump instead of a gas boiler? I did the sums for an air-sourced heat pump a year or two back and a replacement gas boiler still was the best option but the difference was much smaller than the previous time I considered it. I have a feeling that a ground-sourced heat pump would give better figures but digging up a shared tarmac drive made that a non-starter here so I didn't investigate. However, one lot of digging could install both drainage pipes and collection pipes for the heat pump. Would be interesting to see how the figures stack up. My gut feeling is that heat pumps are more reliable than the modern "high-efficiency" gas boilers.

Don't know if the lift will drop another 6" as I've never tried. It will certainly drop some way below level-with-the-wheels which I have needed sometimes on uneven ground but not sure of the limit. If you get to the stage where it is important, I could probably find somewhere to measure it.

Sorry to hear you're on the bed again. Hope it's not too long. With Polio I still have full sensation (a mixed blessing), its just the muscle driver circuits that are knackered so I (usually) spot sores at an early stage. Still had serious leg ulcers in the past that have taken years to heal but been clear for over 3 years now.

[Burgerman]

Thought about ground source heap pump before... Everything takes so long and gets so complicated!

Just called a friend who works at the local Mercedes commercial p;ace. He is getting me a quote to supply the van in that image, 4x4, without the wheels (1200 pounds I supply those) with all the interior carpeted, flat, side lift, fully trimmed, rear seats, all doors remote, privacy glass, and all the expensive toys and options! So it will be a luxury air conditioned people carrier. The 4x4 part -- only issue not sure if that can be an auto. Waiting to find out. If not then it will be rear drive only. But jacked up with massive tyres...

[Mark]

Just my curiosity, but I would be interested in hearing that price too. Might be interesting to also get a quote from O and H who did the conversion on my Sprinter and add that to the unmodified vehicle price. O and H are in Goole so not that far from you and I can supply a contact name if interested.

[Swan T.W.]

What is the inside floor to roof height? And if possible your sitting height,foor to top of your head?

I'll need help to measure that while I sit in two different F55s, but the floor to roof height in my Sprinter (It is a low-roof one) must be around 5foot 4 inches because Sally can stand up in it and I don't think she bends her head. I'll try to measure more accurately. Note that the height at the rear doors is likely to be less than this. I have my seat high because I have long legs but I don't have to duck to get in.

I notice you are in Canada. One thing to note about the Sprinter is that there is some electronics equipment under the front LEFT seat that would have to be relocated if you wanted a left-hand-drive wheelchair position. I have seen one Sprinter that had Ricon 6-way transfer seats in both sides and the electronics had to be relocated into a large separate box between the driver and pax positions; not a small job I would have thought. For a rhd wheelchair position the electronics under the left-hand passenger seat can stay in situ making a much easier conversion.

As far as I can see the Mercedes Sprinter converts to a drive from wheelchair vehicle without major modification to the base vehicle. After driving over 9000 miles in it I'm very impressed with it. There are numerous varients; at least 3 different lengths and 2 roof heights. Mine is the shortest + low roof and still very spacious.

Managed to get inside height from a dealer,64.1 inches [162.8 cent.]

[Mark]

Yes, sounds right and agrees with Sally's height.

[Burgerman]

Some go too far.


youtu.be/khsfF7FXIBg