Renault Commercial Range

From the sounds of things, you need a vehicle that can accommodate the wheelchair as an actual seat in the car rather than having the chair folded and stored for the journey. With that in mind, a van or people-mover is by far the best best bet and the news is good, because there are plenty of choices. For a while there, people were converting Ford Falcon station-wagons for this task, but since the Falcon is no longer made, vans have become the new default vehicle to convert. Which makes plenty of sense.

There are specialist firms around that will carry out whatever conversion you require and tailor-make the ramps, lock-down points and grab-rails you need to make it work for you. Switched on companies will sit down with you and discuss your precise requirements and engineer something bespoke if necessary.

At the moment, the list of car choices is pretty long and includes the new Hyundai Staria, VW Caddy, LDV G10, VW Caravelle, Renault Kangoo, Renault Trafic, Hyundai iLoad, Mercedes-Benz V-Class, Toyota HiAce and, in case you need something really big, even the Toyota Coaster. Some of these companies are also registered as NDIS suppliers.

But don’t rule out a second-hand vehicle, either. There are websites around listing used wheelchair-accessible cars for sale. Some will be ex-taxis, but others can be relatively low-kilometre cars that might just have the exact layout you were looking for.

The Renault Master van is available in a range of dimensions as there are short-, medium- and long-wheelbase options, as well as low-, medium-, and high-roof. The short-wheelbase front-wheel-drive Master is 5048mm long, the front-wheel-drive medium-wheelbase Master is 5548mm, while the long-wheelbase front-wheel-drive Master comes in at 6198mm. The rear-wheel-drive medium-wheelbase Master is also 6198mm long, while the long-wheelbase rear-wheel-drive Master is 6848mm.

Clutches are deemed wear and tear items, which is why they wouldn’t cover the replacement cost. While 80,000 km is not a lot of kilometres for a clutch replacement it is getting near the kilometres that you would anticipate it. The two things shouldn’t be related, I would guess that they saw the clutch was nearly worn-out and it was deemed best to replace it now.