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Advice: Update Commodore with Statesman, Calais etc. parts?

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bigpallooka

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I have a VR Commodore Equipe Hi Roof Taxi. I purchased it to transport my wheelchair bound son and while it does the job, being an ex-taxi makes it a very ordinary looking ride let alone the bubble on top and being stretched. My question is this: I am considering doing up the interior and exterior and was wondering what options will bolt on from Statesmans, Calais, SS etc that I can look for second hand to purdy her up? The seats, door trim and dash a shot for starters and the front and rear bubpers need replacing.
How far can I go with parts and what models are compatable? Any advice would be apreciated.
Regards
bigpallooka
 

stocky

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so thats a wagon right? dunno about rear seats, but some calais/stato front seats would be an improvement. do you have any photos?
 
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bigpallooka

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I'll post a few tomorrow but it is a stretched sedan with the hi-roof in fiberglass and an extra door with hatch top on kerb side.
Regards
bigpallooka
 
J

Joes_meat

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If you don't mind me asking, how big is your sons wheel chair? My sister is also wheelchair bound. But it's a very tall fully electric chair and we're having trouble finding a vehicle that's big enough, short of a van. She's been in an EF taxi before and that was definately too small. Are the VR ones any bigger?
 

semi

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the door trims, seats and other various interior bits from any VR/VS model (except some statesman parts) will fit. Obviously you cant fit calais power window door trims to your exec anual winders and obvious things like that
 

EGG

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the calais interior isn't really anything to write home about, it's mainly a lot of plastic and some power-this, power-that features

maybe statesman is better
 
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bigpallooka

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Mine is already an Equipe so it's got the power this and that already. I was thinking Statesman mostly anyway if I can fit it in.

Joes_meat,
My son is only 12 and his Electric wheelchair is less the 140cm high but this car has heaps of height anyway. I don't think there are many non van options out there. The only problem with this would be for the larger adult electric wheelchairs which may have dificulty in turning and "parking" to be belted down. The centre consol with air outlets pointing to the back protrudes to behind the seats and does get in the way. I have seriously considered modifying it if I can figure out how. The car will supposedly fit two wheelchairs but manouvering electric ones inside once one is already buckled would be horrendus.

I am attaching a picture to help in the description.
 

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2_SeeK_U

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Wow, never seen a 7 door commodore before!

Anyway, the front and rear are the same as any other VS-VR commodore so a front bar from a senator or clubsport, even if you grab yourself a calais front bar or SS (which has the skirting below). The same can be said for the rear bar, it can be replaced with any sedan item. The side skirts however, you'd need to get custom ones made up as l'm more then positive that its longer then a statesman so you couldn't use SS ute side bars or caprice side bars.
Now onto the interior. The front seats can be replaced with any you want, you just have to keep the rails of the seats you have in there now. As for the rear seat(s), l'm not sure as l don't know what has been done but if they are using the original seats from a VS then l'd dare say you could replace them with seats from any commodore (VR-VZ), you would just have to modify the supports that are under the seat but for simplicity you could just stick to any from a VS or VR (Clubsport maybe? even SS). You won't be able to fit a statesman interior as those seats are from a lwb and while your car is deffinately long, it aint in the areas that matter to make the statesman seats fit.

Hope this helps anyway, a photo of the interior would also be great as l'm interested in how they did modified it.
Cheers.
 

Demons1964

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Just adding to what 2_Seek_U has said, if you're looking for bolt-on options here's what you can do with changing over items between VR-VS.

Interior
The front seats in all VR-VS models use the same rails and mounting points so you can use whatever you like from VR-VS. If you want to go with something from VT onwards you'll need to keep your VR rails.
The dash I wouldn't recomend going with anything that has climate control as standard (Statesman/Caprice/Calais etc) because of what you'll need to keep in the front console (climate control surrounds for instance). You can convert to climate control but it's a majorly expensive exercise, and the general consensus is it's not worth it for the hassle required. Unfortunately that limits you somewhat with what models you can grab stuff from, so you'll be stuck with base models (Exec, Acclaim etc or Clubsport if you want some badges).
Front and rear door trims you can use whatever you like, including Statesman/Caprice, they're all interchangeable.
Assuming your rear seat hasn't had any mods done to it, you can choose whatever you like from the short wheelbase models (Exec all the way through to Calais). The Statesman/Caprice rear seats mount in a different way and have a totally different construction and would require extensive modifications.

Exterior
You can change the front end over to VR-VS Statesman/Caprice, and for that you'll need Statesman/Caprice bonnet, grille, L/H & R/H guards and bumper. The Stato sideskirts while longer than standard do have a little bit of adjustment in them, but still won't be anywhere near long enough for your needs. The rear end you'll have to leave the same (i.e. any VR-VS short wheelbase model).
If you want to change the whole look over to a VR-VS clubsport kit it will all bolt up - again except for the sideskirts. You may be able to butcher 2 pairs of fibreglass sideskirts into 1 long pair but I'd leave that to the pro's.

Hope this helps.
Mark.
 
J

Joes_meat

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bigpallooka said:
Mine is already an Equipe so it's got the power this and that already. I was thinking Statesman mostly anyway if I can fit it in.

Joes_meat,
My son is only 12 and his Electric wheelchair is less the 140cm high but this car has heaps of height anyway. I don't think there are many non van options out there. The only problem with this would be for the larger adult electric wheelchairs which may have dificulty in turning and "parking" to be belted down. The centre consol with air outlets pointing to the back protrudes to behind the seats and does get in the way. I have seriously considered modifying it if I can figure out how. The car will supposedly fit two wheelchairs but manouvering electric ones inside once one is already buckled would be horrendus.

I am attaching a picture to help in the description.


That looks like exactly what we need. Where would one buy a car like that from? I've only seen the cars with the larger section in the back.
 
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