Anyone know how difficult it is/how much it costs to add a second row of seats to a van and put in a couple of side windows? Would it work out cheaper than buying a minibus and taking out the rows that are not needed? The wonderful STW encyclopaedic knowledge and advice required.
Cheers
Jo

might be cheaper to buy a minibus & take out the seats you don't need – at least any seatbelts that are fitted will meet the relevant standards.

Either way the insurance will probably be affected as the vehicle will be "modified"

Or get a people mover like an Espace and remove seats to suit.

Bonus: no insurance hassles.

espace isnt big enough for all jojos handbags , shoes and beauty products …. and her one bike

has the green giant died – or is it slowely dying …. every time i see it its rustier …..

when i was looking in feb – once you went to that size of van it was cheaper by a country mile to go for a minibus and throw out the extra seats …. that said the minibusses seemed to end up with the toy town engines – and invariably would always end up at the limits of there loads when driving so clutches would be mince – decided to steer clear in the end and go smaller for insurance purposes …

Trail Rat, it's turquoise, not green! It's not quite given up the ghost, but it's on it's way. The turbo is moodier than I am in the run up to rag week and we were 'cruising' up the motorway North at 40 mph the minute there was any gradient and then shooting away when the turbo decided to speak to us again.
Plus it now leaks around the top of the windscreen when it rains (quite soggy this morning after last night's rain at Kirroughtree) and the week before last I had to get a new front sus spring as the old one collapsed.

I'm looking for a van where I can't put my finger through the bodywork but will also fit two children and six bikes…

orangey brown with a tinge of mould would be more a fitting description 😉

you need a LWB HR sprinter 😉 ditch the flat and move in – get a caravan and you could be a family of cycling gypsys ! – see if the gypsys on dyce common will adopt you lot – handy for matts work !

You need to move down the south of France my dear 😉
That will solve the problems of rust and liking windscreen… Well not really but you have no rain to worry about 😉
Have you thought about getting a fiat mutlibeurk? Onion has one and to be fair, it's a bit like the GD flugly as hell, but seems to work very well…

Take care
XXXX

not too hard to do, there are many different seats available, there are a few companies around who would do it, not sure on cost, same with windows bonded windows are the ones to go for as they keep the strength of the van, you can buy them as kits or get someone to do it for you.

Just done this myself.

Bought a T4 (ex plumbers van 03 10,000 miles, FSH) £3800 in silver. Slightly tatty but slowly improving.

Bided our time on Ebay and waited for a matching double seat to turn up with the mushroom bolts. Got it fitted when i was away in Jan.

Bought a seatbelt for the van wall and cadged a spreader plate (top mount is single skin) for the top mount (available from Demon Tweeks) as bottom mounts are already double skinned.

Costs so far

Seat £115
Fitting £40
Belt £30

Seat comes with a lap belt and i have yet to get round to fitting the other. Details on how to do this are available on the T4 forum. It sounds like a bloody fiddly job as you have to manouver the spreader plate up behind the inner wall using fishing wire and blind luck!

As for insurance i use Brentacre and insure it on there camper van policy.
£450 and i can do owt as long as i keep them informed. Only thing i can't do is change the BHP.
No fuss about which wheels/tyres/load ratings..

Priced up windows (not fitted yet).

First things first, if you intend to carpet the interior then do this first so you get a neat finish.

A pair fitted will be anything from £200 – £300

Somewhere like this will do it properly, but think £1500 with windows.
DIY jobs are cheaper, but who is going to be sat on the seats?
It's anchoring the belts that's the tricky bit.

If you follow my advice then you will have the same set up as if it was factory supplied.

Mugboo about covers it, I spent a lot of time on he T4 and other forums when thinking about buying a one.

Juan is this the none rain you mean South of France has no rain.

VW t4 2.5tdi caravelle minus the rear bench here: the differences between mine and a modified van are as follows:
-taxed and insured as a car
-side windows slide open,
-plastic trim, little 'ashtrays'/bins and three 12v power points,
-ceiling lining
-quieter and waaaaay comfier inside than a converted van
-heating vent in the floor behind the drivers seat
-6 fans in the ceiling for rear passengers.
-same engine/power as most t4's -easily chippable for more grunt and lower service intervals….
-seats are easy to reinstall for picking up multiple french relatives from airports…

drawbacks:
-cost: depending on the age of the van, but i could have bought and then converted similar age/milage t4 van for £3-500 less than i bought the caravelle for.
-middle seats only have lap belts (but mine is 10 years old, perhaps not with newer ones)
-you can see in easily through boot and rear side windows.
-carpeted all the way through the boot.

I would do the same again though, just so much simpler getting the bits i wanted (ie comfy but swallows 5 xc bikes with front wheels only off). Only trouble is finding one in your price range: I was really lucky to find one locally so soon.

HTH

Either way the insurance will probably be affected as the vehicle will be "modified"

I don't think removing seats would justify insurance "modification" status, adding seats will.

2x windows 150 each, new insurance approved, double seat with 3 point belts 500. Prices are about 6 months old from my local fitting place. All fitments come with certificates etc to prove their pukka. It'll work out a huge amount cheaper to buy a van and convert than a minibus, unless you're at the bottom end of the market (sub £2k) when the costs above mean the best plan is to find yourself an ldv. They're not nice to drive but have transit engines so are fairly reliable and very cheap.

Oh and with NFU (very good for private van insurance) there was no charge at all for the addition of 2 seats, just had to send them the paperwork/certificates to prove it was a proper job.

small note on NFU insurance – they're certainly worth trying, but i found direct line were 200 quid cheaper for me ( peugeot expert 07 ). HTH.

http://www.pimpmyride.com/

in my experience the insurance is the problema nd a lot of places will shy away from vans with wimndows in the side??

However, I did a T4 with windows and fitted a middle row of caravelle seats using all the original VW fittings (still available form VW) and insured it with Adrian Flux as a modified vehicle.

Buy a Railvan or Splitter van instead?

Windows – £100 to £150 for the window.
Fitting – £70 each Probably get it down to £300-£350

Seats – Usually work on £300 per seat plus the fitting. Just had a price for a double and it was £571 fitted which was good 🙂 They are M2 tested seats with integrated belts (No issues with mounting points) and insurance backed fittings for floors which includes specific engineered mounting plates.

Personally i wouldnt go near a vehicle that hasnt had the seats fitted by a coachbuilder who hands you the correct certificates at the end. I dont care how good the guy is that has fitted them (I have seen plenty), unless he is doing it for a business i just couldnt live with myself. From an insurance point of view i have found that as long as you state that the seats are to M2 tested fitting and you have certificates to back this up then companies like Aplan dont have any issues insuring them.

Remember that guy who killed all his kids in his bitsa Landrover? I bet he discussed fitting seats so flippantly and look what happened to him.

steveh and thelittlesthobo

Have you got the names of the window and set installers you used. Doing a Fiat Scudo and having trouble finding decent suppliers and fitters.

Ta.

We had seats fitted to our T4 by Jubilee Motors in Brum, brand new T5 seats.
Windows by MAD Workshop in Bristol (VW specialist)

We spent lots to get it done properly but it's been worth it, proper do-it-all family vehicle now.

Insurance though CIS, bit of hassle but nowt major.

I converted my vivaro to crew cab so I could use the van with the family and for weekends with mates biking.

picked up my seats from ebay they came with 3 point seat belts and can be removed they also slide up and down on rails, Took me about 6 weeks checking ebay to find the right seats though. Fitted them with a mate took a few hours as I had to drop the tank for the fittings. My van had the windows factory fitted.

adrian flux insure it as a surf van and cover the seats about £300 not to be used for work though. I take the train so not a worry.

csb – I used a place in Castleford in yorkshire, the web link is below. They did a couple of sets of windows for me and windows and seats for a friend.
http://www.vanwindows.co.uk/#

i had extra seats that i didnt want in my merc when i got it
they have seat belts attached like in the post above. ill sell them cheap if your interested but they are heavy so im not sure how much a courier would cost. pm me if your interested

Update**

After rattling on on here yesterday i took the time to get some proper bolts for my wall mounted seatbelt and fitting took me about an hour.

Fiddly job but essentially easy if you buy a spreader plate with a captive nut designed for this job. Mine was designed for rally car use.

This for a Vw Transporter T4 so no idea about other vans.

Tools

Reel of cotton
Drill and rivet sized bit
Rivet & Rivet tool
Small random nut (used to wieght the cotton)
Punch & Hammer
Wooden kebab skewer

Offer up your spreader plate (should have a small hole drilled in one corner) over the hole in side of van. Using the punch so that gravity is choosing how it hangs over the bolt hole punch a mark on the inside van wall.

Carefully drill this out to the size of your rivet (use a decent sized rivet).

Push the end of your cotton through your freshley drilled hole and then pull it out of the bolthole below.

Fasten your random nut to the cotton and use its wieght to drop it down the cavity.

Attach your spreader plate and carefully pull into place.

This is where i found that a wooden kebab skewer was the perfect tool to fit in the smaller hole to hold the plate in place while i screwed in the bolt.

Keep hold of the skewer with your mouth as you nip up the bolt then rivet it instead of the skewer and finish tightening.

Hope this helps, it will make sense if you are looking at the inside of a T4.

http://www.demon-tweeks.co.uk/Performance/Harnesses/Harness_Eye_Bolts_&_Plates/Willans_Stress_Plate/1695/0/14794

Any questions then email me.

Any decent window firm can fit the windows. Its one of those jobs where if you had the balls you could do it yourself. They basically take a jigsaw to the panel and then glue the window in. None of this slotting in rubbers etc. Autoglass/Autowindscreens etc.

If you are in the Lancaster area then Bob @ Vanbodies does a lot of work for me and can fit the seats & windows. 01524 34422. They have been doing conversions for 35years so know what they are doing.

This probably isn't completely helpful, but I can't read this thread title without thinking of the A Team.

Got 2 side windows (sliding from a LR county) you can have for free if you pick 'em up.

West Big Smoke

It's a vito isn't it jojo?

Have a similarly temperamental and rusty one although it had a camper conversion done by the previous owners. Looking at the paperwork it cost them about £390 to get two side windows installed (one is fixed and the other has one of those clamp opening mechanisms)

mugboo, you may want to look at the way the windows are fitted and the structure of a T4. To have the seatbelts fitted in the C pillar, the inner sking must be bonded to the outer skin to give the structure the rigidity it should have. There;'s lots of debate on the tr4forum on this but VW spoecify that if a panel van is to be converted to have seatbelts it must have this done. Its not a hard job, its a case of cleaning iut the matic that is there, clamping the inner and outer skin toigether and bonding with somethin like sikaflex. Then letting oit dry over night. The added bonus of this is that the windows will sit flusher than if you don't do this.

Steelsreal

Are you saying thet what i've done is ok but before i get the windows fitted i should glue the panel they are going in together?

Cheers J

the problem is that when they nmade panel vans they never bonded the inner and outer skins around the window frames together, theres just a lump of a masticy type stuff in there, only when the frames are bonded is the shell strong enough to accept seatbelts.

I've sent you a pdf about window fitting on your email in your profile.

Do you really need the extra set of windows?
I have rear seats in my van and never fitted any extra windows, seems to work very well as i prevents prying eyes from seeing in behind the seats.

I also have a set of 3 seats on a well known auction site from a VW minibus with all the 3 point seatbelts fitted. 😆