Seating Ideas

[firebuild]

After almost 2 months in the shop, my short skoolie, Buster Lewis, is finally coming home. All this work has been the result of the fabulous local Ford dealer putting gasoline into Buster's poor diesel engine without my knowledge (which means I drove it 20 miles or more), causing damage to first one part and then another. My advice? Don’t ever put gas in your diesel bus. They don't like it much.

Anyway, now that the mechanical crap is over with, I have another problem to address. I have been using a rental car from the dealership this whole time, but now I will be back to having Buster as my get-around wheels. I don’t have any other vehicle.

That’s not a problem for me, but I now care for my Mom, who is 80 and uses either a walker or a cane at all times. I take her to her doctor appointments and the occasional outing. She can handle stairs as long as there’s only a few and a handrail, so I don’t think she’ll have a hard time getting ON the bus, but the question is, where is she going to sit? I have no passenger seat except some fold-up butterfly chairs that are totally unsafe. They’re for stationary moments, not for driving. When I’ve had passengers before they just sit on the stairs, but they’re not 80.

There’s space between the driver’s seat and the stairwell, though it’s a pretty narrow bus (only about 6 feet wide). I was thinking of looking for one of those fairly narrow boat seats that mounts on a pedestal. I need to be able to unbolt it at times, though, because I sell antiques at shows for a few days every month, and I need that aisle space (the bus becomes sort of a popup shop). I have seat belts I can attach. I think a boat seat would work for this, but I’m wondering if anyone has any experience with something like that - how hard is it to bolt in and unbolt, all that. Obviously, I want to do something that’s safe.

Thanks for any input you can give me!

[firebuild]

OK, since nobody answered me, I'll answer this myself in case it helps someone else. I had wheelchair tie-downs installed and my Mom sits in her wheelchair when she's on the bus. She doesn't need a wheelchair except occasionally, but she has one for those few moments, and it worked out well except that it is considerably more expensive than my boat seat set up would have been. I just couldn't come up with a way to set it up that felt safe; the tie downs have seat belts attached and everything. Total cost with installation was almost $1000, which is MILES above my budget for this but it had ot be done.