General Using the underfloor space

[MultiPa]

While I've been reading up about Multiplas I've seen a few articles about the alternative fuel models - I don't know if Fiat made these for other markets or if they were just an idea.

What these show though is that there is loads of room under the seats - you can see these too on the motability converted cars where the floor level has been dropped to allow wheelchair access.

It seems the space was left partly to allow the fitting of other fuel tanks or batteries - but what I want to know is if it is accessible, or if anyone has used it to fit extra tanks? A secret storage area under the seats would be ace, but I guess you'd have to cut the metal to get to it?

 

[Most Easterly Pandas]

You'll find they're different chasis, there is unlikly to be the 'hollow' space that you are thinking of

 

[custard]

You'll find they're different chasis, there is unlikly to be the 'hollow' space that you are thinking of

although there was that recent drug smuggling in Multiplas case :chin:

 

[joipalli]

I don't agree with the different chassis. The CNG (erdgas/autogas) version has a smaller gasoline tank, and the exhaust is rearranged around the CNG tanks.

You can see, you have a rubber cover, next to the gasoline filling. That's for the CNG fill-up.

 

[MultiPa]

although there was that recent drug smuggling in Multiplas case :chin:

I hadn't heard that - interesting use of the space! Found this:

Officers discovered that English-based members of the gang were using four Fiat Multipla vehicles with "hides" under the floors to carry drugs and guns between the UK and Amsterdam.​

This is a UK sourced Multipla converted for wheelchair use, and it does seem to suggest there is a void space that can be opened up (picture from Southern Motability Vehicles)

 

[Zundapp]

I doubt it.

If that's the spare wheel in the right of the picture, which they've apparently now mounted inside the boot space, it suggests that the floor has been lowered, displacing the spare wheel.

There's certainly not a mysterious underfloor void in my car. But having seen the 'secret' drug compartment in the news footage, I couldn't work out where the compartment was! I can only think that a metal box had been welded into the floor somewhere.

 

[MultiPa]

I doubt it.

If that's the spare wheel in the right of the picture, which they've apparently now mounted inside the boot space, it suggests that the floor has been lowered, displacing the spare wheel.

It looks like the spare wheel, but they have to make room for the wheelchair ramp in those conversions, as well as making the ramp low enough to get in. The drivers seat looks at a standard height to me, as though that is on the original floor, so unless there is a lot, lot more to these conversions than I think, there must be a space, mustn't there?

Image from Southern Mobility Vehicles again.

 

[Zundapp]

Well, as these Multipla wheelchair conversions cost nearly £29000, I'd expect a lot of work to be done to justify that cost!

 

[widemouthfrog]

When I first bought my Multi, I couldn't figure out why it was that the drivers seat (and all the others for that matter) seemed very high off the ground, yet they also seemed to be relatively close to the cars floor. It dawned on me why this is so when I peered under the car.

For most cars, the floor pan is level with the BOTTOM of the sills. On the Multipla, the floor is level with the TOP of the sills. I think what you can see in the photos of the wheeelchair conversions is the floor level being dropped to be level with the bottom of the cills, in part at least.

Why the Fiat design team took the decision to do this I'm not sure. It would be interesting to know. There is masses of 'wasted' space below the standard floor. This is where the fuel cells on the Bipower and Blupower versions were housed. If it were possible to mount a second diesel tank in the same space it would create the ultimate camel of a car.

If the floor had been mounted at the lower level as standard and the same 'clean' layout retained that gives a flat floor from the tailgate opening right through to the front passenger footwell (are there ANY other cars like that?) then it would have been possible to carry 8' x 4' sheets inside the car (with the front passenger seat removed). No mean acheivement for a car that only 4 metres long.

 

[guizzo]

I've often removed the front passenger seats as well as the back ones when I use my Multipla as a van for transporting motorbikes, I was thinking of welding a metal box underneath the floor with an access hatch on the inside of the car for tools or valuables then it would make the car even more useful. I don't know what is meant by underfloor space or void, the multipla is a car that has a high floor, simple as that.