Kid Hauler

[Gary Palmer]

Kid Hauling Consideration's: I don't disagree with any of the points or considerations which anyone has identified. However, their were several driving considerations for me and my wife, when our kid's were younger, then older and so forth.

-leg room: With a sedan and even many pseudo SUV's the leg room in the back is the pit's, unless the people in the front seats are pretty short. We upgraded from a Pymouth Reliant, Station Wagon, to a Plymouth Voyager, to a Dodge Grand Caravan, to a Chrysler Town & Country. In regard, the T&C has been a good vehicle. It has the leg room for adult's or large teen ager's. It has rear bucket seats, so that they are less prone to poke, grab, fight, argue, bikker and so forth. I know none of your kids will do that, but mine do. Mileage, not so great, but considering hauling a number of people, pretty good. My T& C has 178,000 on it, with the original motor, it still uses 1 qt oil, every 2,000 miles and it get's 20-22 mpg, on the highway, at 70-75.

I have a sister who has an Odyssey and in riding in it, I don't think it's as comfortable as the T&C, but I think she might get a little better mileage.

Bottom line, when you start counting kid's, if you can give them "space", it helps contribute to the peace, big time. It amazes me how much the rear bucket seats reduce squabiling and so forth. Just a consideration.

Timing. From my perspective, giving your kid's 2-3 years between helps reduce a lot of issues because they are close enough to play together and do things together, but they are far enough apart to not be directly competing with each other in school and so forth. Additionally, it gives them someone to talk to when mom or dad or both are being twips. Just my experiences!

[Matt Timion]

Originally Posted by Gary Palmer

Bottom line, when you start counting kid's, if you can give them "space", it helps contribute to the peace, big time. It amazes me how much the rear bucket seats reduce squabiling and so forth. Just a consideration.

You just gave me a flashback to when we were driving from Illinois to Florida in our Astrovan. My brother and I were in the back seat and both of us kept yelling "MOM! He's on my side!" Bucket seats would have been perfect.

[GasSavers_DaX]

Originally Posted by Matt Timion

You just gave me a flashback to when we were driving from Illinois to Florida in our Astrovan. My brother and I were in the back seat and both of us kept yelling "MOM! He's on my side!" Bucket seats would have been perfect.

We used to fight over the front seat. It got so bad we had a calendar marked with who's day it was to sit in the front.

[GasSavers_civicminded]

Our last one was born C-section - so tube tying was just a minor diversion for her.

[95metro]

Originally Posted by civicminded

Our last one was born C-section - so tube tying was just a minor diversion for her.

"Oh, by the way, Doc, while you're in there could you...???"

[GasSavers_civicminded]

Originally Posted by 95metro

"Oh, by the way, Doc, while you're in there could you...???"

And I watched to make sure he had tight knots .

[kickflipjr]

I love minivans or wagons. I like that they have the ablility to haul lots of stuff and get somewhat better gas milage then a SUV or a truck.

Unfortuantly it is very hard to find a minivan with a manual transmission. I know it was an option on the toyota previa.

[95metro]

Originally Posted by kickflipjr

Unfortuantly it is very hard to find a minivan with a manual transmission

Older 4-cyl Caravan and some V6 Aerostars had manual transmissions. That's probably going to be my next van (unless I get a wagon or large sedan) since my current Aerostar is rusting pretty badly...powertrain is strong, but it's going to look like crap in a couple more years.

I do know of at least one fellow with a 3.0L V6 Caravan who replaced the A604 automatic with the A543 manual from a Daytona.

[Gary Palmer]

The problem with this, for me, is that my Chrysler Town & Country, is really my wife's and has been notated before, tis not a good idea for me to be fooling with her car. However, what's in their is actually pretty good, excepttt for putting the car into a lower gear, coming down a hill, pulling a trailer. It has the 3.8 L engine, but it does pretty decent for it's size and it normally is turning about 2200, at 70mph.

[95metro]

Yeah, don't mess with your wife's car...EVER!

I think Chrysler makes a pretty decent engine - they took some good tips from Mitsubishi, but I hope their new electronic automatics are better than their old ones. That A604 was in every 3.0L car they made and it was an absolute junk heap. Finicky and weak!

A neat thing I recently discovered is that the Aerostar is basically a truck with a van body. I guess every mechanical component from the Ranger and Explorer are swappable into (or out of) an Aerostar...I wonder what I could do with some time and money...???