5 kids, 4 Car Seats and New Minivan Purchase Help ;)

KristiG1983

New member
Hello!

I am Kristi, mom to 5. I have been enthusiastic about car seat safety and advocacy since having my now 14 year old as a teenager. I have read here off and on for years, but have not posted. I could use some input.

We are looking to purchase a new minivan. We currently have a 2011 Suburban, but really miss the features and convenience of a minivan. Before getting this used a couple of years ago, we owned and loved our 2010 Town and Country. We only sold it because at the time we needed to tow a camper, that we no longer have. Since getting rid of the van, we have added another baby to our family. We rented a Town and Country over the summer during a Disney trip and made it work, but not with out everyday car seats. We used out travel seats, which are 3 Scenera's and a Bubble Bum- not seats I am willing to use for everyday use.

We are debating between the Town and Country and Odyssey. I overall like the Town and Country better, EXCEPT for not having the 8th seat and not having the LATCH setup in the third row.

Currently, we have our 12 month old RF in a Britax Boulevard 70, our 35 month old RF in a Britax Advocate Click Safe 70, out 4 1/2 year old FF in a Britax Advocate 70 and out 8 year old in a Graco HB TurboBooster with Safety Surround and our 14 year old in a seat belt.

I also just purchased a Radian RXT, have an old style Advocate 65 that has a little life left in it, a backless TurboBooster and then 3 Scenera's and a BubbleBum that I am not fond of using for regular use. Those seats could come into play.

My question is, do any of you know if I can fit the Radian, and booster in the third row of the Town and Country with a tall adult sized teenager? Or if I were to buy another Radian RXT, if I could fit both of those FF and the TurboBooster with Safety Surround while still having the buckle accessible for the booster? I like the deeper sides and amount EPS foam in the Safety Surround, but is there another booster I should look at that is more narrow?

Finally, if you have a newer model of either of these vans, I would love any input.

Thank you so much for reading my long post and for insight!

Kristi
 
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jjordan

Moderator
Hi Kristi! I think you will find that there is not much love for the Dodge/Chrysler minivans here. But if you know that YOU love them, then it might well be a good choice (and a less expensive one, probably) for your situation. I would doubt that the 3 across you are proposing for the third row would work very well... Dodge/Chrysler doesn't have a good reputation here for being booster-friendly at all, and third rows of minivans tend to be quite narrow. That being said, I haven't actually tried it, so I could very well be wrong. :)

The Turbobooster tends not to play well in small spaces, but Harmony boosters are often good choices.

I have heard lots of good things about the current generation Odysseys. The 8th seat nicely eliminates your need for 3 across the third row!
 

lgenne

New member
Pretty much exactly what jjordan said. We LOVE our 2013 Odyssey, and test drove a 2013 T&C, and my mom has a 2014 Caravan that I've installed some car seats in.

Granted, the only thing I installed in the third row was a Frontier 90, hardly a narrow seat, but the 3rd row of the Caravan is much narrower than the 3rd row of the Odyssey. I see the Caravan as essentially a 6 passenger vehicle. Maybe if you had 3 smallish adults, no car seats, you could actually manage 3 back there, but with 5 children, the T&C wouldn't be on my "seriously consider" list unless I absolutely couldn't afford an Odyssey.
 

Keeanh

Well-known member
Welcome to the board!!

If I were you, I'd look at the 04-10 8p Siennas. If you're wanting newer, then the 2011+ Odyssey. Getting 3 across a Caravan / Voyager / T&C is difficult and the outboard seatbelts are badly positioned.
 

SafeDad

CPSDarren - Admin
Staff member
Welcome!

If you haven't already, I strongly suggest you rent a T&C or Grand Caravan for at least a few days if not a week. If you're in an urban area, that shouldn't be more $50 a day and money well spent in my opinion. We rent one almost every year, and each time I feel like I'm riding in something from 15 years ago. The Sienna, Odyssey and new 2015 Sedona are much nicer in my opinion, but of course everyone has their own preferences! I think the best thing about the T&C/GC is Stow 'n Go, and then only if you actually utilize it. The 2015 Sienna has an additional top tether anchor as well.

http://carseatblog.com/30457/2015-toyota-sienna-3rd-row-preview/
 

DawgDad

New member
There really isn't much more to add to what people have said so far. I think the reason there might not be a lot of "love" for the Dodge/Chrysler minivans on here is because as Darren pointed out...the other options like the Odyssey, Sienna, and Sedona have passed them by...at quite a large pace. Safety, features, reliability, ease of use, comfort, power all get higher marks with the other 3 choices than over the Dodge/Chrysler.

Now, even with all that said...it comes at a price. Dodge/Chrysler is lower and sometimes significantly lower than the other 3 (Kia keeps bumping up their prices). It's really hard to rule them out just on that alone, so I completely understand why you have them in your running.

With all cars, I would always suggest putting your hands on the vehicle, test driving them, installing your car seats, putting your stuff you schlep around on a daily basis in it, and just "living" in it as much as you can before you make a decision. Will a sales person not allow you to do this? No. They want the sale and understand YOUR important needs...so test it out and see how each one works with your life. You don't want to wait until after you buy to see if it works...then you won't be happy.

Let us know if you have any specific comparison questions or needs. Budget could help too...
 

Guest

New member
I second Darren's suggestion that you rent one for a week.

I have family that works for Toyota. There are a lot of advantages to owning a Toyota because of them. However, because of them, we were able to rent a Sienna for a long road trip before we bought our van. Renting was invaluable. We ended up with an Odyssey because we were able to really "live" with the van rather than just looking up a list of specs and features over the internet. Even test driving isn't enough time to find that stuff out. It's really just a bunch of relatively smaller stuff, but it all added up so that we felt the Odyssey was significantly better than the Sienna. So much that it was worth giving up the Toyota side benefits.

Never would have discovered all that stuff if we hadn't rented the car for a few days.
 
Definitely, try renting one. We end up with these frequently as rental vehicles. The 2 bucket seats in the 2nd row haven't been much of a problem with our carseats (Britaxes and Radians) but the 3rd row is really rough. We had trouble wedging a skinny adult between a Radian and a BubbleBum back there recently -- and I can't think of many narrower combinations than that.
 

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