From CR-V to Pilot?

I currently drive a 2004 CR-V and love it. We thought I'd drive it into the ground, but now we are thinking we need more room. We have started looking around at Pilots since there is more storage room and a 3rd row seat. But I want to make sure I am keeping my kids' safety in mind and not just our extra occasional passengers (kids and adults).

Right now I have DS1 (2yrs 30lbs) RFing behind the driver in his Marathon. DS2 (2 months) is RFing behind the passenger in a Graco Snugride. Eventually we will move him up to a Marathon or Boulevard and keep him RFing as long as possible.

This leaves room for only one passenger and we started to run into problems getting places when my parents were here for Christmas. We had to take 2 cars everywhere. :thumbsdown:

So, I guess my biggest question is what are the safest car seat configurations in the Pilot? Can I put 1 Marathon RFing and a Snugride (or 2 RFing Marathons) in the 2nd row and still have access to the 3rd row for adult passengers? I'm a little confused about this whole 3rd row/crumple zone thing.

Thanks in advance!

Hi I don't have a Pilot but I have the sister vehicle the Acura MDX. Size wise they are pretty much the same and share a lot of similar features.
I really don't think you are going to want to put adults in the third row of the Pilot...it is tiny! I have sat in our third row a couple of times and it didn't bother me but there is no legroom. On the other hand my kids love sitting in the third row. I actually have my daughter sitting back there in her booster 90% of the time. I am not concerned with the safety of using the third row for passengers. Serious rear end collisions are pretty rare while serious frontal collisions are common. So if we talk statistics my daughter actually has a safety advantage because she is the furthest away from the most common type of collision. There really is no data to test how safe the third rows are but there also isn't any real world data that tell us they are unsafe.
If you do not want to put your older child in the third row I bet you could get a configuration that would work out temporarily.
I can get two carseats (both big Britax seats or a Britax and an infant seat) side by side and still have access to the third row, but it takes finesse to get it to work. It also helps that my car has LATCH in the center seat that is off-set towards the drivers side, the Pilot doesn't have center LATCH so I don't know how that would work for you. You could always access the third row from the tailgate if you wanted.
Since right now you are using an infant seat I would say you would be fine because you could have the people hop in the third row before you put the seat into the base because that will give you more room for the "access seat" to slide forward but once the baby is out of the infant seat it might get tricky.
There are many members here who have the Pilot and I am sure they will be able to help you out more!

my mom has a pilot (06 or 07). when we went down for christmas i drove it most the time. i had a snugride behind the driver seat and a RF MA behind the passenger seat. still left enough room to comfortably fit my 6ft DH in the passenger seat. my 18yo sister sat between the two carseats for an hour drive and was snug but didnt complain (shes a skinny thing though) my other sister and her boyfriend rode in the back (19/21yrs) and they fit fine but they climbed in through the rear. also i couldnt for the life of me get the infant seat snug in the middle of the 2nd row, not sure if it was b/c it came out of the ceiling or b/c the material of the seats was a little slick. also i installed the seats with LATCH and it was easy peasy

Momma2PnS said:

Can I put 1 Marathon RFing and a Snugride (or 2 RFing Marathons) in the 2nd row and still have access to the 3rd row for adult passengers

Click to expand...

I wouldn't count on it. I have an 04 Pilot, which I LOVE, but we rarely use the third row. 2 adults can fit back there but I wouldn't want to sit there for anything more than a half hour. I currently have DD's RF MA passenger outboard with LATCH. There is no center LATCH and borrowing from outboard is not allowed. I could probably get our SR base next to DD's MA. Let me go try. The other downside to the 3rd row IMO is that your storage space is virtually gone. It's nice to have the 3rd row in case it's needed but the only times we've used it, we've been going out with friends, with no kids, thus no carseats.

ETA: I just went and put the SR in the middle using the seatbelt while leaving the MA passenger outboard. With that specific setup, there was only 16 inches left on the driver outboard side which is not enough to fit the MA. It may puzzle differently with the MA on the driver outboard side, but I don't think it would be different enough to make enough room. I just don't think there is enough space back there. The 40% side being on the passenger side so you'd have to leave the passenger side open. If it wasn't 20 degrees out, I would've spent more time out there and moved my MA. Sorry! Also, the middle seatbelt for the 2nd row comes out of the ceiling. If you installed a SR base (or any seat) in the middle and an MA driver outboard, the child in the MA will have the shoulder part of the belt in their space and who knows what would happen there! I don't think anything bad would happen, but it'd be there for them to play with.

Why don't you do this...

Move baby to Marathon, and buy a Radian for DS1.

Install Marathon outboard and Radian in the middle. Then you will have room for an adult passenger on outboard position.

New Pilot is coming out. Can you wait another year? Then you can either get the new model or get a great deal on the older one.