SUVs Vs Minivans

Off Topic
41

All I’m going to say, as an avid car guy who tries to keep an independent view on the industry, is that the Honda Odyssey is honestly one of the most amazing vehicles I have ever driven in my life.

I wouldn’t buy it personally because I don’t have a need for hauling cargo or large groups of people, but seriously, you don’t even understand. It is so well built. I felt like I was driving an Aston designed for transporting groceries, children and furniture. For the mid 30s fully loaded Odyssey you just get so much more vehicle than almost any other automobile in that price range.

I honestly can’t say enough about it the thing. Someone I work with regularly has a slightly modified Range Rover Sport Supercharged, and I would take the interior of the Odyssey over the Range Rover without giving it a second thought. I was helping my mothers friends daughter (second cousins uncle grandfathers adopted third cousins original birth mothers uncle in law on her fathers side) spec a Q7 a few months ago, and even though I think Audi has far and away the best interiors in the industry the Odyssey was not that ‘inferior’ compared to it.

Most of the people who’d call you a faggot for having a minivan are infact driving SUVs that would be horrendous offroad, that they probably wouldn’t even know how to drive offroad and that don’t come with a manual transmission. Therefore, they are faggots. If you aren’t a big ‘car guy’ having a sportscar you can’t track competently makes you a faggot of the highest order, and if you get an automatic in a sportscar, you ascend from human form to become some kind of minor faggot diety in the faggot god pantheon.

I’ve never really been in another minivan I’ve liked (I was in a last generation Dodge Caravan once, I wanted to kill myself, although I hear the Town and Country is alright), but the Odyssey is on another world.

42

If you’re going with a minivan, I recommend the Sienna. I have had a Quest (actually a Villager - same van) and a T&C. The T&C was a lemon, basically. It was comfortable as hell, but we had the PS system replaced 3 times, the power lift gate mechanism 2x and the power passenger door mechanisms replaced a total of 3x (2 on one side, 1 on the other). If you go with the Chrysler, make sure the dealer you use has a great service dept. because you may well need it. The one we had to go to sucked absolute ass.

We traded it in on a Sienna before the warranty was up. We’ve had the Sienna for almost a year and it has been great. There is so much more interior room than the T&C because of the depth of the rear cargo area. It is also very comfortable and the ride is pretty good. It rides on the Camry chassis, which gives it a phenomenal turning circle for a minivan. I can pull non-stop u-turns in spots where I used to need a k-turn in the T&C. And get this, it cost the same as the T&C and it came with a 10.5" integrated dvd player and has an aux plug for an mp3 player. Now, my wife and I can listen to our music while the kids watch a dvd with headphones!!!

Having said all that, I think you should go with the sportscar. Wait, that wasn’t one of your options - sorry.

DB

43

[quote]tom63 wrote:
Damici wrote:
A minivan just says, “I’ve given up.”

Think about it.

So true, you might as well cut off your balls.

I married a great woman, she forbids me to get a minivan. She thinks they’re driven by guys who need more training on how to be guys. She told me if she wanted to marry a chick, she would have.

I drive a Honda Pilot. I can haul 8 people, put the seats down and haul a lot of crap, or haul a moderate amount of crap and carry 5 passengers. It also has never given me a problem in 67000+ miles. It’s safe in a crash ( I know from experience). My tires cost more, but what jobs are for. Only fools get average tires.

I live in Pa. and do a slow boil when I hear of people worrying about how much tires cost. Half the idiots or more here get all season tires which are shittier snow tires.

So to me 32 K was a great price for a great vehicle. I changed one set of tires for 750 dollars and only had oil changes done. I was rear ended by a Dodge Dakota doing over 20 mph and the car was just banged up in the back.

And I still have my balls.

[/quote]

I will counter you by saying anyone can drive an SUV (my mom has a Pilot), but it takes a man with supreme confidence in his manliness to drive a minivan.

We tested a Pilot before we got our Sienna and there’s no way you’re getting 8 adults in that thing. My 8 year old son couldn’t sit comfortably in the rear seat.

DB

44

When my wife and I had our first child I was going to buy her a mini-van. She hates them but they would make life easier. I ended up buying her a Toyota Matrix instead.
When we had our second child The Matrix was too small to fit all our stuff. I had to take it for the team and get a practical vehicle. I ended up buying a fully loaded Mazda 6 Sport Wagon. It looks great inside and out, has a lot of room, and is pretty sporty.
Make sure you do research on cargo volume. Someone recommended the Subaru WRX which an awesome vehicle but has very little cargo room. The Mazda wagon has more cargo volume than a lot of SUV’s. However, I would buy the new Mazda CX9 if I was in the market right now.

45

Alright, question for the minivan owners. Why is it that these days when people have a kid they get a minivan right away?

Why isn’t a car good enough to haul around one kid? Or even two kids?

I remember taking road trips in my parent’s car with my sister and we did just fine. Why is the minivan a must for families these days?

I just don’t get it. Are parent’s hauling around that much more junk than they use to? Mainly toys and stuff?

46

We bought an Odyssey during the second model year of the new body style (@2000.)

Overall it was a great vehicle. I would concur it is well made and the powertrain was excellent (as you would expect from a Honda.)

One morning my wife was driving the kids to gymnastics. Her light turned green and she was hit on the drivers side quarter panel at the wheel well by an F350 superduty with a full tool box on the back. (Telecomm truck.)

After working all night , the guy had fallen asleep behind the wheel at 9AM on the way to another job. He hit them in excess of 45 mph without even touching the brakes.

It did close to $7000 worth of damage to the car. Amazingly, the wife and kids were shooken up but overall OK.

This happened about 4 blocks from our home so I got the call immediately and was on scene within 5 minutes.

I can tell you with absolute confidence had he hit them a mere 4 feet further in he would have killed my wife and son, and my daughter on the other side would have been seriously injured if not killed, as well.

Bottom line, the wife now drives a 4x4 Suburban.

In vehicles, size does matter and you cannot control who you get into a tangle with.

Frankly, I couldn’t care less about gas mileage. Additionally, the reliability rating on these vehicles is great.

We love the car and will probably always have one. With a couple dogs, a couple kids and lots of toys it is amazing how versatile it is.

47

[quote]dre wrote:
Alright, question for the minivan owners. Why is it that these days when people have a kid they get a minivan right away?

Why isn’t a car good enough to haul around one kid? Or even two kids?

I remember taking road trips in my parent’s car with my sister and we did just fine. Why is the minivan a must for families these days?

I just don’t get it. Are parent’s hauling around that much more junk than they use to? Mainly toys and stuff?[/quote]

The only way to answer this is to say: have a kid. If you still have the question, read on.

Yes, there are a lot of things to bring along if you are traveling with an infant: pack-n-play (for the kid to sleep in), high-chair, etc. These are bulkier today than they used to be due to safety-conscious designs. I think a lot of people also intend to have more than one kid. Another factor is that when we visit grandparents, we like to take them out to dinner and take only one car. It’s a lot easier for people in their 60s to get in and out of a minivan than to climb into an SUV.

There were a lot of things people used to do before better-designed things came along. Hell, people used to walk across the lawn in winter to shit in a wooden box, does that mean you should forego indoor plumbing?

I just don’t see why everyone is so against a minivan. There are a lot uglier or less manly vehicles that you can focus on. And since when did having a larger family become unmanly?

DB

48

[quote]dollarbill44 wrote:
… And since when did having a larger family become unmanly?

DB
[/quote]

I always thought it was manly to impregnate a woman multiple times.

49

[quote]dollarbill44 wrote:
dre wrote:
Alright, question for the minivan owners. Why is it that these days when people have a kid they get a minivan right away?

Why isn’t a car good enough to haul around one kid? Or even two kids?

I remember taking road trips in my parent’s car with my sister and we did just fine. Why is the minivan a must for families these days?

I just don’t get it. Are parent’s hauling around that much more junk than they use to? Mainly toys and stuff?

The only way to answer this is to say: have a kid. If you still have the question, read on.

Yes, there are a lot of things to bring along if you are traveling with an infant: pack-n-play (for the kid to sleep in), high-chair, etc. These are bulkier today than they used to be due to safety-conscious designs. I think a lot of people also intend to have more than one kid. Another factor is that when we visit grandparents, we like to take them out to dinner and take only one car. It’s a lot easier for people in their 60s to get in and out of a minivan than to climb into an SUV.

There were a lot of things people used to do before better-designed things came along. Hell, people used to walk across the lawn in winter to shit in a wooden box, does that mean you should forego indoor plumbing?

I just don’t see why everyone is so against a minivan. There are a lot uglier or less manly vehicles that you can focus on. And since when did having a larger family become unmanly?

DB
[/quote]

DB, I’m not attacking you or anyone else who owns a minivan. Honestly, I couldn’t care less what other people drive for a vehicle.

As a newlywed and someone who plans on starting a family, I was just wondering why everyone seems to have to have a minivan. That’s all.

I don’t have kids so I don’t know what all needs to be brought along when you take them places. However, I will say that parents today do seem to take more things with them than parents did years ago.

Maybe that has to do with the design of things like you said. Or maybe families have more stuff now than they use to.

Either way, I was just trying to get a different view as to why everyone and their grandma have a minivan.

I’m sure when I have kids I’ll understand the reason behind getting a minivan. However, I can never get one. Even if I wanted to get one, I can’t. I’ve been saying for years now that I’ll never own a minivan and if I get one, I’ll never hear the end of it from my family and friends.

And driving a minivan doesn’t make you less manly. Neither does having a large family.

Although, I still like to rip on my buddies when I see them driving their minivans around. haha

50

[quote]dre wrote:
dollarbill44 wrote:
dre wrote:

DB, I’m not attacking you or anyone else who owns a minivan. [/quote]

I didn’t take your post as an attack. I just lumped a bunch of thoughts on the other posts into one response.

Haha. You sound just like every guy who drives a minivan. Let’s face it, when we were younger, none of us fantasized about driving a minivan. We were all going to own 2-seaters that go real fast and attract attention. It fit right into my lifestyle as a professional athlete. I don’t know what happened.

DB

51

[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
tom63 wrote:
…

Hate to tell everyone, bigger test better. Any crash rating head on is based on you getting a head on with the same vehicle. A Honda civic loses everytime to a Ford Expedition. There are better vehicles in the same classification of course, but for me reliabilty is first with a close second in safety. I won’t pick one without the other though.

And I still hate minivans.

But the Honda Civic has far better accident avoidance and on a per mile driven rate you are more likely to die in a SUV than in a car.
[/quote]

I can avoid accidents very easily because I’m very vigilant, but the Pilot beats the civic when it’s happening.

Paying attention will beat most accidents, but if they happen, bigger is better. I’ve seen the stats in my whiplash courses.

And the Pilot doesn’t look like a minivan, you take htat back11111!11!, hahahaha.