My 98.5 A4 is currently being used 90% by my wife to haul around the two kids. I spend about 3 hours each Saturday undoing all of the 'family damage' (e.g., scraping Mustard off the leatherette) that occured during the week. I, in turn, get to drive the '89 Honda Accord to work whilst trying to use telepathy to let the many A4 drivers I see know that my other car is an A4....

Anyway, my wife and I have decided that a minivan is in our future (sad but true). My wife wants to be able to hold five passengers (kiddie car pools) and we will need to stay around $30,000 so the A6 is not an option.

Various friends of ours have recently purchased the Sienna, the Odyssey, and the Windstar. All love their new-found sense of practicality (and their minivans)

The huge upside will be that I get to drive my A4 24/7/365!

Any opinions of specific minivans?

Please no flames, I'm having enough trouble with the whole concept of a minivan in my driveway without any harassing comments!

Chris

One of my friends was faced with the same problem and opted to buy a Volvo Crosscountry
which was previously in the dealership's loaner fleet. It had under 6K miles on it and he got
it for low 30's. Normally, I wouldn't consider buying a loaner, but you gotta figure that Volvo
drivers aren't the type to beat on a car. You can always add the 3rd seat and have more
passenger space.

A4 content? Puh-lease.

Why are people reluctant to use the other forums? You may not get an answer in ten minutes, but you'll get one sometime that day. Whatever happened to patience?

The Odyssey is the Best minivan on the market right now, but your going to wait a while (3-5 months)to get one any you will pay sticker. . Thought if you want leather seats the Odyssey is out. The Windstar you could get today and pay close to the same price, maybe even a little cheaper. The New Mazda MPV is also real nice if you don't want a huge mini-van, plus I think it looks some what sporty. The Toyota is just Ugly!

Don't dismiss the idea out of hand! See if your dealer has one and check it out. In the interest of full disclosure: that 3rd seat is small (rated for humans under 75lbs as I recall, but perfect for little ones), faces rearward (kids actually like that a lot), and when used eliminates the storage area (but then, when is the wife gonna be hauling extra kids AND groceries at the same time). But for that price you (or the wife) would be driving a much better ride -- fully loaded with leather, quattro, moonroof, heated seats, Bose, etc. -- than ANY minivan. Heck, you could probably find one coming off lease in the $25,000 range, or even less with higher miles/fewer options. Worth considering.

Rick

somebody kill me please, I'm on my knees, pretty pretty please KILLLL MEEE! I want to DIE!!!! this would be my response if I were in that postition, give me a Subruban 2500, 7.4 (454 c.i.) with the Banks kit, Brembos, 4" dual exhaust, and a tasteful brush guard with PIAA ligths top and bottom.

Absolute total POS. Great vehicle when threre wasn't something wrong with it, which was almost never. The Honda is sweet for a minivan, drove my neigbor's. Good pickup, very good handling. You will have to pay MSRP or very close to it, and you'll have to wait for it.

BDW

a '95 Windstar once and was very pleased with it. We had traded in a Dodge Caravan for it and considered it a big improvement. Also, Ford tends to be overachievers in customer satisfaction--at least locally.

z

I also have a 95 Windstar which my wife drives (2 kids). I too have an 89 Accord, planning on getting a '00 A4 1.8T once my wife allows me to have some of the money I make. We have had many problems with the 95 Windstar. I think carpoint.com has a service where you can check the recall/problem history of autos. The 95 Windstar is quite extensive. We have had Brake rework, Check engine reset 4x ($75 each time for them to reset before they finally fixed the o2 sensor problem for additional $$, transmission replacement (under extended warranty luckily). However, although I hate minivans, my wife loves the ability to haul the kids, etc. around and be higher up on the road. If a minivan will make your wife happy, she should get one. Be wary of the Fords though.

My girlfriend's friend has a 96 Plymouth Grand Voyager LE AWD, my mom's friend has a Mercury Villager and I have driven all the minivans at the GM Showroom In Motion during July. Here's my rating:
1) Honda Odyssey EX (quality and safety)
2) Toyota Sienna XLE (quality, safety but stodgy styling)
3) Chrysler Grand Caravan (no longer the benchmark, still remains value-for-money but unreliable)
4) Mazda MPV (copycat concept of Odyssey, feels like a short-wheel base Odyssey if you don't care about space)
5) Nissan Quest (not as nimble as predecessor but still has great flexability)
6) VW EuroVan VR6 (non-comfortist's minivan: unique and different if you don't care about bus-like shifter and handling feel)
7) Chevrolet Venture/Pontiac TransSport (GM's best effort on minivan market)
8) Ford Windstar (other than safety, can found other reasons to buy this lousy, poor handling, so-so finished and poor flexability minivan)
9) Chevy Astro/GMC Safari (finally someone worse than a Windstar on every areas including safety).
Hope this help,.
Tom
97 A4 1.8TQMS
99 BORA GLS 2.0
00 (OR 01) NEW BEETLE GLS 1.9TDI (ON ORDER)
98.5 A4 1.8TQAS WETTED

Chris:

I feel your pain - so to speak. If you're interested in the safety/reliability/drivability aspects, rather than all that interior room, why not consider one of the AWD Subarus? For some reason, women love to drive that car. I don't think your wife will be too unhappy either.

H

The gang pretty much summed it up. I looked at Volvo wagons, Windstar for safety, Siena for safety and syle. I do not particularly like the Odyssey.

I am afraid I will keep driving my 88 Scirocco 16V for a while at least until we get the second kid coming... Well, some incentive here... :)

nt

but they haven't so, looking at the market back in '98, I ended up buying a Dodge Grand Caravan ES w/ front wheel drive and the 3.8 liter engine. I love the power of the 3.8, but mostly, with 3 kids, we love the utility of the Grand Caravan. We have the captains chair which allows us to go back and forth between the front and back seats and also allows the dog to stroll in the isle way. The only other one that we considered at the time was the Toyota, but it just didn't have the room of the Grand Caravan. The GM and Ford products were inferior, IMO, at the time and Honda had not come out with their's yet. I love the sportieness of the ES, 16" (current version comes w/ 17") wheels and I love all the ammenities, or should I say my wife likes all these nice features. The cup holders could use some work, but their better than my A4.

It has been a great vehicle. We also looked at Suburban's at the time, and couldn't justify the cost or the cost of insurance for SUV. The Sub also didn't give us the ability to go back and forth between the front and back seats and plus my wife didn't like driving it. The GCES gave us an upgraded suspension package and low speed traction contol and airbags, and abs, etc.

We love it on road trips to Montana with the 3 kids. We just put a TV/VCR inbetween the two front seats and the kids are entertained for hours.

The back seat has plenty of leg room compared to the Toyota, so if that's an issue, you may look at that.

email me if you want more specifics.

We got the T&C AWD about 1 1/2 yrs ago. The Dodge is basically the same thing but about $800 cheaper. No problems at all. Plus Chrysler has the most experience in minivan design. The design touches are really nice. The AWD adds about $3M onto the price but it's worth it. Might be tough to bring it in under $30M though. Maybe 1 yr old ?

If they got an electric shock everytime they responded to an off-topic thread, I think most of them would think twice and eventually not respond to these threads. What do you think? Can we pull it off? It's not really cruel. They do this kind of training in labs all the time. I think the mob members need someone to do their critical thinking for them anyway.

:-)

of seating which is really the only thing that the minivan gives you. Other than that the Odyssy or the Mazdo seem pretty good.

I just facilitated a "ride & drive" for Mazda for the new MPV. It is a nice riding vehicle, with a lot of neat features designed in. I feel the 2.5lt is overworked (3.0 will come soon) it is smaller than the Odessey, which was the focus competitive vehicle. The Odessey is tough to beat in that segment, though I still would not buy either one. Also no AWD option with new MPV.

Hey, namesake!

My wife made the same call--she wanted the power sliding door to enable loading and unloading of the baby in tight parking lots. She also wanted 3rd row seating w/o going to a Suburban/Expedition size monstrosity.

So we got a MY2K Sienna. I don't like driving it, but it is really convenient and as a passenger, it is really comfortable. Fully loaded XLE w/leather, in-dash CD, etc. was just a hair over $30K.

We ruled out the Odyssey which IMHO is better looking (or shall we say less bad looking) on the basis of price and ride quality--much more truck/SUV like than the Sienna. If you don't want cloth upholstery (ground in mustard stains!), the Odyssey does not have available leather (or did not when we were shopping). Add in the 3-6 month wait list, and the fact that dealers refuse to go below sticker, and I was Toyota-bound.

If it's gotta be a minivan, I say go with the Siena. Highest IIHS crash rating (if that really means anything) and relatively low insurance, also.

it no longer have the nimbleness of the predecessor nor the MPV, the direct competition in terms of size. IMHO, the Quest has better fit-and-finish quality than the MPV.
The questio is: do you want flexability or handling. Flexability and handling in one package of compact minivan is MPV. Wants engine power and flexability go with the Quest.
Tom
97 A4 1.8TQMS
99 BORA GLS 2.0
00 (OR 01) NEW BEETLE GLS 1.9TDI (ON ORDER)
98.5 A4 1.8TQAS WETTED