Family car HELP!

[ninetenths]

Thats the thing it uses the existing rear seat space- all these other seven seaters use the boot aka the crumple zone.

[ninetenths]

For those that didnt see it;
http://fifthgear.five.tv/jsp/5gmain.jsp ... Crash+Test

[higs356]

Hi

We have 3 kids ...

My wife likes a car with a bit of speed...(She used to drive a Golf GTI) needed to be comfy ,leather seats(easiest to clean), lotsa space, economical, variable layout, high doors ... so easier for putting kids in and out of seats without hitting heads or twisting back.

We tried all the AWD...mid 4WD but very few of them have huge space and most of them are sluggish.

She loves our Touran ...so do I . We have a 53 Reg, 2L ,140 PS,6 speed, 7 seat leather interior ...the 3 mid seats are moveable/removeable /changeable ...the back 2 fold into the floor ...Oh ...and its got a moveable safety rail which moves to the back if the 6th and 7th seats are up !!!!!
Its worth about 6K...but we're not selling it.
It drives like a Golf ... not like a Sharan which drives like a bus.
You should take one for a drive ...it'll surprise you.

Quick look at Pistonheads...£6K gets you something like this ...
http://www.pistonheads.com/sales/741803.htm

But you can probably do better with £6K at the moment ...look at autotrader and you will definately find a high spec 05 1.9 with lower mileage for that sort of money

Best of luck

[King_Jut]

Wow, thanks for all the suggestions guys, especially nige! love those T4 and 5's

I would love to have a nice big estate car, 5 series A6, 850 etc, agree with Small Speed on that they handle better, and can be surprisingly frugal. But, something like a galaxy would offer space as the compromise. We don't need the 7 seats a lot, but my wife's farther is in and out of hospital (heart/cancer) and we need to be able to do the 100 mile journey, plus with the roof box, trips to france are do able again.

My dad had a Citron Synergy, full leather, and 6 Captain seats, he loved it, but I hated the large windows, felt like a goldfish bowl.

The wife is convinced we should buy a Picasso as they are super cheap, 06 for under 5k, but when I see them a little bit of sick comes up! sorry!

An honda FR-V would be ace, good looks, 3 seat across job done! Although I have never had a Honda, are they any good?

Thanks again guys.

J

[Nige]

Honda are rock solid, last years and are very well built.

[Disco]

I'm not sure what you can get for 6 grand, but I understand what you are going through. Two years ago my wife had twins, bringing our total up to 3. What you have to remember, and I'm sure you appreicate is the size of the car seats and the fact that they dont 'budge'

most cars in the back are for 3 people, but when 3 people sit in the back of a car, the two on each side have the option to 'lean' out slightly. with car seats, this isnt possible.

Also - infant seats are smaller than the ones from 9 months onwards, so if you are going to buy a car I would really try out the back seat with two car seats in them.... not much room in the middle ( depending upon the age& size of your first born.) I found that, either I went for a people carrier ( which I really didnt want to do ) or I went for a range rover vogue ( even the sport was too small ) - you might look to get one of these cheap, but the tax isnt cheap and neither is the diesel per mile. ( reckon I get 21-23 out of mine )


Oh - if you are having twins you need to think about the pram as well and where its going to fit - for example if you were to go for a people carrier with all seats up, I dont think there is much room in the boot area for what is a huge bit of kit. - I ended up getting a new pram - the Mclarren one - because it was light weight and easy to fold, rather than the poncy off roading one - expensive £550 mistake ( but saying that you need a flat bed one for the first few months I think ! )

good luck - least you arent like I was - ie - 10 months into a contract with a BMW M3 convertible, that was just migrating to the newer look... ouch. reckon all said and done, taking into account service and about 6 new tires ( that seem to burst every 500 miles or so ) and the credit charges... and the payback penalty I could have leased a new ferrari for a year.

[jonat127]

You could have my Chrysler for 7 grand
http://www.pistonheads.com/sales/890397.htm
Move the rear bench seat into the middle and leave the two captains chairs in the garage. Then you'll have room for three child seats and behind that you could get two buggies/prams in without even having to fold them down it's huge!
31mpg and £210 tax.
Can't offer handling though. With MPV's you have to change your mindset and get your driving pleasure from smooth limo style driving. It's pointless saying MPV's don't handle, they never will, it's physics that tells you so.......
Jon

[58A - 71E]

Just to put another vote for the Honda....
Mate of mine had twins couple of months ago and bought a Honda FRV.
Looks shat but does everything you want (and what he wants too which is why he got one) and dont worry about Honda for reliability, seriously, they are absolutely bullit proof.

[gridgway]

Apologies for the brusque comments previously, some more detailed thoughts...

people carriers are a marketing con.. everyone I know with kids has rushed out and brought a people carrier as soon as their second and/or third child was due stating categorically that they "need 7 seats" or "have to have a people carrier as its easier to get kids into because of the height".

I don't think anyone I know has done that on that basis. Nor is that the specifically the push of the marketing of people carriers. People carriers are good for taking 7 people about sometimes (does come in very handy especially if your children have friends). But they are really good for carrying a family of 5 and lots and lots of stuff. You tend to have a lot of stuff with a family of 5. Many "large cars" (in fact a large proportion of large cars) do not have 3 sensible seats across the back. They have two seats and a smaller thing in the middle.

I even know a guy with 3 teenage kids who brought a cayenne and insisted for 8 or 9 months that they needed the space, blah blah blah, and then got rid because I WAS RIGHT! He brought my old 545iSE touring and 2yrs on still says "I don't know how we managed before this car" everytime I see him

Well you see, you would be right here as a Cayenne is an SUV not a people carrier. Most SUVs carry 4 in comfort, 5 much less so. Anyway that's not the debate here as we are talking about people carriers. So irrelevant in support of your 545 against people carriers case.

OK p*ss taking and apologising aside, 7-seater and 5-seater people carriers might seem like a good idea with kids, but..

1.) they have next to no boot space, and what little space they do have is a waste of time as its all in the uppy and acrossly directions.. fine for a picture frame, crap for anything of substantial 3-dimensionality.

True for 5-seater people carriers especially, but you get a great choice. with 7-seaters. 5 people with proper seats and tonnes of stuff-space or 7 people with proper seats and much less stuff-space. So still all in all a good idea.

2.) the only persons i know who regularly uses the 6th/7th seat in their people carrier do so to seperate their TWO children because they always fight if they're sitting next to each other (which to me is more of a parenting issue than a vehicular problem; im sure my mum could fix that one in about 10mins)

Well you don't know many people with people carriers then is all I can assume. Again it's about having a great choice of # of people versus space.

One friend insisted they needed 7 seats for their 2 kids (one newborn, one 3yr old), had them installed in their car, then NEVER used them in the 2yrs they had the car. They then went on to buy a fullsize 7-seater people carrier, and removed the back seats and put them in the garage because of point #1 above

Yep, there is often one or two seats in my garage, but they get used quite regularly. How did choice get to be *such* a bad thing in your world?

3.) they are not economical; my old 545iSE touring with its 4.4 litre 350bhp petrol engine did more MPG than my mates 307SW which had a 2.0 diesel engine, AND the fuel was 10p a litre cheaper!

So your 545 4.4l petrol machine does what? According to BMW the new 550iSE does 16.6 urban and 36.2 extra urban, combined 26.2. Slightly larger engine at 4799cc, but newer, so probably about the same as your 545. Galaxy/Sharan/whatever with the 1.9Tdi engine does 35.3/50.4/43.5

I assume you don't mean the 2.0l 307 SW reviewed with a combined mpg of 52.3 here http://www.fleetnews.co.uk/RoadTests/story/?rtID=25223 ?

4.) they do not go/stop/turn as well as a saloon/estate, hence are not safer in my opinion.. I'd rather avoid a crash than survive one

That'll be based on the euro Ncap tests then? Or your extensive testing?
http://www.theaa.com/allaboutcars/ncap/ ... jsp?cat=A6

5.) while people carriers high seats are a bonus for getting babies into and out of, they are a pain in the a$s for lifting 3 and 4 year olds into booster seats which they could get into themselves if you were driving a proper car

Confused as to what stops a 3 or 4 year old getting into their own seats in a people carrier.

6.) they are expensive for what they are; for the price of a run of the mill people carrier you could buy a luxury saloon/estate which would cost the same to run and be a 10x nicer experiece for everyone involved

We are back to the fundamentals then of 5 people comfort. Most luxury saloons/estates do not seat 5 people in comfort with space especially if you happen to be in the middle.

7.) men driving otherwise empty people carriers drive like complete w@nker$, presumably because they feel they have something to prove

Really? Sorry the only answer to this is you are talking twaddle again. Or maybe you have a survey of empty people carrier behaviour? I don't think so.

8.) women with people carriers see fit to add little warning diamonds to the rear window saying things like "small dude in car" or "little person onboard".. personally I don't care and will not adapt my driving to suit your choice of stickers

And that is related to the debate about a good car for the OP in what way exactly?

Now I've got all that off my chest, my recommendation?!..

Well the E60 touring which I had (and am on the look out for again) is out of your budget by about £1.5 - 2k so, E39 5-series touring in what ever engine/trim variant you see fit.

530i will do 30mpg, 525d will do 45mpg. Ignore the 520i and 520d, they're so slow and use as much fuel as the next size up engines as they're working so hard all the time..

There's enough space in the back to fit a fridge freezer, washing machine and tumble dryer and still see out the back window! They're fast, refined, drive like a dream, the SE's had leather and electric everything as standard, and they're so robust that if there's a nuclear holocaust cockroaches (predicted to be the only living survivors) will be driving around in them because they'll all still work!

So ignoring the rather bizaare holocaust rationale. I don't believe that your 530i will do 30mpg taking the darlings around and about. They are not cheap to run, service and insure. The OP (unless I have got his criteria wrong) is not looking for expensive german lux-barge with electric everything. He is looking for modest and cost effective, good seating for 5.

Graham
PS on second thoughts it wasn't worth the effort, what you posted was complete bigotted rubbish. Not saying you are bigotted nor am I making any personal comments as this is a nice forum and I am sure you are a sensible chap.

[johndglynn]

I've got three kids, 4 to 11 and all in kid seats. Anything smaller than a V70 is a waste of time in my opinion, and even at that size it's a struggle. Old 940s were about the best of the estates - boxy shape means big space inside.

I tried Galaxys/Alhambras/other MPVs. We had a Scenic which was a nightmare on reliability. But in any case, driving positions were wrong for me on all the MPVs with those silly pedal angles - my previously broken ankles didn't get on with them for more then a few miles. The Galaxy/Sharan etc seats are too flat and hard, same as Touran IMO, but that is just a personal thing.

We ended up with big 4x4s which are also very handy for doing the other jobs families and car freaks need. Big 4 wheelers are ace value for money and kids love them as they can see so much out of them. Loads of room, pretty safe accident wise, residuals are good at the age I buy and they are very versatile. I don't obsess about economy so much these days, but my Landcruiser 4.2 TD manual will do 28 to the gallon on 33" tyres, which is pretty good. Great to get through the crap weather and a dream to use in the summer, I wouldn't be without a 4wd now. Pre 2001 is still cheap £180 PA road tax.

One thing I have found with owning an 8-seater is that the number of times we are all out together is minimal, most of the time one or two come with me and the other goes with mum. But nice to have the space when we want it - taking a couple of friends with us to Cotswolds Wildlife Park was no hassle for example and was a great laugh. Family airport runs are also easy and group evenings out only need one DD.

[Ian Donkin]

Touran's are a hoot to drive, economical and well-built. We had one as a hire car for a few days and I was very impressed.

I also have an E39 estate (my second) but I'm not sure I could get 3 child seats in the back (although I think the E39 best all-round car ever built). Can even be cheap to run if you know where to go for parts and service.

[Burma-Shave]

Err, havent read all the stuff on here, but when faced with the same decision we got a s210 e class merc estate.

You need the 7 seater option, which is pretty common (fold down seats for two in the boot, with belts).
Gets 3 abreast in the back no worries, loads of leg room and capacious boot of course.
I think they have a nice imperious old money look to em, and they do have a sense of luxury - little hidden lights shining inside the cabin etc., loads of room, leather and wood.

These are the cars that evryone wails about the death of merc build quality, which has brought the price down very nicely. However, they still feel merc like in most ways to me - and I used to own a w123 battleship.

Main problem of 210 series is rust, but in cars after 2001, with the right approach and a clean car, Merc will fix it for nothing. New panels and waxoyl. They are very embarrassed about it. Dont get a car thats had paint somewhere else by some taxi fixer, though, as they will refuse it.

Our 320CDI isnt tax bracket freindly, but gets 40 on a run and is a swift old thing. Avant garde is Merc code for slammed! The 4 cylinders however will be in a lower bracket and you can get all of them for peanuts. 6 is the top of the market.

I just couldnt bring myself to go MPV. A picasso is just too 'downtrodden dad', as well as being fugly. The minty blue picassos are the wimpy houses of the auto world. Old espaces are cool, tho! - our local surf shop righteous dudes used to have an old mark I square one with living room chairs in the back. Sick!

[ninetenths]

our local surf shop righteous dudes used to have an old mark I square one with living room chairs in the back.

In the learly '80s my grandfather had problems with his hip so couldnt get in or out of a normal car so he bought a small Daihatsu van stuck an armchair in the back and had his wife ferry him around in it

[King_Jut]

higs356 do you have 3 child seats across the back? and can the front airbag be turned off?

found a few Rans with high milage in budget, and the wife really likes them.

j

[ninetenths]

Ive pinged you a pm - the Volvo has to go to make way for a Defender.