IL Track Tested: 2012 Dodge Grand Caravan R/T

"Over 50% of Caravans end up in fleet service "

Bet that won't be true in 2012. In 2011 they were still unloading huge numbers of 3.3 V6 Caravans with the old interior. Fleets are perfect dumping grounds for outdated inventory.

A sheep in sheep's clothing.

Let's not forget that the T&C actually outsells the GC.

12mm?

Why don't you guys just pull the fuse for the stability control? I know its not as easy as pressing a button but its just as effective. You should try it on cars with non- defeat stabtility control.

If I needed a van right now I would without a doubt take a GC or T&C over one of the Japanese vans.

I will take the lower price and not-hideous-to-look at conservative styling.

My wife and I are expecting a kid soon and were shopping minivans. We checked out this, the Honda, and the Nissan. My wife hates the looks of the Toyota, so we didn't bother.

We were both impressed with the improvements Chrysler has made with their interiors. IMO it is very competitive with everything on the market. More so when you take price into consideration. However this minivan is still dogged by the perception of low quality. I've spoken with lots of people that one Chrysler minivans and every one of them complains about all those "little things" that break. No major breakdowns but things like liftgate actuators, entertainment systems, Air conditioning.

IMO Chrysler has much further to go than Ford or GM does when it comes to the perception of quality. That perception is pushing my wife down the Honda track. We having bought it yet, but I think it's coming...

Meanwhile I keep showing her large crossovers in the hopes of never having to actually drive one of these monstrosities.

rboyett - nobody is going to care about what you drive for more than 20 seconds. Don't base your decision on looks, look at practicality. Unless you've got a lot of money, this purchase represents a huge chunk of your annual income. Don't let insecurity drive you to do something stupid.

audisport - if you're not going to carry a lot of adults around, the differences between the Chrysler minivans and the Asian minivans are pretty unimportant. But if you plan on having adults in the back, the last time I checked the Honda Odyssey, Toyota Sienna, and Nissan Quest had more spacious and comfortable second and third row seats for adults than the Chrysler Town & Country, Dodge Grand Caravan, and Kia Sedona. The new Odyssey is also the only minivan that makes it feasible to put three child seats in the second row. The Sedona was well-rated for crash safety at launch but now lags the others.

If none of those things matter to you, the Dodge is a fine choice. If space does matter, I would check the other three.

Congratulations Dodge for making the most pointless vehicle in the world. Mere 280hp V6 and 4700lbs and you call it R/T?

@BMW_M%: do you find yourself regularly disabling the safety equipment in your car by pulling the fuse to gain a few 10's of accelleration? Me either.

If your need for speed is such that you would, you are unlikely to be buying a minivan of any sort.

I bought a 11 T&C last June and my wife & I like it alot. The interiors are vastly improved and the engine is great. The fact that you can fold the 2nd row Stow n Go sold me. No one else has this feature. I can count a few instances where we bought something large and needed to fold them into the floor. Otherwise with the others you'd have to drive home, remove the seats and drive back to the store. Also, I liked the Honda but you can't get the black interior unless you buy the premium model, just gray and it didn't come close to the T&C. The 12 T&C now come with standard leather & entertainment screen. You also get power hatch and side doors for the price of a basic Honda with none of those features. We took a trip and were avg 27-28mpg on the highway, it was suprising.

While they are reasonable numbers for a minivan (the braking distance is actually pretty good, especially compared to the Crew trim), nothing seems GTI-like to me. Unless Gilles meant a GTI with a refrigerator strapped to the roof.

As the previous owner of a 2005 Honda Odyssey Touring and now a 2011 Honda Odyssey Touring Elite I still have to go with the Odyssey as overall it just looks and feels more sophisticated.

My main issue with the Chrysler vans regardless of interior and drivrtrain upgrades is the fact that it still reeks of cheapness. Therefore I am still weary about the build quality of the things I can't see.

Sto n' Go. It's ok but it's not a deal breaker as I can fit 3 baby seats in the 2nd row of the Odyssey. The Chrysler can't do that. Also, the 2nd row of seats are more comfortable in the Odyssey which matters to us as we have 5 kids, 2 sets of twins and a single.

BMW: most modern cars have linked the fuel pump with the ESP system therefore preventing it from being disabled.

Wow, Honda versus a Chrysler minivan. At least with the Chrysler you will know the transmission will last longer than 6 months, with the Honda it is a total gamble.

Chrysler is also ranked as the most loyal buyers now for 11 year in a row. The new interior easily trumps the cheap honda interior.

rboyett: Take a 3 row crossover home for the night and pack a packn play your stroller and a few suitcases in it. If you plan on having more than the 1 kid and them being somewhat close in age imagine what else is required (double stroller?) and then see how much room for people you have left. The Minivan will win hands down. If you live in an area where AWD isn't important and you plan on having 3 kids, and take a few trips a year in your car, you will be much happier with a minivan. If you don't ever plan on traveling over night anywhere, think you'll only have 2, and care what people think then go the crossover route. My wife was able to to take 2 of her girl friends, our toddler, and 3 more babies/toddlers (7 total) with carseats, 3 pack n'plays and 2 strollers to san francisco for a couple of nights with enough room for everything and everyone.

But we just have one kid right now with another on the way, and we friggin love our minivan. when we travel we can get everything behind the 3rd row including the dog kennel, and the 3rd row becomes a changing table play area when we are stopped.

If i wanted a Family Sport Box Man Solution id get the Ford Flex Ecoboost. Much better as a drivers car.

Maybe this is a good minivan, but why is it an R/T, and why is Chrysler so willing to insult its own heritage?

Colorado, if you do some research you would find that the DCX vans had some transmissions issues too. For the record, our 2005 Odyssey only needed a tire pressure sensor replacement which was under warranty. Other than that and a couple of TSB's/recalls our Odyssey was flawless after 97k. Our 2011 Odyssey has been flawless after 11k.

The transmission issues on later model Odysseys was due to torque converter issues. The 2nd generation suffered from the transmission issues that plagued all V6 powered Honda and Acuras in the early 2000's.

mustang5507:

"Let's not forget that the T&C actually outsells the GC."

Not true and pretty sure the T&C never has outsold the Grand Caravan.

2011 Sales Totals:

T&C 94,320

Grand Caravan 110,862

Keeping it real in snowy Seattle,
Stephen

First off, to anyone screaming Chrysler Vans seem cheap, let us just compare 2011+ vans as they all brought in major changes. The base Ody was depressingly cheap feeling compared to the much cheaper base Grand Caravan.

I've driven the 2011 Town and Country to some of its maximum abilities in cornering and such. The limit seems to be in those fuel friendly tires. The van has much more in it, but the tires should be swapped for a set of performance to really do an interesting test. It may not matter, that is a lot of weight to push around.

oops, faux pas there colorado1974. You might want to look at Chrysler's rather poor reliability record on their automatic transmission minivans before criticizing Honda for the same thing. Both had a lot of failures and I believe both have addressed the issue (Honda with a completely revised 4 shaft 5AT and Chrysler by moving on to a new 6AT).

Pot, kettle, all that jazz.

@Bigfordfan150: +100!!! When we have to replace ours with an AWD I would choose a AWD ecoboost over anything else since it still has the well in the rear and it hauls the mail! hopefully I can talk my wife into a ford with that car in a few years!

Aren't these vans TERRIBLY unreliable? Like one of the most unreliable products on the market today? They are...

I have no issue with these vans but they sell like crazy. People buy these things up left and right and they are very expensive and unreliable...

Why buy this over like a Chevy Traverse or Honda Pilot or Toyota Highlander??

Something I will never understand I suppose.

"Why buy this over like a Chevy Traverse or Honda Pilot or Toyota Highlander??

Something I will never understand I suppose."

Watch and learn...
http://www.insideline.com/honda/odyssey/2008/2008-comparison-test-crossover-vs-minivan-vs-suv.html

Church et all: Chrysler's minivan transmission problems ended in the late 1990's. Honda's are still prevalent. Just spend 2 minutes and google Pilot/Odyssey/Ridgeline Transmission problems...

"Why buy this over like a chev trav or Pilot or Highlander? Ease of entry for one thing. I have 3kids all under 7 and in the parking lot they can enable the doors without my help and with out opening the back wings of a SUV that swing into the car park next to me.
I'll never understand why people are so afraid of how they will look driving a minivan. People have gotten so insecure with themselves that they are more interested how they may be perceived over practicality.

Rhoyett, I heard scooby, but let's be honest, two people and a 30lb toddler do not need a minivan. We have a toddler and we have never once wanted for space in our wagon, even on long trips to the beach, cincluding with pack n play, baby bathtub, and the rest. And for the 99.99 percent of the time there is nothing else in the car besides the family, an umbrella stroller and a diaper bag---or just me, taking it out for a wash and a little bit of stick on a twisty on-ramp---the wagon is gross excess. If you want space for an additional 4 persons in your car, just in case, then that's what you want.

More to the point, and more relevant to the article, if you really want a "man van" with looks and performance, what you really want is a wagon. A van is per se not sporty. 65-series tires (what car has had those since 2000)? More body roll than Paula Deen in a two-piece?

An CUV is "manly", inasmuch as it is generally taller than others and eats more, but it's not sporty. If you end up having more than two children, at that point, several years away, you can trade up for a proper van. Meanwhile, enjoy driving for a couple more years; you and your family will not suffer for that brief indulgence.

"Chrysler's minivan transmission problems ended in the late 1990's. Honda's are still prevalent. Just spend 2 minutes and google Pilot/Odyssey/Ridgeline Transmission problems.."

That's funny Colorado as the Odysseys reliability ratings are still much higher vs the DCX vans. Do you even own a minivan? We're on our 2nd Odyssey. After this one the wife will probably get an MDX as the oldest set of twins will have vehicles of their own.

They didn't end in the 90's colorado. They continued well into the early 2000s, just google it. And Honda's mass transmission problems with their V6 5AT ended with their redesign back in 05 when they completely changed the transmission layout. Again, pot, kettle, black.

And p.s. - if you're talking about the recall last year, that was on I4 transmissions, and it was to change software to prevent people abusing the transmission by rapidly shifting from drive to reverse and breaking something.

In my experience, automatics are generally more problematic in general. Every major manufacturer has had serious issues with auto transmissions. GM's 4L60E has had perhaps the highest failure rate of any automatic transmission I've ever seen for example.

Town & Country won 2011 JD Power Initial Quality Award for minivans.

http://www.jdpower.com/autos/car-photos/Initial-Quality/Award-Recipients/2011/

"if you really want a "man van" with looks and performance, what you really want is a wagon"

Yea it was called the Magnum. And people complained about it for lack of space. So they dropped it.

And please spare me all the "google this and that" for car problems along with the "I have this this and this in my fleet with ZERO problems". WHO CARES? Every single person can come on and say they've owned something with zero problems or they're the neighborhood busybody seeing on how many times the neighbors POS ends up in the shop trying to get their point across.

Until anyone can PROVE warranty claims paid out by manufacturers or can legally post internal warranty claim data then they need to keep their traps shut. "Google" doesn't make you an expert on reliability.

Jona57, review the criteria that these "awards" are based on and get back to me.

Who cares. The best of these (whatever that might be) is still just an appliance at best. Buy the one that holds what you need at the best price. Use the leftover money to but something fun, like a used MX-5 or Mustang GT then lets argue about that!

Thank you for the review Inside Line. Just over 2k on my '11 DGC Crew and still enjoying it. I was surprised how close the performance figures were on the Crew compared to the R/T. The dealership where I purchased mine from had an R/T available but it would've cost me about 3 grand more and other than the leather interior I didn't really see the advantage of it over the Crew. For a minivan it has really surprised me in the overall ownership experience so far - maybe I should submit it for the "Readers Rides" column here - then again it's still a minivan - maybe not! :)

Frankly, I think it's pretty darn funny to see everyone try to one-up each other with citations and references on something that really comes down to a matter of opinion. It's a frickin' minivan! Some like Chrysler/Dodge, some like Toyota, some like Nissan, and some like others...go out drive them all and see what suits to you. From an aesthetic standpoint, my 'opinion' is the Dodge looks better than the others...from a functionality standpoint...eh, who cares I drive an SUV...LOL!

Have fun doggin' it out at each other y'all :-)

A comparo with a base Caravan would have helped separate the true inmprovements here, but overall I say...MISS! If they were serious about putting a R/T badge on this thing, then they should have dropped it an inch, put a set of summer 18's on it (make all season optional), retuned the suspension more, shift paddles on the steering wheel and set the pcm to squeeze out a few more ponies! Yeah. THAT would be a minivan that I might get my attention! Otherwise, snooooooze.

Ok, a supercar it's not. Who cares? It's a minivan for crying out loud. If I ever find myself (God forbid) in the market for one, I would surely choose this over either the Honda or Toyata offerings. I like the more conservative style, and the Honda in particular is butt-ugly. Also, I really do love the interior on this model (and the other Dodge and Chrysler MVs) much better than it's competetors.

@dwharwood: what kind of wagon do you have? We had a wagon before, but it was to small for the carseat suprisingly. part of it depends on future plans too... it didn't make sense to buy something a little bigger and knowing we will end up with 3 kids probably before the first one is 5, the minivan was the best choice for the future. And with all our family out of town we travel quite a few times a year. it just depends on your lifestyle.

michael_s says:

07:09 AM, 01/18/12

rboyett - nobody is going to care about what you drive for more than 20 seconds. Don't base your decision on looks, look at practicality. Unless you've got a lot of money, this purchase represents a huge chunk of your annual income. Don't let insecurity drive you to do something stupid.

audisport - if you're not going to carry a lot of adults around, the differences between the Chrysler minivans and the Asian minivans are pretty unimportant. But if you plan on having adults in the back, the last time I checked the Honda Odyssey, Toyota Sienna, and Nissan Quest had more spacious and comfortable second and third row seats for adults than the Chrysler Town & Country, Dodge Grand Caravan, and Kia Sedona. The new Odyssey is also the only minivan that makes it feasible to put three child seats in the second row. The Sedona was well-rated for crash safety at launch but now lags the others.

If none of those things matter to you, the Dodge is a fine choice. If space does matter, I would check the other three.

X2 Well said.

I'm a fan of the Chrysler twins over the Honda/Toyota. But I don't care too much about middle/rear seat comfort. If I did, and if I needed car seats, then the stow-n-go just doesn't work all that well. can you get a Chrysler minivan with a regular bench middle row? I don't know or care.

The interior quality issue, well, I've defended the Chrysler strongly, since it's got a better interior by far than the Toyota.The Chrysler just photographs much better and the all-black motif helps tremendously. But its about even with the Honda as far as interior quality. Go sit in them all and you'll see the Chrysler isn't as high quality as the Nissan.

I love the concept, but Dodge fell just a little short. To truly make this a man van please do the following:

- Find a way to get the HP up to 300.
- 8 speed transmission
- Add AWD
- Place the shifter between the two front seats. Imagine a van with the center console of the Durango

Make these changes and I will be the first one in line at my local dealership.

I expect that Dodge makes a Grand Caravan SRT8 or redesign it. But I want the horsepower in the R/T (Road 'n' Track) to gain up to 524 horsepower and a Lamborghini engine.

Yawn. Heritage dilution at its worst...

Chrysler made AWD versions of their Town and Country and Caravan minivans all throughout the 90's. Likewise Ford with the Aerostar and Chevy with the Astro van. It's a shame that they've all stopped doing that. In fact, the only minivan on the market with a (pricey) AWD option appears to be the Sienna.

What a joke. A jouney is much nicer and better looking. This thing looks strange with no roof rack.