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Old 04-14-2017, 11:15 PM   #21
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Design varies with manufacturer and model, but with the 3rd row seats, you always lose cargo space somewhere. Fold the seats down and they are out of sight, but the rear deck is now 3-4" higher (lost cargo capacity in the rear). They fold down into the area where the spare is normally stowed, so you either lose the spare (don't get me started on that), or they stick the spare under the 2nd row seats. So now when you fold down the 2nd row seats, that deck is higher (lost cargo capacity in the mid-section). I don't mind when 3rd row seats are an option I can opt out of, but more and more, they are becoming standard, and according to the salesman (excuse me, "purchasing consultant"), your only option is to "deal with it". Nope, my other option is to walk away. (Oops, here I am, up on my soap box again! Must get down and stay down.)
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Old 04-15-2017, 02:39 AM   #22
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Vermilye View Post
While I haven't seen it in writing, I was told by a Toyota salesman when I was looking for my 2010 RAV4 that the reason for the higher capacity was heavier rear suspension. While I could see that raising tongue weight, I don't see how it increased towing capacity...
Toyota and some others define the tongue weight as a nearly fixed fraction of the total trailer weight. If tongue weight is the limiting factor (as it is for some vehicles), then if you can have more tongue weight, you can then have more trailer weight.

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Originally Posted by gbaglo View Post
Why wouldn't they make the heavier suspension an option? Do I have to leave the 3rd row seats in my carport to get more capacity?
I can't follow the logic. I can see a heavier suspension with 5 seats might ride rough, but how's that different than 3rd row seats that nobody sits in?
In anything other than a pickup truck, it is very rare for a vehicle manufacturer to offer the buyer a choice of spring stiffness other than as part of a complete sport suspension package. Every component interacts with the others, and they neither want buyers building Frankenstein vehicles and holding the manufacturer responsible for the result, nor excessive complexity of inventory. The aftermarket fills in whatever people are willing to pay for... whether they're good ideas or not.

The stiffer springs without the weight of the third row seats has even worse ride than those springs with the seats, although the difference would be small.

And there's another approach...
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Originally Posted by Vermilye View Post
I do know that when I brought home the 17B, I went to my local dealer and asked if the rear suspension on my RAV4 Sport could be exchanged for that of the 7 passenger. All I got was a smile...
The Sienna equivalent is to put the taller springs from the AWD version into the 2WD version - you can buy whatever parts you want and what you do with them is your concern. There is also a seating option: 8 passengers versus 7, with the extra person going in the second row... and I think different springs due to the expected extra weight.

Added air springs are another way to get more spring stiffness, and can be inflated or (mostly) deflated to suit the situation of the moment. This is easier with some suspension designs than others.

Minivans all have the third row of seating, because most customers buy these vehicles for the seating capacity. Some of us buy them for cargo capacity - we've only used all three rows a couple of times in a dozen years - but there was no delete option for the third row seats, and I'm not surprised. In practice I often leave the middle row seats in the garage, but some Sienna owners have removed the third row (which is not intended to be removable).
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Old 04-15-2017, 09:58 AM   #23
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Brian B-P View Post

Minivans all have the third row of seating, because most customers buy these vehicles for the seating capacity. Some of us buy them for cargo capacity - we've only used all three rows a couple of times in a dozen years - but there was no delete option for the third row seats, and I'm not surprised. In practice I often leave the middle row seats in the garage, but some Sienna owners have removed the third row (which is not intended to be removable).
But in most minivans you can remove the middle row (or at least that was true when I had one). In my MPV the middle row was easily removable and the back row folded either back or flat. You can't remove the third row seats in an SUV (or the middle row.) And a lot of them don't allow the middle row to fold very flat. In some ways minivans are more useful than SUVs. (Though I haven't shopped them lately so can't attest to no unfriendly changes.)
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Old 04-15-2017, 03:20 PM   #24
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Originally Posted by Bobbie54 View Post
But in most minivans you can remove the middle row (or at least that was true when I had one). In my MPV the middle row was easily removable and the back row folded either back or flat. You can't remove the third row seats in an SUV (or the middle row.)
Yes, that's what I said - and I mentioned that I remove the middle seats from our Sienna.

Some minivan middle-row seats don't come out: Chrysler's Stow 'N Go seats are an example, and they fold flat to the floor instead... but you're still carrying around their weight. Any seat that can fold flat to the floor, in any row, is typically not removable.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Bobbie54 View Post
You can't remove the third row seats in an SUV (or the middle row.) And a lot of them don't allow the middle row to fold very flat. In some ways minivans are more useful than SUVs. (Though I haven't shopped them lately so can't attest to no unfriendly changes.)
Seat designs that don't work well for cargo are certainly an undesirable feature for some of us. One reason that we didn't buy a Nissan Quest minivan in 2004 was that the middle-row seats didn't come out, and although they folded down very low, they didn't even fold flush with the cargo floor.

One reason that the second (middle) row of seats is generally not removable in an SUV is that the resulting floor level wouldn't line up with the rear cargo area. Minivans are taller and typically have longer wheelbase, so there is more room to make all of these components work together. Minivans are now mostly front-wheel-drive as well, making packaging of components under the floor easier; anything called an "SUV" needs to offer some sort of four wheel drive system, at least as an option.

I agree that minivans are more functional in many ways; in the rest of the world they are called multi-purpose vehicles (that's the origin of the name of Mazda's MPV). SUVs are often more about style than function, while minivans are about function despite style.
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Old 04-15-2017, 04:20 PM   #25
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Originally Posted by thoer View Post
The 3rd row seats are made of anti-matter. There, that was easy!

Then again, maybe the 2nd and 3rd row seat's quarks are in quantum entanglement....
Toyota knows more about dark matter than they've ever led us to believe.
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