Sheet of Plywood Fits, Sort Of - 2015 Kia Sedona SX-L Long-Term Road Test

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Sheet of Plywood Fits, Sort Of - 2015 Kia Sedona SX-L Long-Term Road Test

There are minivans that can fit a full-size sheet of plywood. Our 2015 Kia Sedona is not one of them, at least not in the configuration that we have.

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nagant

The first gen Stow N Go seats from Chrysler were just terrible comfort wise but super innovative. The second gen are much better but still not as comfy as a fixed seat. There will always be a compromise between comfort and flexibility.

stever

Hard to beat the Stow n Goes. Mine get flipped around all the time.

nagant

stever said:

Hard to beat the Stow n Goes. Mine get flipped around all the time.

True! They were so cool when they first came out and much more comfortable when the 2nd get arrived. The first ones were just not comfortable for adults on any sort of a long trip. Chrysler has had some great ideas for storage etc since 2001, ( I love the flip/fold/remove back seats with flat floor on my PT (one of the biggest reasons I bought it). The RamBox was a good idea even though it was constructed of flimsy plastic. Chrysler has a lot of great ideas but a lot of the time the process from design to actual build quality is let down by poor assembly.

daryleason

I'm not very up-to-date on the minivan culture. But for some reason, I just assumed that every minivan in existence (at least now) had second & third row seats that would either fold completely into the floor or would all fold down to form a completely flat surface. That'd be like trying to sell a sedan that didn't have a pass-through to the trunk from the backseat or a pickup that didn't offer a flip up/fold down back seat. You know it COULD happen, but you would never expect to see it, since everyone else is offering it.

stever

Minivans seem more geared more toward hauling passengers. Back in the day, I tossed the middle row seats from my '99 Quest because I don't carry passengers that often. The rear seat slid back and forth and made a nice big empty, but not as big as my current '09 Grand Caravan and it wasn't easy wrenching that seat out. It folded but didn't disappear.

My brother used a partial sheet of plywood in his last Odyssey to accommodate storage and occasional sleeping in the van better when they went camping. It fit over the folded middle and rear seats and was kind of a kludge. As I recall, the middle row didn't disappear. He rarely messes with the center row on his current '12 Odyssey - he has a F-150 for hauling.

I haven't been in one for a few years, but the Siennas also struck me as more plush for hauling passengers instead of freight and I've read reports that the new Quests have seats that don't easily disappear either. The Sienna has the issue of making room for the AWD bits underneath and that may interfere with the seat configuration.

easles

This is one reason we opted for the SX model with Technology package instead of the SXL. Seats that slide and fold forward for more room. Another reason was that the SX was 200 lbs lighter (no sunroof or lounge seats) - which helps the SX model get the best MPG of the bunch. Really loving it so far, except for the "edgy" or "flinty" impacts in the back when going over the terrible streets of Seattle. I have read that the OEM tires (Hankook Dynapro HP2 in our case) are notorious for being a poor riding, hard tire (professional head to head review on Tire Rack says so anyway). Hope to smooth this out with a better tire in a few years. For now, I have lowered the tire pressure to 31 which helped a little...maybe. Can the editors comment on impact harshness over sharp concrete bumps with this one?