bachex

We have six kids (for now) and tow a big travel trailer with our NV. It does great except when there's a headwind. Last week we took a trip about 300 miles south with the trailer. Most of the driving was freeway and I kept it at about 75mph. I got 11 miles to the gallon over the entire trip, which isn't bad at all with a big TT fully loaded with kids, gear, bikes, etc. It did great even on some of the steep grades....definitely slows down a bit but that's understandable. It sounds like this is the perfect vehicle for your setup.

Ok dumb question. Do I really need an air filter? Why would Nissan include a spot for the filter but then not put a filter in? Makes me believe it's probably not that critical. Am I wrong?

Sampson - Haha! You just won major points with my wife....she's a car seat nut and wondering if maybe you're one of her buddies from car-seat.org. Here's what we have and a question... Question: We never thought about having the single seat in a different position than the rest of the bench. What does that do to the single seat in the third row? Can you post some pics of this? <the wife> We have a Radian (now Diono) rear-facing in the same position you do, also with an angle adjuster. (Depending on when you got your angle adjuster, you may need a new one. The first batch didn't work well and left deep impressions making the angle adjuster hardly worthwhile. The newer ones are thicker and sturdier and they'll send you a new one for free if you call them.) Our 21 month old sits there. That's it for the front row. (Although I have ours installed with the seatbelt because I don't trust the LATCH since Sunshine Kids had some issues with the SuperLatch and tried to cover it up.) I have it tethered to the driver's seat (at the bottom near the console) with the D-ring. 2nd row, we have a Radian in the middle seat, forward-facing. And a Britax Frontier 85 next to it on the driver's side. The Radian does not install well forward-facing in the passenger side position due to the long buckle stalk. I have them both tethered to the seat next to them. (A technical no-no, but I have many tech friends who don't think it's the end of the world.) 3rd row I have a Sunshine Kids (now Diono) Monterey booster seat. It is LATCHed into the only position with LATCH back there. In the past, I had 2 Radians rear-facing in the middle row. One on the driver's side and one in the middle and that worked well. </the wife> The overall safety, headrests, seating flexibility, number of LATCHes, etc was one of the primary reasons my wife wanted this van. It hasn't disappointed at all this regard.

KMGLTZ, How badly has it impacted your MPG? Any other downside to doing this? Is it louder? Is the ride more rough?

I'm 6' 4" but most of the height is in my torso. My wife had a rear facing carseat right behind me and it was a bit tight....I never hit my shin but it grazed it a couple times. She moved the car seat to the center position on the first row and now I can scoot the seat back just a bit. Unless you are super tall and can't put the seat back you should be ok with it in that position.

I mounted mine just to the right of the steering wheel but down low. It almost hits my right shin.

We used to have a Chevy Express and one of the things we have loved about our NV is the significantly better fit & finish in the NV compared to the Chevy. Everything in NV interior is very well done and it's so quiet compared to the "tin can" Chevy. The one exception to this is the latch thing at the top of the back door. It looks completely unfinished, ugly and like it was an afterthought. I'm wondering if they're going to fix this in future model years (I've got a 2012). Anyone that has a 2013....I assume this hasn't changed? Any idea if there's any way to cover this up?

I bought some foam blocks to go on the rails of the canoe and they came with a strap that had some "S" hook things. I threaded those under the mount things on top of the NV. It worked fairly well but I want to get something slightly more permanent.

We had two hybrids before we bought our Shadow Cruiser. Hybrids are nice and light but watch out for the wind....we had some heavy winds that busted the bracket that holds up the tent. Investing in a weight distribution hitch like Equalizer (http://www.equalizerhitch.com/) is a good investment. WRT brake controllers, make sure you get a good one. I got the Tekonsha (http://www.amazon.com/Tekonsha-90195-Electronic-Brake-Control/dp/B000P17NXQ) and installed it myself. The install wasn't horrible but if you're not super handy you may want to pay someone to do it.