I dont want to sell my van!

[bigyellowvanman]

Morning all!

I have a T6 day van, which I absolutely love. Its been a big part of my little family (partner and doggo) for the past year.

My issue is, we are hoping to grow our little gang with children in the near future. My van has a the 1+2 setup in the front and no rear seats. In the back I have an L shape pull out bed.

Am I going to have to swallow my feelings and sell my van for a combi? Or do I need to look into rock and roll beds? What other options are there?

 

[JOG]

The van is probably the most versatile “family car” going. If I had a regret it would be that I didn’t get one earlier.

I would suggest you investigate changing the bed for a rear seat (that converts to a bed) with isofix connections.

 

[Ads_Essex]

Having had a quick look at your build thread, I’d be inclined to fit a PopTop and bed on rails (like the Cali bed, SmartBed Evo, etc) with an EvoMotion kitchen to the offside an awning rail on the near side.
It’ll be a large outlay to start, but means you’re keeping the van (which you know inside out) and spending less than you would if you bought a Kombi and converted that.

 

[caldodd]

We have a Kombi and a 10month old. The triple seat is going and a sliding R+R is coming.
Boot space for the pram and everything we need for the little one is ideal. Watching other parents struggle to collapse prams and pack shopping into boot space while we just open the tailgate and throw it all in, we really want to keep that space.
Camping with a triple bench is not ideal, parents upstairs and the cot downstairs, painful!!
For our situation we feel sliding bed will work best, but everyone’s situation is different.

 

[DXX]

but everyone’s situation is different.

Exactly, whether it be must have travel item, physical size, mobility, tolerance to discomfort / inconvenience……... The only constant is the size of the van.

 

[Paynewright]

We’ve used our 9 seat SWB window van (now 6 seater) for family duties since 2019 and now the kids are 16/18 we want to convert to a 4 seat camper.

Still undecided on the camper format, however knowing what I know now, I think the best van for us would be a LWB TSI. Looking around I can see it costing us £8-£10k to change due to rarity.

Am I prepared to give up a 35k mile SWB TDi and drop 10k more for a LWB petrol - I’m not sure? Cost to change is dead money and will go a long way to getting yours how you want it.

Sometimes it is better the devil you know!

(Your van looks great BTW!)

 

[Chippie1]

As said above I know my van inside out and know it’s been very well looked after and if seats was my only issue and easily rectified which it is then I would be keeping all day long.

 

[bigyellowvanman]

Having had a quick look at your build thread, I’d be inclined to fit a PopTop and bed on rails (like the Cali bed, SmartBed Evo, etc) with an EvoMotion kitchen to the offside an awning rail on the near side.
It’ll be a large outlay to start, but means you’re keeping the van (which you know inside out) and spending less than you would if you bought a Kombi and converted that.

I certainly need to update the build thread as its come along a bit! I think I'll need to bite the bullet and reconfigure the rear layout somewhat.

 

[bigyellowvanman]

Thanks for the replies all! I think the best thing to do is going to be reconfiguring the rear. Right now I guess we can have three abreast in the front but this will change if we ever grow to a family of four. It seems the general consensus is that most of the value lies in having a van that you know has been built right. And that is pretty hard to replace.

 

[archersam]

How is it laid out in the back? It could be simple to add a mid row single with the built in seat belt as that just requires 4 brackets and can go in a variety of positions on the floor pan and when not needed can be easily removed.

 

[bigyellowvanman]

How is it laid out in the back? It could be simple to add a mid row single with the built in seat belt as that just requires 4 brackets and can go in a variety of positions on the floor pan and when not needed can be easily removed.

 

[archersam]

So you can see where all the brackets could be.

A single with built in belt will sit passenger side left and whilst ruins your nice floor a bit gives you a simple solution.

 

[JOG]

We have a Kombi and a 10month old. The triple seat is going and a sliding R+R is coming.
Boot space for the pram and everything we need for the little one is ideal. Watching other parents struggle to collapse prams and pack shopping into boot space while we just open the tailgate and throw it all in, we really want to keep that space.
Camping with a triple bench is not ideal, parents upstairs and the cot downstairs, painful!!
For our situation we feel sliding bed will work best, but everyone’s situation is different.

And fantastic for those emergency nappy changes!!!