DanTheVanMan
New member
Part 1
Hi guys! I've been a lurker for a while drooling over 4x4 vans. My wife and I travel a lot. Her job requires a lot of travel -- sometimes for months at a time and I can work remotely from wherever there is an internet connection. Up until 2 years ago we mostly just flew or drove our Jeep to wherver we needed to go - then we had a son. That made flying with lots baby stuff / strollers, car seats etc a nightmare. We've rented minivans and though we liked the stow and go seats and space we really couldn't bring ourselves to buy one, plus we have to travel in all different types of weather and coming from a Jeep background and being outdoosy types we really prefer 4 wheel drive for any kind of travel. One trip early on in our sons life we rented a minivan for a 10 hour drive only to find when we got to the rental company it wasn't available. So we opted for a extended Ford Econoline V10 they had availble. Since this was a 3 month rotation we had lots of baby stuff with us to take to the hotel so a normal SUV wasn't going to cut it. Even being an extended van we almost filled up the rear few rows no problem but still had plently of space for our son to play on the floor when we stopped to take breaks. This got the wheels turning in my head and I started looking for 4 wheel drive vans that weren't your normal soccer mom mini-van.
This thread is useless without pics so enter the eye candy.
After researching a bit I found Ujoint Offroad's website. Just so happens we currently live in Eastern, North Carolina. Our upcoming trip was a long drive to Tennesee. As you all know Ujoint is located in North Carolina. So I convinced my wife to split the drive in half since our son wasn't good at long road trips and stay overnight near Asheville. I needed to get her on board with one of these vans or suffer being stuck in mini-van hell. I arranged for us to conveiniently drop by Ujoint on the way to see if I could spot one of these monster vans in person. We dropped by Ujoint on a Sunday -- so I didn't get to meet Chris this time but I did get to introduce my wife to the idea of a full sized 4x4 van. Her first sight of one of these vans was Ujoint V5.
She loved it. We spent the next year looking for a van to either convert or buy that was already converted. We searched Craigslist all over the country and came close a couple of times, finding a few Quigleys and other conversions only to have them priced out of our range or get snapped up almost immediately. We even toyed with the idea of a Chevy Express AWD but I really preferred the look of the Fords and wanted to get exactly what it was that we wanted and preferably diesel. Time passed, the search became frustrating. We stumbled upon a good deal on a nice black 4x4 Chevy Suburban in really good condition and ended up buying it because we needed the space and couldn't wait anymore. We got a long fine with the Suburban. It was a decent ride and pretty spacious. But deep down it wasn't exactly what we wanted for our long road trips - and I found myself looking longingly at 4x4 van pics still late at night.
Months pass and my wife has moved on and is relatively happy with the Suburban despite little glitches with it and the fact that we run out of space everytime we travel with all our luggage and kid gear. My son likes the mountains so we decide to take another weekend trip to Asheville, NC area for his birthday. We drop by Ujoint again and this time I get to meet and chat with Chris and tell him how these are my dream vehicles. For anybody who hasn't met Chris he is a super nice guy and very willing to help anybody with a passion for these vans like he has. My wife needed a little more convincing at this point so Chris lets me show her the interior of one of the vans with the reclining Sienna seats. She likes those a lot and still likes the space the vans have and since she was a little annoyed at a nagging electrical problem with the Suburban this was a good way to get her opened back up to the idea of getting a van. She states "we don't want a van like this - we NEED a van like this". Score!
We leave Asheville and are well into our 7+ hour ride home. She had the Ujoint vans fresh in her mind when she spots this little ad on Craigslist on her phone during the drive back. Of course it figures that Hendorsonville was right near where we just were but we're not about to turn around and drive back 5 hours into our drive home with a two year old getting impatient in the back seat.
more...
Hi guys! I've been a lurker for a while drooling over 4x4 vans. My wife and I travel a lot. Her job requires a lot of travel -- sometimes for months at a time and I can work remotely from wherever there is an internet connection. Up until 2 years ago we mostly just flew or drove our Jeep to wherver we needed to go - then we had a son. That made flying with lots baby stuff / strollers, car seats etc a nightmare. We've rented minivans and though we liked the stow and go seats and space we really couldn't bring ourselves to buy one, plus we have to travel in all different types of weather and coming from a Jeep background and being outdoosy types we really prefer 4 wheel drive for any kind of travel. One trip early on in our sons life we rented a minivan for a 10 hour drive only to find when we got to the rental company it wasn't available. So we opted for a extended Ford Econoline V10 they had availble. Since this was a 3 month rotation we had lots of baby stuff with us to take to the hotel so a normal SUV wasn't going to cut it. Even being an extended van we almost filled up the rear few rows no problem but still had plently of space for our son to play on the floor when we stopped to take breaks. This got the wheels turning in my head and I started looking for 4 wheel drive vans that weren't your normal soccer mom mini-van.
This thread is useless without pics so enter the eye candy.
After researching a bit I found Ujoint Offroad's website. Just so happens we currently live in Eastern, North Carolina. Our upcoming trip was a long drive to Tennesee. As you all know Ujoint is located in North Carolina. So I convinced my wife to split the drive in half since our son wasn't good at long road trips and stay overnight near Asheville. I needed to get her on board with one of these vans or suffer being stuck in mini-van hell. I arranged for us to conveiniently drop by Ujoint on the way to see if I could spot one of these monster vans in person. We dropped by Ujoint on a Sunday -- so I didn't get to meet Chris this time but I did get to introduce my wife to the idea of a full sized 4x4 van. Her first sight of one of these vans was Ujoint V5.
She loved it. We spent the next year looking for a van to either convert or buy that was already converted. We searched Craigslist all over the country and came close a couple of times, finding a few Quigleys and other conversions only to have them priced out of our range or get snapped up almost immediately. We even toyed with the idea of a Chevy Express AWD but I really preferred the look of the Fords and wanted to get exactly what it was that we wanted and preferably diesel. Time passed, the search became frustrating. We stumbled upon a good deal on a nice black 4x4 Chevy Suburban in really good condition and ended up buying it because we needed the space and couldn't wait anymore. We got a long fine with the Suburban. It was a decent ride and pretty spacious. But deep down it wasn't exactly what we wanted for our long road trips - and I found myself looking longingly at 4x4 van pics still late at night.
Months pass and my wife has moved on and is relatively happy with the Suburban despite little glitches with it and the fact that we run out of space everytime we travel with all our luggage and kid gear. My son likes the mountains so we decide to take another weekend trip to Asheville, NC area for his birthday. We drop by Ujoint again and this time I get to meet and chat with Chris and tell him how these are my dream vehicles. For anybody who hasn't met Chris he is a super nice guy and very willing to help anybody with a passion for these vans like he has. My wife needed a little more convincing at this point so Chris lets me show her the interior of one of the vans with the reclining Sienna seats. She likes those a lot and still likes the space the vans have and since she was a little annoyed at a nagging electrical problem with the Suburban this was a good way to get her opened back up to the idea of getting a van. She states "we don't want a van like this - we NEED a van like this". Score!
We leave Asheville and are well into our 7+ hour ride home. She had the Ujoint vans fresh in her mind when she spots this little ad on Craigslist on her phone during the drive back. Of course it figures that Hendorsonville was right near where we just were but we're not about to turn around and drive back 5 hours into our drive home with a two year old getting impatient in the back seat.
more...
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