Deb and Ed M
SW MI & Space Coast, FL USA
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Joined: 06/07/2004
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We own a Transit, medium-roof van with the 3.5 ecoboost motor, and LOVE driving it. It also gets almost 18 mpg. Personally, I would try to rent a full-size wagon like a Transit?
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RespondingBack
Los Angeles, California, USA
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Joined: 01/23/2004
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Good Sam RV Club Member
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Double-check with your insurance company re larger vehicle rental (e.g., full-size vsn). Thought I read somewhere that some insurance companies exclude certain rental vehicles from your regular car insurance coverage.
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RoyBell
Chicago
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Joined: 06/03/2015
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I own a business and have commercial business insurance. My daily is a 2500 Cummins Mega Cab. I am not sure where we would even rent a GMC 1 Ton Passenger van?
The 3.5 EB is a fun motor for sure. That's about what we get with ours unloaded. Maybe with some weight in it, they would drive better. Ours is pretty much empty all the time, and a work van so no seats inside.
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RoyBell
Chicago
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Joined: 06/03/2015
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The good news is I scored a nice cargo box on sale for 20% off last night. The bad news is, I don't know if the rental minivan has cross bars or not. Apparently the new vans (Pacifica) are a new design so they don't have the clamps for the factory bars yet. I have an assortment of cross bars and clamps, but if they don't have the parts to attach to the van, then they will do no good. I'll call em this afternoon and see what the vans come with.
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Ductape
On the Road
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Joined: 11/15/2005
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There's a lot of difference in the driving experience between a cargo van vs passenger van. Six people and luggage I'd pick a full size van ten times out of ten.
49 States, 6 Provinces, 2 Territories...
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RoyBell
Chicago
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Joined: 06/03/2015
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So we rented the minivan and the rooftop cargo box worked perfectly. Six people fit comfortably in the van since the majority of the luggage was in the box. Told everyone one suitcase and one overnight bag. Kept the overnight bags in the van for the overnight midpoint hotel stay each way which kept me out of the box until we reached out destinations. With cruise set at 70-75mph the whole way, I got an average of 26.5 mpg. Chicago to Central/South FL (1350 miles). For some reason mpg is always worse on the return trip. This is on par with what we have gotten in past year without the box...We drove through rain storms and everything stayed dried. This is the first time I ever used one and I am thoroughly impressed. Glad we decided to go this route vs getting a suburban (which would also have worse gas mileage) as the money saved I can now use the box on future trips!
![[image]](https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4603/38886022674_458d55ebb2_b.jpg)
![[image]](https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4606/38886023404_e1f7795e32_b.jpg)
This is the Yakima Skybox 21 . Carry on size luggage will sit on their sides allowing roughly 6-7 suitcases. The middle size one probably would had been sufficient in our case, but too late now ![[emoticon]](http://forums.trailerlife.com/sharedcontent/cfb/images/smile.gif "smile")
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