2018 Grand Caravan?

[Number_35]

That’s a good looking van! Didn’t the 3.3 tend to fail head gaskets or consume oil or something?

I remember the hunter green town and country with OE gold accent wheels was the go to van in the mid 90s.

The first V6 used in the Chrysler minivans was the Mitsubishi 3.0, noted for high oil consumption. I think the 3.0 was introduced for the 1987 model year.

The in-house 3.3 replaced the 3.0 around 1990, and was a much better engine. I don't think it had any glaring weaknesses. It and its big brother, the 3.8 were used in the Dodge and Chrysler minivans until around 2010, finally succeeded by the 3.6. Pentastar.

 

[Fordiesel69]

Our 2015 has not been good. Needs front and rear brakes / rotors pretty much every year. They rust and seize up constantly despite synthetic lube where none of our other cars have this issue. It has 37K on it and the radio does not work, and the alternator went bad out of the blue and just stopped charging. We have kept it coated every year since new with Krown and it still has some minor undercarriage rust forming.

Transmission is also very slow to engauge reverse after sitting.

 

[svtrit]

Our 2015 has not been good. Needs front and rear brakes / rotors pretty much every year. They rust and seize up constantly despite synthetic lube where none of our other cars have this issue. It has 37K on it and the radio does not work, and the alternator went bad out of the blue and just stopped charging. We have kept it coated every year since new with Krown and it still has some minor undercarriage rust forming.

Transmission is also very slow to engauge reverse after sitting.

This one sounds like an anomaly. I’ve not heard of all of these issues on one can on the forum dedicated to these vans.

 

[Enthusiast]

My parents have North of 165k miles on their 13 Grand Caravan. Just a couple sensors, thermostat, gas cap, and the stow n go seat got stuck once. That's about it. My dad used to have a 14 and a 16 model for company car. The 14 had 70k on it when it was totalled. The 16 had 70k when he retired. Most of the people I know that have them haven't had much trouble.

The one example that didn't hold up well was a last generation T&C. The transmission went out at 100k, the engine went out at 150k. It wasn't dealer maintained and I used to go to their mechanic. They wanted to use Max life transmission fluid in my 200 but I told them to use ATF+4; therefore that might be the problem there if they either didn't have it maintenanced or maintenanced incorrectly. I don't know about the engine failure.

The Pentastar seems to be either you get a great one or an average one. My cousin put 258k on their 12 Wrangler before their son totalled it. They claimed it never had engine problems (not even a oil cooler replacement).

 

[Sienna dude]

Why not a used Sienna or Odyssey with? Keep looking.

 

[tiger862]

This is an older thread and maybe I missed it if he bought the van 8 months ago. I didn't see if he purchased one or not. I just traded my 18 Caravan with 42k with a shift flare and felt like wash board road when cold. Paint was littery come off. To say disappointed is an understatement. If I kept it I was going to have to put torque converter and valve body. Struts were noisy and drivers hinge needed replacement. Everything that was wear item was going to be replaced until converter started slipping.