A Lexus in Toyota skin
Written: Apr 28 '04 (Updated Jun 08 '04)
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Pros: It IS a Lexus (without "L") - Luxurious, quiet, smooth, ergonomic, and practical.
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Cons: It's still a Toyota - Little driving excitement.
The Bottom Line: A practical minivan excels at comfort and features. While XLE Limited fills the void left by Lexus, the LE line brings good value.
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| hh123's Full Review: 2004 Toyota Sienna AWD |
Got our Sienna two weeks ago, put eight hundred some miles and we are very happy with the car so far.
The purchase was easy - Rang up the Costco auto program in the morning, spoke with a participating dealer the next hour, and drove it home in the afternoon.
The hard part, however, was a 6-month debate we went through - Do we need a minivan, or an SUV (cross-over ones, to be precise, as we never do serious off-roading)? In the end we found that image/style was the only advantage of cross-over SUVs, and decided to trade it off for additional space and convenience minivans offer.
Once we got over that part, everything became easy. With our priorities around feature, comfort and luxury, the 04 Sienna Limited AWD with HO package (#6 on Toyota website) handily beat all the competition.
Overview
The 04 Sienna Limited is essentially a stretched SUV - the Lexus RX330. It has the same 3.3L/5A powertrain. Wheelbase is about a dozen inches longer, ground clearance is so close - 6.9" vs 7.1" - that I believe the difference comes totally from tires. Usable space (Passenger room cargo room), however, is increased from 140 cf to 220 cf, a whopping 57%!
Interior
The interior looks more Lexus than Toyota. Both material and finish appear to be top notch. It makes one wonder if the car's got a wrong logo.
Driver seat is 8-way power, with manual lumbar adjustment. Passenger's and 2nd-row seats can be moved back and forth, with adjustable seat back. Driver's and passenger's are also heated with temp. control. 3rd row seats are split 60/40 with adjustable seat back, and both can be folded into floor with one hand. 2nd row seats can be tumbled forward for easy entry into rear seats, or removed. The removal, however, is no mom's job - the seats weigh about 50 lb each, and the latch on the floor is quite tricky to deal with. Plus the task has to be performed by squatting behind them, a good position calling for back injury. I played with it up and down a couple of times, and I easily found excuse to skip my evening workout. On the bright side these captain seats are very sturdy and comfortable, and I wouldn't trade them with the new Caravan's "Stow&go" ones - It's a rare event for us to remove the 2nd row seats, and seat quality takes higher priority for us over the ease of handling them..
A/C temp. can be set differently for 3 zones - driver, passenger and rear. Rear settings can be managed by person sitting in left seat in 2nd row, or overridden by driver through dash controls. Cooling power is adequate though we (forever) wish it could be faster in hot days.
The 10-speaker JBL audio can play from radio, in-dash CD/tape, or roof mounted DVD. Radio reception is excellent. Can search for RDR and traffic stations. There's an A/V jack at the left side of 3rd row, which can be used to play camcorder, TV tuner or any other A/V source through DVD panel. Sound quality is on par with average home theater systems, though I am not too sure if 5.1 is implemented.
The DVD control is quite cumbersome, even with the remote control. Worse it's not controllable by the driver, so expect kids screaming for DVD needs when no other adult sits in the back. When the car is stopped (stick in "P"), the navigation screen displays DVD program so the driver can share the fun when it's safe.
Navigation system uses a touch screen to enter street names and numbers. It's very intuitive, and I managed to use all the features without the manual. Voice instruction is clear and precise, so I rarely need to move my eyes off the road. GPS gets no reception in parking structures but I guess that applies to all GPS systems. Point of Interest (POI) adds to the convenience during unplanned trips to ATM, gas station and fast food.
The 1st and 2nd row windows can be slided down, and quarter ones can be pushed ajar outward by a switch under the steering wheel. When all windows and moon roof are fully opened every passenger can get a good amount of fresh air at highway speed, though the experience can not replace one of a top-down convertible.
Exterior
There seems to be quite some criticism about the car's look but we don't bother - there's no "good looking" minivan in our minds anyway.
Sliding doors and rear liftgate are all power and can be controlled by either the remote or roof mounted switches accessible by both driver and front passenger. The latter make me feel like a bus driver when picking up or dropping off riders who don't know how to operate the doors. Opening and closing of the doors are smooth, and jam protection works responsively.
Side mirrors are large and make it easy for people converting from sedans. Driver side and internal ones can dim automatically to ease glares during night driving. Both external mirrors can be heated to clear up quickly in the rain.
HID headlights provide good luminance at night. Consistent with Toyota's practicality doctrine, the HID uses 4100K bulbs, which look less cool than those purple colored high K ones, but brings maximum light output.
The high beam, however, appears to be darker than the low beam (because it uses conventional bulbs). I wish they could replace it with the option of aiming low beam HIDs higher, since it's already manually adjustable. (I even know how to make it happen but not too sure if it voids the warranty)
Driving impression
In the parking lot the Sienna maneuvers easily due to surprisingly short turning radius for its wheelbase. Parking sonars and rear-view camera make parallel parking no longer dreaded for my wife, though she complained that the camera's fish-eye view a little hard to get used to. I find the rearview cam useful when I need to check if there are small kids hidden in dead spots of the mirrors.
On the road the powertrain provides sufficient kick off the line, yet not enough to cause complaint from passengers. The 0-60 is rated around 9.2 sec for AWD, and 8.3 sec for 2WD (from MSN), about average with passenger sedans. Perhaps due to its weight both initial acceleration and braking appear sluggish, though not any problem once got used to.
The car won't win a race, at least on paper. Edmunds shows 04 Odyssey gets to 60 in 7.9 seconds (2WD), though sometimes results from different sources can not be compared easily (Would appreiate if anyone could share data from the same source).
During hard cornering there's a good amount of body roll, and understeer if pushed harder (worse the foot activated parking brake makes it impossible to be used to compensate). But it doesn't seem to tip over. The handling limit is similar to Odyssey's but I guess drivers can get discouraged earlier in Sienna due to its body roll, and leave with the impression that it does NOT handle.
The driving characteristics is also very close to RX330 which I frequently drive as a loaner. The Sienna's additional 300 lb doesn't seem to tax much, though on paper the 0-60 is slower by half a second. This confirms our impression that the "stretch" results is almost a pure trade-off between style and space.
Haven't really tried the AWD performance. Traction control and VSM are both useless on dry surface, as it's nearly impossible to spin the tires without making crazy turns. But I assume these features are useful, as we've seen fairly large proportions of buyers on AWD with both Sienna and RX 330 (or RX 300).
(Update 05/04/2004 begin)
We did make AWD work on dry surface last weekend - starting from a traffic light on a 30% uphill in San Francisco. I moved my foot off the brake and quickly pressed on gas. Had a moment of standing still with the front tires smoked a little bit, then a sudden push forward which left all other vehicles far behind. I guess that the Sienna is using a VC (Viscous Coupler) design with front wheels primary - The car drives as a front drive, until significant slippage causes the VC to lock up and start transferring torque to the rear wheels. I wish it was a rear-primary VC however it would mean a new design for the powertrain. The ultimate dream is a Torsen with 30/70 torque split. But it would eat more into gas mileage and push the car into a different price class.
(end of Update 05/04/2004)
AWD does take a toll on gas mileage. So far we averaged about 17 mpg for mostly city driving, while my neighbor's 2WD gets 19 mpg for similar driving pattern. And I can feel the drag shortly after releasing the gas pedal, which I never noticed with the 2WD version during test drives. One weird thing all my other cars deliver 2 to 3 miles above city mpg rating for the exact same trips, but the Sienna got 1 below - Either I got a lemon, or Toyota bloated its ratings with 04 Sienna. I'll sync up with other owners and find out which one is more likely the case.
Stock BridgeStone 225 17R60 RFT tires get pretty good traction, but I am a little disappointed with its 240 B B rating, which may mean short tread life, average wet traction and average temperature tolerance.
As every other Toyota/Lexus the ride quality is marked by smooth shifts, low engine/road noise, and a soft ride just not to be boaty. This makes us feel more comfortable and is one of the major factors for our choice. However, the smoothness also makes the car subjectively slower than really is, and deals another blow to people looking for excitement.
The high ground clearance is not always a pure penalty on cornering. Light off-roading, like typical camp grounds, makes me less nervous than other minivan drivers.
Laser aided cruise control works OK on non congested highways, but could be downright scary in stop&go situations. I noticed once that the engine raced pass 4,000RPM after the car in front swerved into another lane to avoid cars stuck ahead. I had to slam on the brake before it was too late.
Wish list
1. Control rear DVD from the dash. I know it's dangerous to deal with all DVD features while driving, but at least we should be able to turn it on/off - To me occasional flip of a switch is far less distractive than continuous whining from behind: "Daddy, the screen is dark..." (As a side note you CAN change tracks for rear DVD once it's on. This works only, however, when the DVD sound is played through radio speakers.)
2. Memory seat, mirror, pedals and steering wheel positions. This is the only feature we miss from RX330.
3. Auto close of doors when lock from remote. Currently the car gives a long beep but does nothing else if any of the doors is left open, so we have to go back to the car, find out which one is open, and close it before trying to lock it again.
4. Open API (Application Programming Interface) for laser cruise so that capable users can improve the software to be less dangerous. The car's laser sensor seems pretty sharp, and is capable of "seeing" cars hundreds feet away. However the manner cruise control unit manages engine and brake leaves a lot to be desired. Like in "short following" mode it could have cut off gas and braked earlier instead of ignoring it first, then braking fairly hard and beeping for attention. Also it should doublecheck when the car in front moves away, before slamming on gas then braking hard after finding other cars ahead.
5. An under-dash refrig - Even the original Toyota van back in 84 has it, why not in 04 model?
6. Storage for wireless headphones. Without one the headphones get sit or stepped on quite often and it just a matter of time to see them break.
7. Tray table for rear seats - I can play laptop games during long trips (thanks to the 115V outlets) but I have hard time dealing with the mouse.
8. Active suspension - The car's high CG makes it hard to compensate body tilt by anti-roll bars only, and a firmer suspension could compromise ride quality. An active suspension (as implemented in oversea versions of SC400s) could help. It could also ease the plunge during hard brakes.
9. More power - A 4.7L V8 could smoke all 4 tires, and get Toyota the title of the "fastest minivan". (Sigh)But I doubt if this would ever happen, as Toyota has never been the leader in power. Hope Toyota folks rethink after being stung by Nissan all over the places with the 3.5 series.
10. Accept MP3 CDs in CD player. With navigation the in-dash 6-CD changer is squeezed into a single one. Playing MP3 CD would give it roughly 10 hours of content, thus largely avoid the need to swap CDs of 74 min each. Switching CD is inconvenient - need to flip the navigation display down and up. It also calls for more space holding extra CDs.
Final words
All in all we feel the 04 Sienna is just another master piece from Toyota, which delivers reliable, practical and comfortable transportation at a reasonable premium. The AWD Limited has been on hot demand and for months there has been long waiting lists of people willing to shell out close to MSRP. If you can get over the "SUV barrier", be sure to check the 04 Sienna out - You may end up with buying something else, but it's such a strong competitor that no one can afford to ignore.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 43000
Condition: New
Model Year: 2004
Model and Options: XLE Limited AWD w/ pkg #6
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Epinions.com ID:
hh123
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Reviews written: 7
Trusted by: 1 member
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