2012 Dodge Grand Caravan: What's New

Vehicle Overview

Dodge overhauled its Grand Caravan minivan last year, giving it a vastly nicer interior, improvements to its Stow ‘n Go seating and a new V-6 engine. With room for seven in three rows of seats, the Grand Caravan competes against the Honda Odyssey and Toyota Sienna, and it’s related to the Chrysler Town & Country.

New for 2012
The Grand Caravan gets a price drop for the 2012 model year with the introduction of an American Value Package model that starts at $3,000 less than last year’s base passenger van. Sapphire Blue interior lighting is also new.

Exterior
You have to hand it to Dodge for making a minivan look aggressive. The 2012 Grand Caravan features Dodge’s trademark crosshair grille, and the minivan’s face gives it quite a bit of road presence. The Grand Caravan R/T sports a unique monochromatic exterior with its own 17-inch aluminum wheels. Other exterior features include:

• Standard 16-inch steel wheels with covers; 16- or 17-inch aluminum rims optional
• Standard dual manual-sliding side doors; power-sliding doors optional
• Standard heated side mirrors
• Optional fog lights
• Optional power liftgate
• Optional rain-sensing windshield wipers

Interior
The Grand Caravan’s dashboard wouldn’t be out of place in a luxury car. It features premium, low-gloss materials and mostly good fit-and-finish. Apart from a few things, like the airplane-style map lights that Dodge insists on using, the Grand Caravan has a top-rate minivan interior.

The standard Stow ‘n Go second-row bucket seats have a one-touch folding feature. Lift a lever, and the seat articulates forward and into a bin in the floor. You do have to move the front seats forward quite a bit to give the middle seats the clearance to tumble into the floor, but when you do, the one-touch lever makes the operation simple. R/T minivans have black leather seats with red stitching. Other interior features include:

• Standard cloth upholstery; leather optional
• Standard dual-zone manual air conditioning; tri-zone automatic air conditioning optional
• Standard cruise control
• Standard CD stereo with MP3 jack
• Standard tilt/telescoping steering wheel with audio controls
• Standard 60/40-split folding third row with tailgate-seating mode
• Optional heated front seats and steering wheel
• Optional heated second-row seats
• Optional remote start
• Optional second-row power windows
• Optional second- and third-row retractable sunshades
• Optional touch-screen navigation system
• Optional backseat entertainment system with 9-inch screen

Under the Hood
All trim levels of the 2012 Grand Caravan are powered by a 283-horsepower, 3.6-liter V-6 that teams with a six-speed automatic transmission. Mechanical features include: 

• Runs on regular gas
• Front-wheel drive
• Sport suspension on R/T models

Safety
Safety features include:

• Standard all-disc antilock brakes
• Standard electronic stability system
• Standard side-impact airbags for the front seats
• Standard side curtain airbags for all three rows
• Standard active front head restraints
• Optional power-adjustable pedals
• Optional blind spot monitoring system
• Optional rear cross path detection system
• Optional rear parking sensors
• Optional backup camera