Having just returned from our summer hols Mrs B and I have been giving some thought to purchasing a camper van at some point in the not too distant future.

I've been having a look at a few VW T4 types, most of which are 2 berth.
Is it possible to fit a car seat into them (i'm assuming it would have to be either in the front with the Mrs B sat in the back, or in the back attached to the folded up bed if seat belts are present.)

The nipper (17months old) might not be too happy sat all the way back there.

Anyone here have such a van and offspring which have to travel in the back? What are your solutions?

Also, whats the best option – 2nd hand uncoverted van or 2nd hand camper / converted van.

Ta in advance.

We have two kids now (3.5 yrs and 3wks)

We have a rock and roll bed with a lap belt on the inboard side and a properly installed pillar 3 point belt on the sliding door pillar. We specifically chose a car seat that would work with a lap belt so that we could put the rock and roll seat anywhere we wanted in the van fore and aft. Now Jr has been promoted to a booster+ kind of seat he has to use the three point so we are forced to keep the rock and roll seat in line with the door pillar – no real problem with it.

Baby goes in a rear facing baby car box. This is supposed to be used with a three point harness too but (and flame me if you like) I have found (and thoroughly tested) that it works fine and securely with the lap belt on its own if done up properly.

The alternative is to put baby in the front and Mrs S in the back seat in the lap belt.

We prefer to keep the kids in the back as it makes it easier for Mrs S to feed them/pick up their dropped toys/check on them when asleep etc when we are on the autoroutes of france without having to stop all the time.
HTH

Cheers Stoner.

Ours is a t4 camper Holdsworth xl
In the back it has proper 3 point seat belts so ok for child seats

My advice would be get a tdi if you can afford it as we have a 2.4d and its still slow (proper converted campers are bloody heavy)

other than that look for others types of campers as T4's are not as reliable as the VW followers would have you belive.

ps we are selling ours and prob going to get a toyota Hiace and convert it ourselves

I've got a T3 with a proper westfalia rock and roll bed, two 3 point belts and a lap belt in the middle, kids go in the back with the 3 point belts and mrs MikeG sits in the back with them playing until they fall asleep, then she can escape to the front.
If you can afford it I'd go for a proper conversion rather than a homemade one have a look on the T4 section of the brickyard for as much advise as you need.

Okay, next question.

On the basis that the vast majority of T4s are two berth campers where do you stick your kids for the night?

Stoner – what do you do with yours with that age split?

Cheers

Though I'm a T3 driver me'self, some T4's have a drivers seat and a bench seat up front (3 i the front) which would solve your car seat woes I would think. If yours doe not have this it is easy to source one and make it fit. This does ruin the rotating captains seat thing, although i did see a weird back tipping system where you could flip the back of the seat to make a rear facing bench for when you're in the back?

Kids normally sleep outside in the awning (big tent with van sized gap) or in a high top (the big plastic ice cream van type lids, most commonly seen on T3's) Or, with a bench seat up front it is easy to put a kiddy across the front seats, or make a hammock above the seats (not sure how this works but i've seen it done a few times?)

Also, if you make your own camper rather than buying one you could change the seating arrangement to accommodate unto 4 people (snuggly), Well you can in a T3, which is a little bigger than a T4 IIRC but principle should be the same.

We have a T5, but issues are similar. I put a proper RIBA bed/seat in the back – it's a 2 seater with 3 point belts. At the moment the baby goes in the front with us (2 seater passenger bench seat), in a rear facing baby seat. I'm aware this isn't recommended because of airbags, but the seat is on the drivers side of the bench seat, where there isn't an airbag. I've also put in a rear facing crew seat, behind the drivers seat, with a 3 point belt, so all three kids could (and soon will) sit in the back. Mum just likes to have the baby close to hand at the moment.

As meehaja says, a lot of T4's have three front seats, but I'm not sure about air bags.

Sleeping: we've put in an elevating roof, with double bed (giving two double beds with seat bed). Done by Vamoose
There's a guy in the NE does similar for nearly half the price (on T4's)
Alternatively, you can set up a 'bunk' across the front seats.

You can find links and pics on the T4 forum

When it was one kid, Mrs S and I slept upstairs and Jr slept crossways behind the rock and roll seat on the padded boards.

Now there's two, they both go upstairs and we are downstairs on the rock and roll bed. Littlest goes in a travel cot in the upstairs and biggest has a sleeping bag.

Boxelder, thats a tad dodgy! Every van I've seen with a passenger airbag, the airbag is double sized and designed to protect both front seat passengers. It may be in front of the left hand passenger but it is almost certainly rectangular shaped to cover the centre passenger.

Get the airbag deactivated whilst using the baby seat, normally it can be unplugged and a resistor module plugged in its place to fool the system into thinking the bag is connected. If you just unplug it, the fault light will probably come on and the whole system will be deactivated, all airbags and seat belt pre-tensioners won't work, so not ideal.

Thanks all.

Been scouring the 'tinterweb for vans.

What are the your thoughts on this one:

http://www.vwcampercrazy.co.uk/search_detail.asp?AccountID=9156&AdvertID=3659

The Vamoose roof is drawing me too it but is it a little pricey?

Ta in advance.