FAMILY CAR REVIEW: 2018 HOLDEN EQUINOX

There are two cup holders in the front of the Equinox, just in front of the central console storage box. They are a really good size to hold a disposable coffee cup, my Cheeki travel mug also fits in there well, a 600ml water bottle fits in there but rattles around a bit as did the Pigeon baby bottle and my large refillable water bottle wouldn’t fit in there at all.

The cup holder is moulded rubber so things don’t make a noise when they do rattle around and it is a nice surface.

The front door pockets have room for two bottles in them. I could get my large refillable Décor water bottle in there, and either a 600ml disposable water bottle or the Pigeon baby bottle. I could get my wallet in there with my large refillable water bottle, which was the perfect combination for me! They are not big enough to store an iPad in. The door pockets are not lined, so anything in there will rattle.

There are really generous rubber lined wells in the doors! These are the best I have come across, really large, deep and rubber lined! We found them really useful the week that we had the Equinox and put lots of things from our little girl’s hands or the keys etc in them when getting in and out of the car.

The central console storage box lid doubles as the front armrest, it is nice and big and deep, with a rubber base to stop things sliding around. There are no sockets in there, it is purely storage space.

The glove box in the Equinox it does fit my iPad and wallet but there was no manual in there as there would be in reality so it is hard to tell exactly how much space you would have but it is not an enormous glove box.

There is a wireless phone charging pad/area in front of the gear lever. Even without a phone that has wireless charging, this would still be where I’d store my phone as the sockets are all in there too. There are two USB sockets, the AUX and 12V sockets.

There is a lined glasses case in the ceiling. It does feel a little plasticky but definitely does the job. There are lit vanity mirrors in the visors on both sides in the front. The visors seem quite small in the Equinox, and I found they aren’t really deep enough to help with shading from the sun while you are driving.

In the back, there are two cup holders in a fold-down armrest in the central seat. They are positioned a little far back for forward facing children to reach their drinks. The cup holders have a rubber lined, removable well in them, which is really good for holding different size vessels. It has bulbous grips in it to help secure the different size cups and bottles. I found I could fit a lot of different sized things in there. A Pigeon baby bottle and 600ml plastic water bottle fitted in nicely without rattling around. A disposable coffee cup also fitted well. The rubber is removable, so can be washed out after any spills or leaks, which is a great BabyDrive feature.

There are two half map pockets for the second-row passenger storage too. They do hold an iPad and they are solid so you cannot see when the iPad is in there.

The rear door pockets are similar to the fronts in that they will hold two bottles. I could just get my wallet in there with my large refillable Décor water bottle. I could get the Pigeon baby bottle and 600ml plastic water bottle fitted in there nicely together too.

The boot space and its functionality are really important. I like to have a big boot space and little side wells or areas I can divide things into. So something I don’t want to move around while I’m driving such as Tulsi’s lunch bag or her wet swimming gear can be sectioned off in a little well where it’s not going to spill or get squashed by the rest of the things in the boot.

Hooks for securing shopping bags to are also favourites of mine, I like being able to secure the bag containing more fragile things like eggs so they don’t move around on the journey.

I measure the boot space in freezer shopping bags, prams and dogs. Not because I think all there is to a mum’s life is food shopping, prams and dogs. (Although it can feel like it sometimes!!) But because these are visually mesurable items we can all associate with. For me, the car company boot measurement of litres is not an amount I can easily visualise and 400L in one car may differ in usability to that in another due to the configuration or shape of the space.

The boot capacity of the Holden Equinox was surprising. When it is empty I could get 12 shopping bags in there. Or you could put a medium sized dog with a few shopping bags.

With the twin stroller in the boot, I could fit 4 shopping bags alongside it.

With the Mountain Buggy Urban Jungle pram in the boot, I can only get three shopping bags in with it, which is less than the twin stroller. The Mountain Buggy would only fit width ways across the boot, not lengthways, so the space around it is very limited.

The Holiday2 umbrella stroller in the boot I can get 10 shopping bags in there with it. The stroller just fits across the seat backrests, keeping it out of the way and leaving all the boot space around it for shopping bags.

The boot of the Equinox is quite a usable space, there are indented plastic wells behind the wheel arches on either side. They do not dip down, so are not as usable as deep wells are but they are still handy for providing some separation of items that are wet or muddy.

The boot floor is flat and nicely carpeted, perfect for an emergency nappy change!

There is a 12V socket on the right-hand-side and two levers to pull down the second-row seat backs.

There is an indent for a cargo blind on either side of the boot but Holden did not supply the cargo blind so I could not test it. There is also a large space under the boot floor that looks like it is for a spare wheel and cargo blind storage.

I found the height of the boot floor in the Equinox to be easily usable. I didn’t have to lift anything too high to put them in or out or bend down to low. It is a good practical shaped space.

The Equinox has the most AMAZING BabyDrive feature that I wish all car manufacturers would adopt instead of beeps and alarms to alert you potential hazards, the Equinox seat vibrates!! This is the PERFECT way for mums’ cars to be! If you could just flick a switch to turn all noise alerts to vibrations in your seats it would be FANTASTIC!

When I first experienced it I was backing out of my driveway for my first drive of the car and thought wow this is going to be a quiet BabyDrive friendly car… unfortunately not! The Equinox has the potential to be a lovely quiet car! Unfortunately, instead they have mixed this silent technology with some of the shrillest and loudest beeps and alarms I have experienced to date! (More of those to follow!)

Becoming a parent I soon realised there are some noises and sounds I feel are unnecessary and I could happily live without if it meant my baby stayed asleep!!

That often the distraction of my screaming, distressed baby is more dangerous when driving than not having a lane departure warning for example.

If it is the lane departure warning beeping that creates distress with my baby then which is safest?

It’s where I think we need to be able to strike a balance and choose when we can mute the warnings or swap them to a vibration in the steering wheel or flashing light perhaps?

A lot of these noises come with the increase in technology and especially linked to safety features and alerts. For me these all have their place.

Another thing I have realised is I spend my time in a lot more places where small children roam, parks, beaches, play gyms, swimming lessons, daycare centre etc. I have become more aware that when I’m reversing or manouvering in the car parks I have to tripple check for small children running around behind me or being in my blind spot when reversing. For this I LOVE reversing cameras, I just don’t like their beeping sounds!!

I have become so much more aware of safety and potential accidents or hazards since having a child and so I love the peace of mind that I get from the cameras and sensors combined with my own vision from windows and mirrors as I don’t trust cameras alone.

One of these shrill sounds is the rear seat reminder alarm. For some reason, Holden thinks you need to be reminded when you come to a stop to check your rear seat for passengers! The shrill alarm sounds and you get a warning on your digital display too that you need to dismiss using buttons on your steering wheel! It’s all a little too technical for my liking and I think it’s highly unlikely any child in the back seat would be quiet enough after said alarm to not remind you of their presence themselves!! This is the only adjustable sound I could find in the Equinox, you can turn this reminder off in the settings, which for me is a definite!!

However with this turned off there are still plenty of bub disturbing beeps and alarms to be wary of!

The lane departure I found to be silent and just guided the car within the road lines, with no baby disturbing sounds, which was a relief!!

What the Equinox does have is a hazard warning system that detects hazards in front of you and if you don’t brake for it then it interrupts you with a flashing red light on your head-up display and a violent vibration in your seat. So it really alerts you to the hazard quickly and I found this really effective, more so than an alarm as I am never too sure what the alarm is for as there are so many!

The indicator noise in the Equinox is quite crisp and defined but I haven’t found it too loud to disturb my sleeping child. The sound is not adjustable.

The Holden media system's sat-nav voice in the Equinox could be muted easily on the screen by simply pressing the volume icon on the map screen. It is however very loud when it is on and I couldn’t find a volume control for it, just the option for on or off.

I found Holden's sat-nav system very easy to use, I wasn’t clicking through lots of screens it was very straightforward.

I found it easy to connect my phone to the Equinox. I already had my nursery rhymes playing on my phone and when I plugged in the USB they played out of the car's speakers quite quickly. I find this helps with keeping bub from screaming in the car!! That initial time was really easy and then every time after when I plugged my phone it would just resume playing where they left off, which was fabulous and made it really simple for me!

The Equinox does have Apple Car Paly and Android Auto, which make everything easier I find, as I do not have to learn another system each time I drive a different car. The Holden uses MyLink in its media system, which I actually found really simple, and easy to navigate, the home page only has six icons that are very easy to work out and use.

The doors and windows are not particularly noisy on the Equinox, the window motor does have quite a distinct sound but I don’t think it is anything that would wake bub.

The doors are quite heavy and loud to close so you just need to be gentle when closing them so as not to disturb bub sleeping.

The Equinox also has Auto Engine cut out, with no button to turn it off! NO! It is the first car I have come across this in. I don’t like not being able to turn it off. I find it really disturbs a sleeping bub when the vibration of the car stops or changes and I know it was always a discussion at mum group when Tulsi was a baby how much mums dreaded even stopping at lights let alone the engine turning off and on again!

The seatbelt removal alarms in the Equinox leave you no choice but to plug them in as soon as possible just to silence the horrendous sound! It so shrill and loud!

If you start the car without your seatbelt done up, the shrill alarm noise is deafening and really disturbs all passengers not just the bubs. It is a dreadful sound to have within a car.  When there is such a good vibration method to alert you to hazards I have no idea why Holden have gone to the complete other extreme with this ear-splitting sound?! I actually wonder if it could damage your hearing or especially in infants! There is also a lit digital display in front of you to let you know which rear seatbelts are done up.

When you come to a stop and turn the engine off the car again beeps a really shrill sound to alert you to check/remember your rear passengers, to remind you to take your keys, it really seemed to want to unnecessarily remind you about everything at the top of its shrill, beeping voice! This is a terrible BabyDrive feature and perhaps the worst car I have driven for noise.

Another thing with the Equinox is the door locks. I seemed to have to press the unlock button on the key fob endless times to unlock the car doors!? I found on numerous occasions that I would go to the car with my arms full of child and bags etc. Press the unlock button, put the key away and when I went to the open a door it would be locked? I would then have to scrabble around for the keys again and keep pressing the unlock button until eventually, they all unlocked. By the end of the week, I was just pressing the unlock button about 5/6 times when going to the car to ensure it was actually unlocked!

I did use the kick boot when I had arms full of shopping one Saturday morning. With the key in my pocket and a few swings of my leg under the back bumper, the boot lid did open! Surprisingly the boot warning beep is actually pretty quiet, which made a refreshing change!! The sound does come out of the speaker in the rear side door through which would really disturb a child asleep in the back seat as the speaker is next to them!

There are controls to lock and unlock the doors and windows from the driver's door control panel and you can lock the doors from the front passenger door too.

The road and engine noise are very good; there is very little road or engine noise at all.

Another noise that drove me mad in the Equinox was the air-conditioning. It is the loudest blowing fan. It seems to react really slowly to adjustments and you either have it on full blast where it is so loud you can’t hear anything else, or as you turn it down you think it is not reacting because the fan is still blowing so loudly. I think it is just very slow to respond and you find yourself boiling hot and the fan has stopped! I couldn’t work it out over the week we had it or get used to it. It seemed an all or nothing system in terms of flow and noise!

The Equinox is a five-seater. It has top tether for all three of the back seats and ISO Fix for the two outer seats.

I could only fit two child seats into the outer second-row seats. There just wasn’t enough space to fit a third child seat.

I fitted a rear-facing Mountain Buggy Infant Protect capsule and forward facing Infasecure Kompressor 4 child seat but there just wasn’t room in the middle for the booster seat.

Fitting the child seats was relatively simple. The ISO Fix bars stick out nicely so they are easy to locate and connect the ISOFix to. The top tether anchor points are situated in the back of the seat backrests and were easy to attach to. I found those easiest to access through the boot and not too difficult to reach.

The ceiling in the Equinox was nice and high so posting bub into their seat from inside the car was fine. From outside the car, it was good too. The door openings are nice and wide making posting baby in was easy.

Australia being a country of weather extremes- blazing sun and torrential rain, mean you may find it easier to put Bub into their seat from inside the car sometimes. If it’s hot you can get the air-con going, cool the car down and not stand out in the sun while you fasten them in or shelter from the rain and not get soaked yourself whilst you’re doing it. So it is important to test whether Bub can be easily installed from either direction!

With only one child seat installed, there is plenty of room to feed bub in the back. There is also quite a bit of room in the front and legroom in the back to recline your chair to feed bub in the front.

With a rear-facing child seat installed behind the driver's seat, there was plenty of legroom for a 6ft driver to sit in front.

The seats in the front and back of the Equinox were perforated black leather. The leather would make them easy to wipe down but the perforations make them incredibly difficult to keep clean as crumbs, sand and child spills get into the perforations and are difficult to get out.

The back seats are split 60:40. They can be reclined slightly and there are levers in the boot wall to fold the second-row seats flat to give you an enormous back boot if you need to move large furniture for example or bring something home from IKEA!!

The front seats in the Equinox are really comfy and the driver's seat has electrical adjustments whereas the passenger seat has manual adjustment levers. It is still very comfortable.

I could also wear a ponytail in the driver's seat, which was great and in the back, the headrests do a twist motion when you press a button in them which meant I could also wear a ponytail with the back ones too!

I had spent hours styling my hair this morning to get it just right too… said no new mum ever!!!

The steering wheel is fully adjustable in/out and up/down. The buttons and controls on the steering wheel were a kind of moulded rubber, which I never felt confident I had pressed the button fully.

The cruise control in the Equinox was not good. Using the steering wheel controls to set it was simple enough but it really didn’t stick to the set speed and would just race off and I would find myself doing up to 12km over the limit before it would start to brake, especially on undulating roads.

There are four air conditioning vents in the front dashboard; two in the centre and one at either end. The controls are easy to use; they are centrally located on the dashboard. In the back there are two air vents in the back of the central console box, which are good because you can reach them from the driver's seat. It is really handy to adjust it while driving if the rear passengers are uncomfortable and too young to do it themselves.

Visibility is good in the Equinox, the windows are nice and large allowing a good view out and lots of light in. The rear side windows do slope up slightly towards the back that would reduce visibility for rear-facing passengers. But for children who are forward-facing, the view out would be very good.

The windows are tinted but the sun still comes in quite strongly, I didn't add shades to the windows but you may need to with a tiny infant in the back.

There are lit vanity mirrors on both sides in the front and press on ceiling lights. The rear lights are above the doors in the back which is good for when you are putting bub in and out of their seat however you can’t reach them from the driver's seat.

I often will reach back to turn on the interior light if I am driving at night time, I find my little girl gets less distressed traveling at night that way. It helps if I can reach the interior light from the drivers seat so I can turn it on and off whilst driving. I often find my daughter will need it on as we start our journey in the dark but once she falls asleep I can turn it off. It is also useful when there are lights situated above the doors where the handles are usually positioned. These are good for when putting baby into their child seats when visibility is poor, so you do not have to reach across them to a light situated in the ceiling centrally etc.

I found the Equinox good to drive. It is simple and you don’t have to think too hard while driving it. You do have to remember to select all-wheel drive mode (AWD) each trip as it is not automatically in AWD and it needs in in the wet or on gravel roads.

The Equinox feels like it is designed to be safe, stable and predictable to drive rather than fun or entertaining. So in this sense, it is a very good BabyDrive.

It's a very fast and powerful car and on occasions where I had some wheel spin out of a junction it handled it brilliantly and kept stable and moving forward. On motorways there is a bit of noise and it seemed to cope with big bumps much better than smaller ones and it seemed to be generally busy coping with smaller bumps and uneven road surfaces and it has a slightly hard ride. You can feel the smaller bumps and road surfaces and the younger passengers feel that too.

Around town, it was great in terms of manoeuvrability and it didn’t feel big. Especially when parking the visibility is really good and you can see well out of the side windows too even with rear-facing child seats installed.

The rear-parking camera has a really nice clear image, which I found really useful when parking. Instead of shrill beeps when parking, the sensors use the vibration in your seat to alert you to hazards, which was great. The seat vibration is also used for cross traffic alert and a flashing light in your head-up display also.

There are handles above both back doors, which are well positioned for hanging children’s toys from.

Aesthetically from the outside, the Equinox looks very American but inside it feels like a Holden. It's very practical and user-friendly with a combination of textures that would wipe clean well enough. Some of the door plastics mark quite easily.

There are carpet floor mats throughout the Equinox. In the rear, there is one long mat that goes all the way across as there is no lump in the central floor.

In the back of the central storage box in the second row, there is a 240V plug socket, 2 USB sockets and a 12V socket. There are also the controls for heated seats! You can choose to heat the seat backs, the seat bases or both!!

The Equinox has a powered tailgate, with its own unique beeping noise! It is not as loud as the rest of the beeps and alarms inside the car but it is still annoying and the beep comes out of the rear door speaker which means it would be especially disturbing for a baby asleep in the back seat.

The Holden Equinox scored five star ANCAP safety rating, scoring 34.21 out of 37 points overall. It scored 14.21 out of 16 for the frontal offset test, 15/16 for side impact test and 2/2 in the pole test.

The Holden Equinox comes with six airbags as standard, dual frontal and side airbags in the front, and curtain airbags covering the front and second row passengers.

As standard the Equinox comes with anti lock breaks (ABS), automatic headlights, electronic break force distribution (EBD), electronic stability control (ESC), emergency break assist (EBA), emergency stop signal (ESS), daytime running lights (DRL), hill launch assist and reversing collision avoidance.

Some of these safety features are also features that drive me crazy as a mum! Like the lane departure and forward collision alert or the parking sensor beeping sound.

I want all the safety technology AND to be able to mute the sound when Tulsi’s asleep!