Advice needed - baby car seat questions (merged)

beefcarrot

You could also try the Britax Fit Finder on their website.

Link here

meeps

I bought a britax evolva isofix for my car online after doing the fit finder, and having chosen a car with isofix with the next stage car seat in mind, so was quite annoyed yesterday when after 40 minutes with 2 assistants at halfords they declared it unsafe in my fiat grande punto as the buckle was flush against the metal isofix bar. I got a refund and am now looking into what seat to get instead, a friend has shown me her son's maxi cosy rodi xr as it has good reviews and which report. It has a little strap at the top back that holds it to the headrest so the seat won't be moving about when its empty.

deanos

Dont understand how the metal can be against the isofix bar ?

flea72

meeps wrote: »

I bought a britax evolva isofix for my car online after doing the fit finder, and having chosen a car with isofix with the next stage car seat in mind, so was quite annoyed yesterday when after 40 minutes with 2 assistants at halfords they declared it unsafe in my fiat grande punto as the buckle was flush against the metal isofix bar. I got a refund and am now looking into what seat to get instead, a friend has shown me her son's maxi cosy rodi xr as it has good reviews and which report. It has a little strap at the top back that holds it to the headrest so the seat won't be moving about when its empty.

i thought isofix meant you dont have to worry about buckle crunch, as the seat isnt fixed using a seat belt, it locks onto the fixed mounting points in the car?

flea

meeps

sorry not sure how best to explain it, the car seat has 2 metal rods with red clips on, that attatch to the isofix points in the car, the back passenger side seatbelts are almost flush into the seat rather than the usual couple of inches of strap, so there isn't any give, and when the girl did the belt up the plastic side of the buckle was against the metal bar- she said in training they had been told that wasn't safe as an impact could cause the clip to shatter, and the child would not be safe as the belt is what is holding them in.

hope that makes a wee bit of sense!

deanos

I dont think buckle crunch would matter in that situation as the isofix points are keeping the seat in place,in a stage one seat it would as you have to pull the belt really tight, and this is how buckle crunch occurs

Have a word with Britax on monday, they will definately tell you right, if its on the fitting database it would have been tested by Britax in that particular car

I wouldnt trust the monkeys in Halfrauds as far as i could throw them after they sold me a incorectly fitting car seat :mad:

Do you have another shop you can take it into

meeps

errm, let me try again, if you can see this picture...

http://www.askaprice.com/images/news/inhouse/559-03.jpg

the seat belt clip ended up tight against the metal attatchment arm, and there was no way of changing that as the isofix point is fixed and so is the buckle. I guess thats like buckle crunch but with the added problem of the child not being harnessed seperately.

I wouldn't go back to halfords as they didn't seem to have much of a clue, but I agreed the seat didn't seem to fit and so got a refund and left it with them. We have an 'In Car Safety Centre' somewhere which I will find and talk to them about it.

flea72

meeps wrote: »

errm, let me try again, if you can see this picture...

http://www.askaprice.com/images/news/inhouse/559-03.jpg

the seat belt clip ended up tight against the metal attatchment arm, and there was no way of changing that as the isofix point is fixed and so is the buckle. I guess thats like buckle crunch but with the added problem of the child not being harnessed seperately.

I wouldn't go back to halfords as they didn't seem to have much of a clue, but I agreed the seat didn't seem to fit and so got a refund and left it with them. We have an 'In Car Safety Centre' somewhere which I will find and talk to them about it.

oh, so the child is still restrained by the normal seat belt, and only the chair is held isofix? i think you will find you that due to the width of all these style of car seats, then you will have the buckle in tight at such an angle that its hard to do up properly, without undue stress on the buckle. there are some seats high backed booster style seats that have an integral 5 point harness, which would alleviate this problem, but i cant think of them off the top of my head, will have a trawl.

flea

deanos

We have the Evolva 23 Isofix and it fits in no problem, its a Vectra so will be wider inside compared to a Punto, i guess the Isofix in that is only suitable for a stage 1 seat.

Slowlygettingthere_3

I keep a forward facing car seat (purchased last month) in my car for my Nephew, it gets used maybe 2 to 3 times a week. I have an old car which gets very cold during winter evenings.

The car seat was used tonight and for the first time the buckle wouldn't just click into place, the only way to fasten the buckle was to pull the release button right down and then put the clips into the buckle lock (I'm probably not explaining this clearly).

Does anyone have any ideas as to whether this could be caused by the weather and how I would go about fixing it.