Car seats for classic cars

hngrymummy

I saw an advert in a car mag that went something like this:
'Wife says that we can't keep the car now that we have a baby. Therefore - FOR SALE baby. One careful owner'

escortg3

I can remember car seats that didnt use seat belts they used to have anchor straps that went through bottom of back seats and bolted in the boot, this is great because you could permanently fix car seat in middle of rear seat. child had better view and you could get a passenger both sides in back.

vaio

Steel wrote: »

Our late 1950s fibreglass sportscar didn't have seatbelts originally. Neither did it have mirrors or a windscreen although I insisted on all three being on the car before I would go out in it.

Interestingly though, we found a major safety issue that I wonder whether most people with classic fibreglass cars would even think to look for.

The original design of the car meant the seats were bolted to the fibreglass bodyshell and the load spread by penny washers. If we had an accident, our weight thrown forward in the seats could have ripped the bolts out of the fibreglass and potentially thrown us out of the car.

We had to weld to strengthening pieces to the chassis for the seats to properly bolt into.

Now I say to anyone with a classic car, if its fibreglass (not sure if OPs is) check how the seats are bolted down otherwise the job of the seat belts and baby car seats could be compromised in an accident.

Seats or seat belts?

I can see that you need really secure attachment points for belts as they dissipate all the forces in an accident but once the belts are doing their job you are essentially no longer in contact with the seat so as long as what the manufacturer installed originally for the seats is in good nick I wouldn’t worry.

Obviously it’s a different story in the unlikely event that the belts are anchored on the seat rather than the car