There is no safety difference between harnessing older kids, 4 and up, and using high back boosters. This is one reason why we recommend not using harnesses eats forward facing in Sweden. We actually feel it's safer with high back boosters.
The situation outside Sweden, like in UK, is more complicated since rear facing to age 4 is a new thing. For most, rear facing past 12 months is not common. There is therefore a problem with those kids who are relatively young but weight more than 18 kg (40 lbs). Using a high back booster for a 2.5 year old is not a good thing since it's tough to get a nice belt fit and maturity is also an issue.
Introducing a couple of harnessed seats with higher weight limit might be a good idea but IMHO there is also a danger in having too much selection. Parents are very confused in general about choosing car seats, an almost limitless selection like in some countries is not a good thing.:twocents:
Two-Way is a good and very strong combination seat with taller seat shell than a regular seat. It's light weight and doesn't need much room rear facing and of course little room forward facing. The sets fits very well in standard cars such as a VW Golf. The seat shell allow most "normal" children to sit rear facing/forward facing to 125 cm or longer (49 inches).
There is also a special needs seat from Britax but it's a real beast. Very heavy and expensive. Very few of these are sold.
If you or your friend has any questions please feel free to ask here or email
hakan@carseat.se
