2010 Subaru Forester and RFing seats

judahs_dad

New member
After a vehicle breakdown yesterday one hour into a 2000 mile round trip vacation drive, we've borrowed my parents 2010 Subaru Forester for our trip.

I was able to get our CCO RFing in the center with the swedish install (i think that's what it's called, with the shoulder belt routed behind the CCO). it's solid, compresses where it should, less than 1 inch laterally and foward/back at belt path.

DS1 (5.5 yo, 47#) will ride FFing in an Radian XTSL, driver's side.

I'd like to get my sub-30# 2.5 yo RFing in our other XTSL passenger side; it fits, but is maybe 1-2 mm away from touching the front seat. My question is: can the radian touch the front seat at all? If it can, can it brace?

If it can't touch, would you FF the 2.5 yo (with safe stop, obviously) for a 2-week, 2000 mile drive, or would you move the front seat so far forward as to be not very comfortable for my poor wife?

My only other option would be an FPSV, but I doubt that'll fit width-wise and because of the seat bolstering.

Many many thanks!
 
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jjordan

Moderator
The Radian is allowed to touch/brace against the front seat, but only if the car allows touching/bracing as well. You'll want to check the car manual to see what it says. The problem with bracing in some cars is that it can interfere with advanced airbag sensors, so check the airbag section first to see if it says anything about things touching the backs of the front seat.

Sometimes cars have different airbag sensors in the driver's seat, so it might be okay for the radian to touch the back of the driver's seat but not the passenger's seat. If that is the case, you might switch the FF and RF radians.

You might also consider putting seats in as the FF radian behind the driver, RF radian in the middle, and RF FPSVD behind the passenger. That would be a very narrow 3 across, and the RF radian and RF FPSVD puzzle very well together. This might help *if* the RF radian in the center sticks up between the seats rather than hitting both of the front seats. :)
 

KaiLing

New member
The place to look for information on bracing is in the Forester's manual's section on airbags. It's confusing (at least to me), but there should be a section that explains how the passenger side airbag is getting information from the computer. It most likely says something like "do not hang bags from the seat" and "do not rest feet on the seat" so that you don't trick the computer into thinking there's a heavier person in the front seat than there really is. As a rule of thumb (though the manual is the place to look), if there is a light in the car that comes on that says "passenger airbag off" then bracing against the passenger seat isn't recommended or allowed because we don't want to confuse the computer that is deploying the passenger side airbags.

The driver's seat is different, because there's always a driver, so there isn't the same kind of sensor telling the computer if and how heavy the driver is. Some cars allow it and some don't. If bracing is allowed at all, I'd guess it's allowed there. There should be a similar section in the manual about the driver's seat.
 

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