Help selecting multiple car seats for multiple cars!

My daughter just turned 2 a few weeks ago. She is 21 lbs and 32 inches tall. She has been riding in the Safety 1st Air Protect 35 for this whole time. But she has reached the height limit (32 inches) and it is time to switch to convertible car seat!

I want to keep her rear-facing for the next few years.

My vehicle is a 2003 Toyota Corolla S. I will not need to take the car seat out possibly ever so ease of install does not really matter. I am leaning towards the Diono Radian RXT. I would like to install in the center. Only issue I see is that sometimes on weekends my husband drives this car and he does need to push the driver seat all the way back. But the angle adjuster could help with this correct? I am very small and drive with the driver's seat all the way forward.

My husband's vehicle is a (4 door) 2007 BMW 328i. Pretty sure the car seat would have to install on the passenger side here as my husband needs to push his seat all the way back to drive. Of course I would prefer her to ride in the middle if possible. Are there any car seats where this is possible with a pushed back driver seat?? He may need to occasionally (couple times a month?) take the seat out to fit more passengers. But he is good at installing so that is not a huge issue. He hates bulky seats and is leaning towards the Safety 1st seats. His car feels smaller than mine and I don't think it could handle the Radian, especially with his seat back.

My in-laws take care of my daughter several times a week and they have 2 vehicles. One is a mid-90s cargo van (sorry I don't know the make & model.. Astrovan?) and the other is a 1992 Toyota Corolla. I don't really want to drop $1,000 on 4 car seats so I would like to have one that is VERY EASY TO INSTALL for them to be able to switch between cars a few times a week when needed. Grandma needs to be able to put the seat in with a simple belt install like she does with our current seat. We bought them a base for my daughter's current car seat but they don't like messing with it. So we need a car seat with a VERY simple rear-facing belt install. For this car seat it is also very important that my daughter has alot of leg room rear-facing. My in-laws do not quite understand the extended rear-facing thing and are more likely to try and turn her around if they think she looks uncomfortable. I suppose I could buy 1 seat for each of their cars if they were under $200 each but I tend to not trust those seats especially brands like Chicco / Evenflo. They just don't look good quality to me.

Any help appreciated! I only recently realized that these type of car seats really STAY IN the vehicle and that we need 1 for each car! We play musical cars WAY too much to be able to switch 1 or even 2 seats around..

Thanks!

Forgot to mention that even if we bought a seat for each of my in-laws vehicles they would still need to be very very easy to install.. they frequently haul things around – cans for recycling, food for catering, etc. in each car and would need to be able to take the car seat out and put it back in several times a month.

Hi and welcome!

For convertibles that tend to take up less room rear-facing (generally speaking; it can vary from vehicle-to-vehicle), this blog post has some good comparisons: http://carseatblog.com/22818/the-ul...ertible-space-comparison-review-size-matters/

All seats that are on the market have passed the tests require by federal law, so I wouldn't necessarily rule out any manufacturer (for instance, the Chicco NextFit is known as being a nice, comfy seat and many people here love Chicco's infant seat and Evenflo's seats are often recommended here, as well). Of course, I totally understand if you aren't a fan of a particular brand or seat, but I just didn't want you to wind up excluding a seat that might be good for your situation.

I'm not sure of a seat that's easy to install with a lot of leg room, but I wanted to give your thread a bump and give you the link to the blog post.

Britax convertibles aren't cheap but I've heard they are very easy to install and use. Unfortunately, they do not have a lot of leg room. They should fit your daughter for a long time as she just outgrew her infant seat but if grandparents won't use it rf there's not much point in getting one. Evenflo has something called "surelatch" on some of their seats that is supposed to make installing very, very easy. I don't have latch in my car so have no idea what its like firsthand but it sounds like it would be good to look into.

I think you will like the radian in the corolla. I used to drive an '03 corolla (it was an LE) and have had quite a few radians.
In the center, you will find that you don't even need the angle adjuster as the top of the radian kinda fits in between the front seats nicely, even all the way back. With that year of Corolla you don't have to worry about the radian touching the front seats or headrests. (Newer corolla models have advanced airbags in the front vehicle seats and don't allow car seats to touch them.)

Sorry, I don't know much about the other vehicles / easy-to-install seats.

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babyherder said:

Britax convertibles aren't cheap but I've heard they are very easy to install and use. Unfortunately, they do not have a lot of leg room. They should fit your daughter for a long time as she just outgrew her infant seat but if grandparents won't use it rf there's not much point in getting one. Evenflo has something called "surelatch" on some of their seats that is supposed to make installing very, very easy. I don't have latch in my car so have no idea what its like firsthand but it sounds like it would be good to look into.

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The grandparents cars are too old to have latch, as I understand it. So the surelatch feature won't help there.
In my opinion, a radian is just as easy to do a rf seatbelt installation as a Britax convertible (although to don't have experience with the newest Britax models.) maybe the Radian is even easier as you don't have to fuss around with the fabric cover.
But I wouldn't call either one "easy" or especially convenient.

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The Nextfit seatbelt installation is stupid easy and very fast -- provided the person installing has the strength to pull the belt tight enough for a secure install, but I think this must be the case with every seatbelt install. It is one of five convertibles we own and I think it's a phenomenal seat! My 2yo has tons of room in every dimension. Since your kid is older you can use one of the more upright angles to get a safe install that doesn't take up too much room. I think it would work nicely for the grandparents car if they're strong enough to move it from one car to the other and pull the belt tight, but again, these constraints are probably present with any seat that will allow ERF with lots of room and has built-in lock offs.