Light, easy to carry Group 1 seat in France or UK

TheirMom

New member
We will be in France throughout the fall and will need to purchase a group 1 seat for our baby (or maybe a 0+/1?). He will be 15 months old when we arrive. I estimate that he'll be about 22.5 lbs (~10 kg) and 33 inches (~83 cm) at that point. We will not have a car, so this will be for use when we are traveling and renting a car. This seat will thus be carted through lots of airports and train stations, so I'd really prefer one that doesn't weigh a lot! Our U.S. car seat for him is a Chicco NextFit, which I really like, but it is ridiculously heavy. I'd also prefer not to spend too much, because he will not be using this seat very much or for very long. We can purchase one in France or in the UK (we go to the UK for a week 2 days after we arrive in France). I'm just at a loss looking through all the sites! We will be signing up for Amazon.fr's version of Prime, so we could have something shipped to our apartment and waiting for us (we hope, apparently the doorman will still be on his vacances when we arrive).

It's all very confusing to me! I'm used to being told that 5-point harness is the safest, yet I keep seeing all of these 3-point harness car seats in Europe! There are forward facing seats for 1-year olds! Do I need a group 0+/1 seat instead of a group 1?

Thanks for your guidance!
 
ADS

Adventuredad

New member
99% or Americans turn their kids FF at 12-15 months and so do unfortunately many in Europe. Habits are by far the the best in the north, Sweden, and get worse the further south you go. Just like in US.

The only country in Europe which doesn't sell forward facing seats for young kids is Sweden. You can't find a FF seat for a 2 year old even if you try. This is exactly the way things should be.

We would normally never recommend an infant seat for a 15 month old child. It's not nearly as safe as a rear facing seat and it's also not fun for a 15 month old to sit at such a high angle.

In your case it might actually be a good idea since infant seats are light, cheap and easy to bring along. Since you won't be using it much perhaps it will be ok for your child.

Some of the most popular infants seats by Maxi Cosi are three point. There is no difference in safety. Maxi Cosi Citi is a popular choice weighing in under 3 kg. You will find a large selection of rear facing seats, many with 55 lbs wight limit, but it sounds like this is overkill in your situation. These seats are also more expensive and not as easy to bring along.
 

bbartlettnfld

New member
I was living overseas when my son was born and really got great use out of the Maxi Cosi Cabrio Fix, He was able to use it until he was 18 months and almost 30lbs Cabrio has a 13kg weight limit, so about 28lbs. (he was a very solid chunky baby.. and Still is, years later!) The seat is quite light weight and very easy to click into any stroller that has Maxi Cosi adaptors. I used it with a Bugaboo bee, bugaboo cameleon, Quinny Buzz, Quinny ZAPP and Cybex Callisto. It was a 3 pt harness but gave a wonderful harness fit!
 

SafeDad

CPSDarren - Admin
Staff member
99% or Americans turn their kids FF at 12-15 months and so do unfortunately many in Europe. Habits are by far the the best in the north, Sweden, and get worse the further south you go. Just like in US.

Certainly RF beyond a year is not as common in the USA as we'd like, but it is increasing based on pediatric recommendations to keep kids rear-facing until 2 years old. Can we please have a link to your statistics for RF usage by country, please?

We would normally never recommend an infant seat for a 15 month old child. It's not nearly as safe as a rear facing seat and it's also not fun for a 15 month old to sit at such a high angle.

This is a bold and potentially very misleading claim. Do you have a published study or any evidence for this pertaining to France or the UK or anywhere? For many parents, an infant carrier becomes too heavy to carry beyond 12-15 months. Along with weight and height limits, that is the main limiting factor. I am not sure about France or the UK, but a few models in the USA do offer increased weight and height limits to fit kids beyond that mark, but the carrier would more typically be left in the car full time for larger babies.
 

finn

New member
If you don't want an infant seat the Britax First Class plus rf to 13kg and isn't stupidly heavy.

We had a cabrio fix, which we loved, my 90th% for height daughter outgrew it at about 14 months.
 

TheirMom

New member
I like the idea of the Cabriofix, but I'm sure my son is too tall for it (he's around the 96th percentile for height). He could still fit in his infant seat if things only went by weight!

Along with the Britax, I've found a few others that are rearfacing:
Cam Gara 0.1
Graco Junior Mini
Fisher-Price Safe Voyage
Bebe Confort Iseos Neo
Bebehut Deluxe

The Bebehut is certainly the cheapest by far, and one of the lightest (7 kg). It doesn't look cheap---is it an OK seat?

I also like the looks of the Cam Gara a lot. It's very light, only 5.4 kg!
 

_juune

New member
I like the idea of the Cabriofix, but I'm sure my son is too tall for it (he's around the 96th percentile for height). He could still fit in his infant seat if things only went by weight!

Along with the Britax, I've found a few others that are rearfacing:
Cam Gara 0.1
Graco Junior Mini
Fisher-Price Safe Voyage
Bebe Confort Iseos Neo
Bebehut Deluxe

The Bebehut is certainly the cheapest by far, and one of the lightest (7 kg). It doesn't look cheap---is it an OK seat?

I also like the looks of the Cam Gara a lot. It's very light, only 5.4 kg!

I'm not sure it's much help but here's a link to a gallery of pics of a boy between ages 1 and 2 and a lot of infant seats; some appear to last quite a while in height.

As for the convertibles:
- If the child is expected to be very close to 10kg I would want to make sure the Fisher-Price Safe Voyage is really group 0+/1 [RF to 13kg] instead of group 0/1 [RF to 10kg]; I think it's made by TeamTex/Nania and their convertibles are group 0/1; I may be wrong, though.
- The Bebehut Deluxe I've never heard about.
All five of the convertibles require what is here called "Euro routing" when RF, so there is a small risk that the seatbelt in a random car may turn out to be too short.
 

TheirMom

New member
Thank you, Juune. I looked at the pictures with interest, but unfortunately, I'm not familiar enough with all of the car seats to be able to tell which is which, and there isn't any information on how tall the child is in each of the pictures.
 

_juune

New member
Thank you, Juune. I looked at the pictures with interest, but unfortunately, I'm not familiar enough with all of the car seats to be able to tell which is which, and there isn't any information on how tall the child is in each of the pictures.
Yeah, true, his height isn't mentioned anywhere :( You could actually try asking in the comments there. I do know he is pretty big, 90-percentile.
 

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