Outgrowing baseless install?

Nedra

Car-Seat.org Ambassador
My sister is wanting to keep her kiddo in an infant seat as long as possible. The main advantage of this is for traveling and being able to do the baseless install. The seat is a B-Safe and the child meets all the requirements of the seat. However, they have found that when they need to do the baseless install, her feet are cramped. I told her that this wasn't a safety concern, since I know that kids can have their legs dangling all over the place and it's still okay. But she reminded me that with the baseless install, the belt must go over the child's legs, so having her legs bent up means that the belt is passing up and over then instead of straight across from one belt guide to the next.

I hope this makes sense.

So the question that this raised for me is whether this is a known issue and what other people do. Are you just supposed to switch to a convertible (or only use the seat with the base) once the child's knees interfere with a flat belt line in the baseless install? Or is there another way to make a baseless install fit safely? Like, could you install the seat and then have the child bend her knees OVER the belt instead of needing them to be stuffed UNDER the belt? Do the manufacturers have recommendations about when a baseless install becomes unsafe?
 
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tiggercat

New member
Just criss cross the baby's legs so they don't interfere. I just noticed this with my friend's toddler in her SR35 the other day.
 

Nedra

Car-Seat.org Ambassador
Just criss cross the baby's legs so they don't interfere. I just noticed this with my friend's toddler in her SR35 the other day.

I think the belt comes across the baby's knees, so criss-crossing the legs just makes them poke up taller for the belt to go over. I could be wrong, but it sounded like my sister had tried every form of "scrunching" she could do. But i think maybe the b-safe is narrower than the SR35? If so, that might be part of the problem. How old is your friend's toddler? My niece is 16 months.
 

joolsplus3

Admin - CPS Technician
One seat (not this one), used to require a base at a certain weight, I wonder if an unintended benefit of that was having no legs in the way...
Anyway, just thought of that... uh... not that I'm helpful for answering this current problem!
 

katymyers

Active member
Ella used to dangle her legs over the seatbelt on baseless installs in her infant seat (she's super short but has legs for days lol). I never saw anything wrong with it, someone correct me if I'm wrong, but it didn't affect the install at all and she was properly harnessed so I allowed it.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Keeks64

New member
One seat (not this one), used to require a base at a certain weight, I wonder if an unintended benefit of that was having no legs in the way... Anyway, just thought of that... uh... not that I'm helpful for answering this current problem!

The 1st years Via used to require the base past 22lbs even though the seat went to I think 35lbs?
 

aept

New member
One seat (not this one), used to require a base at a certain weight, I wonder if an unintended benefit of that was having no legs in the way... Anyway, just thought of that... uh... not that I'm helpful for answering this current problem!

Combi shuttle requires the base after a certain weight. I think it's 22 lbs.
 

tiggercat

New member
I think the belt comes across the baby's knees, so criss-crossing the legs just makes them poke up taller for the belt to go over. I could be wrong, but it sounded like my sister had tried every form of "scrunching" she could do. But i think maybe the b-safe is narrower than the SR35? If so, that might be part of the problem. How old is your friend's toddler? My niece is 16 months.

Could be, crossing worked nicely to allow the seatbelt to lie flat for me but they are different seats so I can see how it might make it worse for her. I'm not sure about the legs going over the seatbelt, can't quite picture how that could work. Friend's kiddo is 17 months and maybe 23lbs?
 

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