Pondering a new ERF convertible

My husband is tired of the Radian in our 2000 Subaru Outback for our 20-month-old boy, so we're looking to replace it. He'd like something that's more compact front to back. It's behind the passenger seat and while I can reasonably fit there, when Grandpa visits he doesn't fit. I know the Radian with angle adjuster is supposed to be compact, but I think in this car at least, other seats have the potential to be *more* compact.

Little guy was almost 27 lbs at his 18 mo visit, which puts him in the 81st percentile for weight, but he's usually been more like 67th %ile for weight. That puts him hitting 40 lbs right at age 4. He seems to be in the mid-60s/low-70s for height percentile and I don't think he has an especially long torso.

Ones we're looking at:

-4Ever. Sounds like it has this magical combination of a deep seatpan (we're hoping to RF til 4) while being very compact front to back.

-Boulevard Clicktight. I'm concerned about the lack of legroom but it seems like the sides of the seatpan are low and wouldn't be hard for kiddos to throw their legs over. I like the ARB option. Husband really liked this one in the store. He uninstalls the kids' seats occasionally to haul around large items and loves our Clicktight Frontier. But he can install the Radian in just a few minutes and I'm sure he could get good at installing just about any seat.

-Peg convertible. I really like the extra 5 lbs but I'm concerned about the height. It's not any shorter for RF than the Radian, though, right? The Radian got older son to 4 RFing no prob (who must have an average-to-short torso because he's always been in the 90-95th percentile for height). Irritating that the ARB is only available in Canada! (right?)

-Nextfit. The lockoffs are very appealing because tipping is one reason why husband is tired of the Radian. But the high sides will probably be annoying.

-Clek Fllo. Sounds great but I suspect it isn't going to be compact enough. It sounds like the Fllo would make more sense than the Foonf without LATCH and for a seat that we might not even use FFing.

-Clones. We'll take a look.

-Pria. If it wasn't for that damn 40" standing height limit!

Am I missing anything? Other thoughts? I can't wait to try out some of these seats in our car!

What about that new Safety 1st seat with the 50lb RF limit?

Definitely not compact. :-D

I just bought and installed the new 50 lb. Safety First.

I would look into it...if you want to RF a long time.

The Radian I always found stuck way out front to back.

The Safety First sits nicely on its base.
Maybe it would be too big, but if you have a chance to try it with your vehicle and the recline you'd need, might be worth a shot.
It has high sides. But then again, they all seemed to besides the Radian (which didn't install well where we needed it).

My daughter (almost 2 and 95% height) had NO legroom in her Advocate from 2011. And in the Safety First, her legs extend all the way out. It's amazing!!!!

We have a Pria and Britax convertibles. The Pria def. has that magic combination of decent legroom while being compact. I've been struggling a bit with the latch install but I suspect it is the car combined with me. However my daughter is little so the 40" standing limit isn't a concern.

We also have several G4's. The legroom is definitely limited compared to our Pria and the Diono in my parents car. My daughter will throw her legs over the side of both the Diono and the Pria, but not in Britax seats. While the Britax sides aren't super deep in the seat pan they also aren't nearly as shallow as the Diono or Pria.

What about the Milestone? Similar to the Forever but doesn't have high sides in seat pan (in case leg room becomes an issue), isn't too much of a space hog, and doesn't (I don't believe) have the 40" standing limit.

Is your guy a climber? Starting around 2yo my son insisted on climbing into the Nextfit by himself, so problem solved ;-) We have a CR-V so it sits even higher than the Outback. It installs great, is easy to use, and very compact.

Yeah, since we'll be at Babies R Us, we certainly might as well take a look at the Advance EX!

I think the Milestone and 4Ever have pretty similarly low sides. We'll definitely take a look at the Milestone if we're at a store that carries it, though. I had the impression that it might not install quite as compactly as the 4Ever because of its fewer recline settings, but I could certainly be mistaken.

Our guy is a bit of a climber! It might indeed tickle his fancy to climb into his own seat. We'll have to see how the side of the NextFit interacts with the doorframe.

We had a very helpful trip to BRU today!

We decided to measure the space available when the front seat is all the way forward, for reproducibility.

Our existing Radian with angle adjuster gave slightly less than 4" of space with kiddo in it. 5" after a fresh install at the end, with no kid.

They did have the Advance EX in stock. (I wasn't expecting them to, since on the website it said that you could order one to that store for pickup in 5-10 days. So I guess the website isn't necessarily a good indication of whether something really is in stock at a particular store.) It wasn't quite as huge front to back as I was expecting! Installed properly for >22 lbs, it measured 4.5" - so approximately the same as the Radian. My husband didn't care for how the shoulder belt crinkled up in the edge of the belt path, but we didn't spend a lot of time trying to get it as smooth as possible. It was straightforward to install. We didn't try little guy in the seat. It doesn't fulfill what we're looking for in terms of a much more compact seat, but it was fun to see and play with it and it seems like a really nice seat at a nice price.

The NextFit was a surprise hit! It gave 8.25" of space (and I'm pretty sure that was measured with kid in it). So a much, much more usable front seat for us. The seatbelt lockoff is a HUGE plus because one of my husband's complaints about the Radian is tipping and sliding up the seatbelt. The harness adjuster was nice and smooth. Husband didn't mind the maneuver to get toddler into the seat. The crotch buckle pad was crazy huge and I do wonder whether it's required.

I don't know which version of the nextfit BRU carries but mine doesn't have a crotch buckle pad so hopefully it's not required on yours.


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We were looking at the Zip. I didn't even look at whether the regular NextFit next to it had a crotch buckle pad. Sounds like it's unlikely to be required.

Sounds like the Nextfit might be a good choice for you!

FWIW, I wouldn't be *too* concerned with leg room. My 3.5 year old dd (just realized the other day her 3T pants are really too short, so her legs are 4T length) will choose riding in her little brother's RF Britax convertible instead of her own RF Radian, which (obviously) has a lot more leg room. She's done it enough that I think it's not just the novelty of it any more. (And also she talks sometimes about missing her previous convertible, which was a RF Britax classic Boulevard, that expired.) All that to say - at least in her case, leg room is a total non-issue.

Good point about RF legroom and not really knowing what kids will find appealing!

We also looked at the 4Ever and the Clicktight Boulevard today.

The 4Ever was easy enough to install. It installed very compactly with a measurement of 8.75". Similar to the Advance, my husband also didn't care for how the shoulder belt crinkled up in the belt path. I was able to get a smoother belt with a second try at installing but he didn't like how he could still tip the seat on its side with little force. The harness adjuster wasn't as smooth as the NextFit's.

The CT Boulevard was another big surprise - of the four, it was by far the hardest to install! I'm sure we could get much better with practice but we weren't able to actually ever get it installed before the test subject was Done With Carseat Shopping. We knew that we needed some slack in the belt to get the Clicktight panel closed but getting juuuust the right amount of slack was really difficult. Threading the belt through those narrow slots was a pain and just really awkward in the car. I accidentally locked the seatbelt at one point while trying to loosen and tighten the lap and shoulder belts to get just the right amount of slack in each, which meant I had to get the seatbelt completely out if the slots again. I also think the CT mechanism on this particular floor model may not have been working quite correctly, because it was very hard to open and we were never able to get it closed on the belt. But we're interested in trying one again sometime. One thing that I appreciated about the NextFit and the 4Ever was their recline position indicators, and missed having one on the Clicktight.

Looking forward to trying the Fllo and Peg on the next shopping trip(s).

And it occurred to me that we should try our Guide 65 in my husband's car. It's certainly compact! Then I could legitimately get a Scenera NEXT for my car. :-D The Guide wouldn't get him to 4, though.

I've actually read on multiple occasions where people prefer the G4 Britax to the Clicktights. If only the G4's were taller :-(

I'm not 100% certain if the Milestone sides are lower than a 4 ever. They look to be, but I've never seen them side by side.

Good luck with your hunt. I love to hear other people's experiences with the different seats.

Questions about the Foonf and Fllo.

In this video, it looks like the Foonf can get *very* upright at its more-upright recline setting. Clek Foonf Prototype Installation - YouTube (starting at about 1:15)

Can the Fllo be that upright? As I understand it, there is just one rear-facing recline position for the Fllo's flip-foot and then you press it differently into the vehicle upholstery to get the less than or greater than 22 lb recline. Is that right?

Can the Foonf only be that upright without the ARB? I thought the ARB was required for the Foonf RF?

Hmmm. If the Foonf can get much more upright than the Fllo, perhaps it'll have to go into consideration.

Cnidaria said:

Questions about the Foonf and Fllo.

In this video, it looks like the Foonf can get *very* upright at its more-upright recline setting. Clek Foonf Prototype Installation - YouTube (starting at about 1:15)

Can the Fllo be that upright? As I understand it, there is just one rear-facing recline position for the Fllo's flip-foot and then you press it differently into the vehicle upholstery to get the less than or greater than 22 lb recline. Is that right?

Can the Foonf only be that upright without the ARB? I thought the ARB was required for the Foonf RF?

Hmmm. If the Foonf can get much more upright than the Fllo, perhaps it'll have to go into consideration.

Click to expand...

Both the Foonf and the Fllo have an acceptable range of 30°-45°, depending on weight. The Foonf requires the ARB for rear facing.

You are correct about the method of changing the Fllo's recline. It has been fairly easy for me to adjust, both with and without the ARB. The main difference is that without the ARB the Fllo takes up less space front to back - I think 2" less than Fllo with ARB, and maybe 3" less than the Foonf.

Thanks! Do you have any trouble getting the Fllo to stay at the angle you want, since it doesn't have settings on the base?

We trekked out to visit the Fllo. The measurement was 4.5" of space with the ARB (with the kid in the seat), and 7" with no ARB (with kid). So with ARB, that's only gaining a smidge of space over the Radian, but the option to remove the ARB is intriguing. Perhaps it we get it, we would leave the ARB attached most of the time, but uninstall it when Grandpa visits.

Having pre-watched the installation videos, we found it easy to install with the seatbelt. Hooray for lockoffs! It was very easy to get kiddo in and out; definitely moreso than the Nextfit. It seems like it has a really nice balance of side-impact protection and accessibility. I can picture a 4yo in that seat much more easily than in the Nextfit, too.

I feel like the Fllo would be the absolute perfect seat if it:
-was permitted to be installed a little more upright (say, 25°?)
-had recline settings
-had a bubble level


PS: the shopping experience was almost more memorable than the seat. The store's "carseat expert" was assigned to help us, and it was weird to have him hovering. At one point he stepped in to install it for us, and he was trying to use both lockoffs, and somehow kept accidentally locking the seatbelt, and the lockoff kept popping open. I don't know WHAT he was trying to do. I'm glad I spoke up after a few minutes and took it back over. He also bad-mouthed Chicco and big-box stores when we told him what other seats we were looking at. I like the idea in general of supporting independent small businesses instead of big-box stores, but this guy made me want to get the heck back to BRU and be able to try out seats in peace. :-D

The other memorable thing was that this shop was a few feet from some train tracks. Man, train horns are loud that close. Several trains went by while we were trying the seat, and poor 20 month old guy was scared out of his mind.

So the new 50 lb. RF seat...

My husband has been using it this week for the 2 YO and he said when he goes to tighten, nothing happens. He hates the seat. He said he got the harness to be acceptable, but whew! It probably wasn't tight enough, and I am annoyed that a seat that RF so long isn't any good if you can't tighten it!!!

It's a huge issue. Just a little annoyed since I replaced the other one (an Advocate) since it would not loosen! You can't win!

Boo. I'm sorry to hear that!

Can you reach around the back of the seat to pull the straps down, then making it easier to pull the adjuster strap?

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