Carseats of the Future

Ali

New member
DD will be RF until 33 lbs in her MA.

Does anyone know if any companies (especially Britax) are designing and testing seats that will allow RF to higher weight limits? I would love to keep DD RF for even longer. Those crash test videos still give me nightmares.

Thanks!
 
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jen_nah

CPST Instructor
There has been no talks about it that I am aware of. Not saying it won't happen. But right now us techs are just pushing to get parents to keep their children rearfacing until 1yrs "AND" 20lbs. We hope to start seeing more extended rearfacing down the road but right now it's not the norm.

Heck I get calls daily from parents wanting me to turn their 10-11mth old forward facing. Or like today I had a dad that had a 9mth old that was 22lbs. He just didn't get it that it's 20lbs "AND" 1yr.
 

skaterbabs

Well-known member
You know what gets me? If we pushed (for example) 18 months and 30 lbs, by DEFAULT that would include 12/20.
But no one ever listens to me. :rolleyes:
 

Splash

New member
My pediatrician tells everyone it's 18/30. She never even mentions 12/20. She says that they MUST be 18 month AND 30 pounds.
When Charlie hit 20 pounds at about 4.5-5 months, she made sure I knew that. I already did, but it was nice to be 'reminded.'
She also says boosters are for five years old and at least 40 pounds, until approximately 11 years old. She's got something going for her.
 

scatterbunny

New member
The American Academy of Pediatrics, for a few years now (in their policy statement on carseats), has pushed manufacturers to develop seats that rear-face to 45 pounds. So far none have listened. :(
 

Norway

New member
Why even talk about the weight? Just push 1 year as a minium. Can you get seats that FF for babies under 20 pounds?

Since both Graco and Britax makes RF carseats for up to 40/55 pounds in Scandinavia, it shouldn't be that hard for them to get the seats approved for sale in the US. Do any of you know why they haven't tried to get at least one model each approved for the us market?
 
S

simply something

Guest
Because if we just push the 1 year minimum, then parents who have peanuts will think it's okay to turn them before they are twenty lbs.

That was the problem before when it was stressed 12 or 20..so they made it 12 AND 20..
 

jen_nah

CPST Instructor
Norway said:
Why even talk about the weight? Just push 1 year as a minium. Can you get seats that FF for babies under 20 pounds?

Since both Graco and Britax makes RF carseats for up to 40/55 pounds in Scandinavia, it shouldn't be that hard for them to get the seats approved for sale in the US. Do any of you know why they haven't tried to get at least one model each approved for the us market?

Like the PP said we would then have those small children that are 12mths but do not weigh 20lbs yet going forward facing. They would also then be voiding their CSR warrenty due to that. There are even some that have a 22lbs forward facing weight limit.

My oldest was a peanut she was only 18lbs on her 1st bday. She didn't get turn ff'ing until she was almost 2.
 

jen_nah

CPST Instructor
I like other push until at least 18mths too. I feel that will at least get the child over the 12/20 limits. But, I strongly push the parents to keep them rear facing until they reach the rf'ing weight limits.
 

Norway

New member
jen_nah said:
Like the PP said we would then have those small children that are 12mths but do not weigh 20lbs yet going forward facing. They would also then be voiding their CSR warrenty due to that. There are even some that have a 22lbs forward facing weight limit.

My oldest was a peanut she was only 18lbs on her 1st bday. She didn't get turn ff'ing until she was almost 2.

Ok. I thought most people knew about the weightlimit on their seats and followd them. So that they wouldn't turn their kids before 20 pounds, or 22 pounds. It is a bit confusing with your different weight- and heightlimits for RF/FF and harness/booster. Limits on carseats in Scandinavia are standard and easier to understand and we only have weigthlimits, not height.

KAK22: You want to see Graco's newest carseat? Here. IT is a RF only carseat up to 55 pounds. It is not released yet but hopfully it will be in a months time. I am planning to buy this for my 2,5 yo :)
 

Ali

New member
Norway - thank you so much for the picture!

Hopefully someone will have a US approved seat with higher limits by the time DD is over 33 lbs.
 

tjham

New member
Yeah, the "no chest clip" thing freaks me out! We're always hearing of kids here who undo their chest clips and wiggle their arms out. How much more often would that happen with NO chest clip at all!?!?!
 

Ali

New member
Wow - I was so excited about higher RF limits and the cool foot rest that I didn't even notice that!

It looks like it will slide right off their shoulders - especially the infant!
 

Norway

New member
There are no seats with chest clip in Scandinavia. Some people buy them as extra if they have a bigger kid that wriggels out of the harness. But you don't need them to keep the harness in place. Maybe you don't pull the harness as tight as we do. I don't know.

This is the newest infantseat on the market. You can put the back down when you use it outside the car. An isofixbase will be available in the fall, but it is very easy to install with the seatbelt. It can be used with this cool stroller to make a travelsystem. :)
 

Dreaming_of_Speed

Senior Community Member
Its not that we dont tighten our harnesses as tightly as your country does, it that we have harness slots that are further apart for comfort and dont require seats to have a one click exit. In your country they require seats to only require one action to get a child out in an emergency we dont have that so we can have the added safety of a harness positioner on our seats.

I wouldnt trust the infant seat that turns into a flat seat out of the car. We had a similar seat that could be used as a car bed and turned into a regular infant seat for larger infants. It was recalled b/c it could collapse as an infant seat. Its install process looks tedious to me with all the wrapping and fixing the seat belt into special holders, our method is a lot more simple IMO but i assume its alot easier with the isofix base.

i think its going to be a long time before the US gets a seat that RF's past 35 pounds. There just isnt a good market for it here. Very few ppl want to keep their kids RFing past 20, even less will want to go past 35. Our current seats are rather large and ppl have a hard time fitting RFing marathons in their cars, can you imagine getting something the size of a regent in your car RFing? I'm skeptical as it is on the scandinavian seats that RF so high, simply b/c plastic can only take so much force and a 50 pound child in a frontal impact creates ALOT of force. If anyone has a crash test video of one of their seats I'd like to see it. I've never found one and i want to see if these seats really do what they say they do.

Ok flame a way i'm expecting it.
 

Splash

New member
I would think that the ENTIRE shell of the seat is a lot more trustworthy to hold 50 pounds than the thin plastic reinforced strips between harness slots in a FF seat! You're right, plastic can only take so much. But in RF the entire seat absorbs the force. In FF it's just the reinforced harness slots.. a LOT less plastic!
And a chest clip isn't really a safety feature. It's a pre crash positioner, but it has nothing to do with the integrity of the seat or how it restrains the child. And considering that very few people even use the chest clip correctly, and lots of people use ONLY the chest clip (instead of the buckle) to restrain their kids... I think the chest clip is almost a liability!
That said, I do like them, because I'm used to them.
 

Dreaming_of_Speed

Senior Community Member
A lot of FFing seats these days has thin pieces of metal running thru the reinforced area helping to reinforce the harness slot even more. The shell can only take so much weight before it cracks, it may all handle the force but the initial hit takes place where the child's body is and then the force moves outwards. That first big hit could cause a seat to fail. I trust the shell to hold 50 pounds but what about 50 pounds in a frontal impact at 80 MPH (yes on our local highways we do 80 mph on a regular basis, on the bigger highway just out of town ppl do 100+ but i rarely travel on it) would it hold? i dont know. I'm not entirely sure i trust my marathon to hold ryan's 28 pounds at that kind of speed.

The chest clip is a safety device b/c it holds the straps in place which is crucial. It does affect how it restrains the child by holding the straps where they belong on the body before an impact happens, if it werent there and the harness wasnt in the proper position the seat couldnt perform properly. Chest clip usage is a huge problem but so is strap tightness in most of those cases. I rarely see a child who's harness is properly tightened who has a clip at thier belly button. Many who use the clip improperly are using the seat improperly in its entirety (too loose harness, to loose install, too low clip, not putting the handle down (infant seat), wrong direction. It seems to come in a set. If there's one mistake there will be more.) I've never come across a child in real life who is secured by nothing more than the chest clip in real driving situations, i've seen it done when the parent was using the seat as a child carrier or seat inside a building or when they arent going anywhere in the car but never when the car was going to be moving. It would be a liability if the company didnt put in the owners manual how to use it but they do so if parents dont learn to use them properly its their own liability ad neglect.
 

racesmom

Senior Community Member
Fisher Price used to make seats that didn't have a chest clip when rear facing. Using one was considered a danger. Granted they didn't go to 50 lbs RF. I loved our 5pt SIV. As long as the harness was snug it stayed right where it belonged. I believe many countries don't allow chest clips RF or FF. I'm sure if it was causing deaths or injuries it would be changed by now.

If higher weight RF seats can be installed in vehicles in Sweden I'm sure the same could be done here. Parents just have to want it.

I do think more parents are opting for ExRF. I hang out on a couple boards where many of the toddlers are RF past one year, even two years. It would help GREATLY if peds were educated. The parents I have the hardest time convincing are those whose ped said the child could be turned. Once the ped says it it's hard to convince them otherwise- even with crash test videos, respected resources, etc. Whatever the ped says MUST be correct -ugh.
 

rachel3612

Senior Community Member
There are other countries with much better car seat testing than there is in the US. In those countries they keep kids rear facing for longer than we do here. They also do not have chest clips, they have done the testing and know they are not important. My infant seat did not have a chest clip and the old fisher price safe embrace only had a chest clip for forward facing.

I have a seat that was first made without a chest clip but to sell them in the US they had to add it. My dd always slid it all the way down, never to get her arms out and the straps were always in the right position. I never made a big deal of it. She never did it in her Britax just in the Maxi Cosi.

Its interesting that in the countries that rf for a long time also do not use harnesses forward facing, it does make sense. My DH will not let me get our 6 year old a harness seat for that reason, he says that if they are so much more advanced than us to rf for so long they might have a good point about the harness. Now if we could get a seat for her to be rf in he would go for that.

If the seats here did not come with chest clips i would be thrilled. There are people out there that do only buckle the chest clip. My SIL is one of them. She also lives somewhere that does not a have a cps tech to go see and there are lots of missuse there. She would regularly hold the baby on her lap in cars if she didn't have a seat with her. That is very common there.

Rachel
 

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