Question about extended use of 5 point harness

Hi-
Some of you may know that I just re-harnessed my 6.5 year old son. (Went from a B505 booster into a Truefit) By the way he is very happy in the Truefit and I am loving the ease of getting him in. With our booster the seat belt was constantly getting twisted and it was hard for me to lean my pregger belly over him to get the thing buckled up - I'm no longer squashing him every morning - just hop in grab our straps and go! Granted this won't be a truely long term solution as he is getting pretty big to harness in this seat but I am willing to bet we will get him to about 7.5 years old.

Anyway I was reading another thread where many people have said that there is no benefit to extended harnessing and it may actually cause more harm and introduce more areas for failure. (Ie if you booster with the seat belt there is only one thing that can go wrong - if you harness then the harness can fail, the seat belt or latch can fail and the tether can fail thus increasing the chance of injury because so many things can go wrong.) Someone else also mentioned that the head excursion and forces applied to the neck or much greater in a harness because in a booster seat the entire seat moves with the body and in a harness just the neck, arms and legs move.

So I am trying not to panic but I want to make sure that I made the right choice in re-harnessing. (I did this to increase safety not put him in more danger.) Do any of you know if there is any data or testing done to compare a larger older childs risk of injury in a booster vs in a harness?

Sorry for this long and panicked post - I just have never seen people against harnesses before and it has me scared. (could be pregnancy induced terror - LOL)

mom1mg said:

Do any of you know if there is any data or testing done to compare a larger older childs risk of injury in a booster vs in a harness?

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No, it's all conjecture at this point. We do not have concrete proof that boosters are safer than harnessing, nor that harnessing is safer than a booster.

mom1mg said:

Someone else also mentioned that the head excursion and forces applied to the neck or much greater in a harness because in a booster seat the entire seat moves with the body and in a harness just the neck, arms and legs move.

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Why a new thread?

And I really think you should read the other thread again calmly.
Like said in the other thread, there is no statistically proofen age where a Booster is safer then a Harness. But at some age, a Harness is not safer then a Booster. And "not safer" doesn´t mean "unsafe", it´s statistically equal.

And no, there are now crash-tests available.
Joy

In case anyone is wondering what other thread is being referrenced in the PP:

http://www.car-seat.org/showthread.php?t=82444

Since you posted in the Canadian Forum, I'll just mention that there are no seats available in Canada that harness past 65 lbs like there are in the US, nor (as I understand it) are there any plans to consider allowing them. At least a part of the reason for this (again, as I understand it - happy to be corrected if I'm wrong) is because it just isn't necessary. There is no evidence that harnessing to higher weights will increase safety. To my way of thinking, there is reason to believe that harnessing of children who would otherwise be perfectly safe in a booster (at least meeting all size and maturity requirements) could be problematic. But I have no evidence to show you to back that up.

Your son is safest in the seat that is going to be used properly 100% of the time. If for now that is a harnessed seat (since it sounds like you may have been having booster issues), then that is what you should use.

Thank you for your replies,
Just to clarify the reason I started a new thread in the Canadian forum was because (obviously) I live in Canada and I know that there are some differences in testing and standards so I was looking for Canadian specific information.
Thank you for posting the link to the other thread to which I was talking - I'm new here and never even thought of it.
Yes for us personally the harness is working better but at some point in the not so distant future we will have to re-evaluate if a booster is appropriate so I was doing my home work early as I want to make the best choice possible. (For me it wasn't that my son didn't sit well in the booster it was that the booster we had didn't fit him well once he grew and thinned out and we were going to buy another booster until I was informed that it is safer to ride in a harness as long as possible which at the time made sense to me.)
Thank you again. I am very interested in hearing opinions from both sides of the booster/harness issue as I have never been exposed to the "boosters may be safer" idea.

Oh sorry, didn´t see that it is the Canadian Forum. Then forget my question regarding the additional thread.

With the HW limits in Canada i don´t think the PP is right:

sparkyd said:

because it just isn't necessary

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It´s more a problem of crash-test regulations.
In Germany for example, you only have 4 Groups: 0(+),1,2,3.
If you want to make a car seat, it must work until:
40lbs, 55lbs or 80lbs.
You can´t choose a value in between.

I don´t know the canadian regulations, only wanted to show that there are other possible reasons. For example, you will never see an ECE-Certified 65lbs seat because of that.
Joy

joyride said:

Oh sorry, didn´t see that it is the Canadian Forum. Then forget my question regarding the additional thread.

With the HW limits in Canada i don´t think the PP is right:

It´s more a problem of crash-test regulations.
In Germany for example, you only have 4 Groups: 0(+),1,2,3.
If you want to make a car seat, it must work until:
40lbs, 55lbs or 80lbs.
You can´t choose a value in between.

I don´t know the canadian regulations, only wanted to show that there are other possible reasons. For example, you will never see an ECE-Certified 65lbs seat because of that.
Joy

Click to expand...

Manufacturers in Canada are free to choose whatever they want for weight limits provided it doesn't exceed the maximum of 65lbs.

Right now we have 40lb, 47lb, 48lb, 50lb, and 65lb limit ff'ing seats.

Sparky is correct that there is no plan to increase the max limit to 80lbs and there are specific reasons for that which I won't go in to but somebody else may or may not be willing to if this thread gets seen...

At 6.5yrs old, and with a child who sits properly in a booster and is over 40lbs, there is likely no benefit to keeping the child harnessed. Probably no risk either - or at least not a concrete one that I'm aware of provided that the harnessed seat fits properly and is used properly. FWIW, if a parent asked me if they should re-harness their over 40lb 6yr old who had no special needs and was able to sit properly in a booster, I would say to go with a booster that provided a good seatbelt fit.

That being said, I wouldn't beat yourself up over your decision. You have a baby on the way so the seat will get used at some point, and the solution you have works for you right now and isn't increasing his risk of injury so far as I'm aware. :thumbsup:

eta: For children with special needs there is legislation allowing for special needs seats with a much higher weight limit. I'm blanking on if it's 105lbs or 110lbs right now - I suspect it's 105lbs, but need to look it up to be certain. You'd need a dr.'s prescription though and a good reason in order to get one.