Why not Consumer Reports?

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Victorious4

Senior Community Member
At the bottom of the screen is a small box that you can use to search -- there have been quite a few threads about the CR issue....
 

kelly

New member
I think the biggie for me is that yeah, they crash 'em. But that's it. They use a bench, not a car, so real world crash results may be different. They've tested two seats that are identical except for name and cover style. They got DIFFERENT results! ?? They tested a Britax (RA, I think) one year and gave it raves, the next year it was substantially lower. The seat was unchanged in that time frame, so it was something about CR that changed (or was inconsistent).

And, since they don't install them in cars and try them out they don't know that some seats are VERY hard to install and very hard to use day in and day out. If a seat is hard to install or hard to use, it'll get mis-used by many. :(

And, they don't measure them. A 40 lb seat that the vast majority of kids outgrow by 30 lbs because its soooo short is a waste of money.

My final gripe is that they rate price (seemingly heavily) into their super-spy-secret formula. I think that is a huge disservice. If I have $40 to spend, I want the best $40 seat. Rank them and let ME find the highest rated one I can afford. If I have $300 to spend, same thing. But, the $300 ones are ALWAYS going to be rated artificially low because they impose their idea of "value" on everything. That bugs the heck out of me. If they just ranked them w/o regard to price then everyone could simply say, "What the best seat I can get for $80?" and go from there. But as it is, you can't do that.
 

SafeDad

CPSDarren - Admin
Staff member
And, since they don't install them in cars and try them out they don't know that some seats are VERY hard to install and very hard to use day in and day out. If a seat is hard to install or hard to use, it'll get mis-used by many. :(
QUOTE]

I will note that they do claim to install them in various cars, reportedly by CPS technicians on staff. They don't, however, give any indication of their standards for how secure or how easy the installation was. You know, the most experienced instructor may be able to get the vast majority of seats correctly installed in the vast majority of vehicles. The typical parent can't.
 

kelly

New member
I will note that they do claim to install them in various cars, reportedly by CPS technicians on staff. They don't, however, give any indication of their standards for how secure or how easy the installation was. You know, the most experienced instructor may be able to get the vast majority of seats correctly installed in the vast majority of vehicles. The typical parent can't.

Yeah, I was just thinking of the Evenflo Titan (?), I think it was Titan. (It was set to be discontinued. Techs cheered, as it was HARD to install properly. Then CR rated it #1 and boom, it stays on the market to torment your poor guys more. ;))
 

SafeDad

CPSDarren - Admin
Staff member
Yeah, I was just thinking of the Evenflo Titan (?), I think it was Titan. (It was set to be discontinued. Techs cheered, as it was HARD to install properly. Then CR rated it #1 and boom, it stays on the market to torment your poor guys more. ;))

Yeah, the NHTSA ratings are even worse. As it is, almost every seat gets an "A" and none get a "C" overall. Sadly, many of the models that got top grades for ease of use on paper are those that technicians and parents know are among the most difficult to use in real life.
 

abacus2

Well-known member
I think the biggest problem is that they fail to factor in at all how well the seats fit a variety of children. I purchased the Evenflo Vanguard 5 that they had highly rated for my then 6 month old. She outgrew the supposedly 40#, 40" seat at 18 months, 29", 25#. At the time I had no idea there was significant variation in harness slot heights for 40 lb convertibles.
 

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