A total disappointing (and frustrating) infant-carseat trying day

[hipmaman]

Just in case people are wondering why I'm looking at infant carseats Not expecting at all, but just doing my 'public service' duty to try and review carseats for ya

So I managed to get to Zellers to check the First Yrs Via infant carseat out. Well, my Zellers does not have it! They didn't even know what seat I was talking about Totally unfriendly staff too

So in the car we went to TRU to check out the Safety 1st SureFit. They had the Maxi-Cosi Mico, Graco SnugRide, Graco SafeSeat 1, Peg Primo Viaggio and Evenflo (I can't remember the name aghrrr ) on the same shelf, so I had a few pictures taken. I figured... great.... lots of seats to compare the SureFit to and baby was in a good mood to model :thumbsup:

NOT....

The harness was too low so I wanted to change slots and take proper pictures. Ummm, the base and the seat were stuck and could not be detached. Oh well, I'll have her try it out w/o harnessing then. Then one harness straps just fell out of the slot. Dunno if it was not properly set in the yoke or if the yoke was one of those with wide gap and straps can fairly easy fall out. But I couldn't check because the base and the seat were stuck, remember!

So I started to measure the slots height. Got the first lowest set. Wait, Trudy and Julie said the slots in the fabric and the shell were badly misaligned. Ahhh, I see how bad now I went on taking measurements with my fingers inserted into the fabric slots to ensure of the actual slots in the shell. Got 1, got 2, got 3, got... wait, where was the 4th one, the tallest set? WTH?!?!

At this point, I knew I couldn't really do a good review, so let's settle with sorting out the slots misalignment issue. Well, it didn't go so well. It turned out the plastic shell, the foam and the fabric were so badly aligned that the foam was totally covering the top slots and the fabric shows the top slots higher, but in fact it was much lower (at the very least - 0.5" lower for the actual slots on the shell) and the foam slots were lower than the actual slots. I started to take the cover off (as much off as I could without have the staff evicting me )

Needless to say, I got so discourage and disappointed (I wonder why I would be since I have not had a good experience with Safety 1st carseat before). I left with some pictures to show ya.

Off to load them now.

 

[snowbird25ca]

Ugh, how frustrating, that totally sucks. The Surefit at our store was slightly stuck, but I'm imagining the one at the store you were at is jammed on there due to the harness splitter plate. It's a small splitter plate, like the kind they're using on the 3in1's now, so the straps wouldn't slip off unless someone had them off then didn't replace them all the way - IMO anyways.

So it looks like all these seats are going to have this bad of an alignment? It's bad enough that infants who are very small and truly need those bottom slots are going to have a hard time getting a good fit of the harness. :thumbsdown: The designer 22 seats are bad enough, but to think that it's worse - I wonder if this pattern was originally going to be a designer 22 seat and then they decided to put it on the surefit? The slots and the cover really are that messed up, it might be interesting to try it on there and see.

And bummer about the crappy zellers employee.

 

[hipmaman]

SureFit infant carseat 4-22 lbs

11 mos old with about 3-4" from top of her head to top of the carseat.

Four sets of harness slots

Without harness, she would not sit properly. She would use the second highes set of harness

Uhhh, do you see any harness slots?!?!?

I was trying to show the bottom slots - notice the bottom foam slot is about 0.75" to 1" lower than the actual bottom slots.

AND the fabric slot is actually about 0.5" higher than the the actual slot.

A total mess up job with the harness slots. I gave up trying to measure the slots since each set of slots don't align from the actual slot through the foam slots and the fabric slots. I just gave up!!!

 

[snowbird25ca]

Wow, seeing it under the cover it's no wonder it felt so strange when I was feeling with my finger yesterday. I would've just given up too. Oy!

 

[Jewels]

Okay you made me laugh! Thanks for the info and sorry you had such an ordeal.


Well, I knew that the slots were not lined up properly but I didn't really pay attention to how badly. I would guess that is why I figured she was just below the top slot but now i'm guessing she was just below the second to the top :rollleyes:

 

[joolsplus3]

Well, phew. I came *this*close* to recommending this seat the other day, and I couldn't remember the name so I didn't. Sheesh, and we warn aftermarket covers may not line up properly? I could do better than that and I don't even sew!

 

[snowbird25ca]

Well, phew. I came *this*close* to recommending this seat the other day, and I couldn't remember the name so I didn't. Sheesh, and we warn aftermarket covers may not line up properly? I could do better than that and I don't even sew!

:ROTFLMAO:

You have a definite point about aftermarket covers there Julie. Not that I'd recommend one (or that it would even fix the problem with the foam being so messed up.)