Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Do you always remove babies coats etc before putting in car seat?? Even when it's freezing?

189 replies

Chopsicle · 01/11/2019 18:40

I don't have time to heat the car up before putting my 9 month old in and it's started to get a frost so it's really cold at the minute.
Too cold for me to put him in without warm clothing.
What do people do? Obviously I want him to be safe but also don't want him to get cold..

OP posts:
gemma19846 · 03/11/2019 11:31

Then it was lazy parenting when they were young. Its not an informed choice its choosing to ignore the fact thick coats in a car ARE dangerous for children

TabbyMumz · 03/11/2019 11:35

Chanklybore.....I've already stated my case. There are lots and lots of worries about car trips in general and using car seats at all (flat head syndrome) etc, but we all still put our kids in them and take risks.

TabbyMumz · 03/11/2019 11:38

"Then it was lazy parenting when they were young. Its not an informed choice its choosing to ignore the fact thick coats in a car ARE dangerous for children"

Gemma I'm not going to argue with you...you make your decisions, I make mine. Bit childish to go around telling people they are lazy parents. Noone years ago took coats off and there are no stats to say anyone slid out because they probably didn't.

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about these subjects:

mincepiesareyum · 03/11/2019 11:42

When you make a cuppa in the morning make up a hot water bottle and chuck it in the car seat to warm it up a bit? Obv take out before you put your baby in. I just used to keep a blanket on the radiator by the front door so would just drape that over baby when they were buckled in

SoyDora · 03/11/2019 11:43

I just don’t understand why you wouldn’t do something as simple as taking a coat off, when it could prevent death. It’s not difficult. It’s not onerous. In general, it is more comfortable for the child (apart from anything else).
But we’re going round in circles so will agree to disagree!

ChanklyBore · 03/11/2019 12:23

Tabbymumz, the You make your decisions, I made mine argument would be fair enough, apart from the fact that you are here ADVISING a parent with a young baby. If it doesn’t matter to you, fair enough. But don’t advise others incorrectly and then insist you are in fact correct when challenged on this.

As for the ‘nobody did years ago’ - they absolutely did. How many years ago are you referencing?

Aragog · 03/11/2019 12:35

Noone years ago took coats off

How long ago are we talking?
DD is 17y and we did then.
I've never worn a big coat in the car in all my time as a driver.

SoyDora · 03/11/2019 12:37

When I was brought home from the hospital 35 years ago I was in an unsecured carry cot on the back seat. Probably in a snowsuit. I didn’t die.
Still not the standards I want to uphold for my own children though.
Times change. Advice changes. The advice doesn’t change for no reason, it’s based on research. They don’t tell us things for fun, or to make life more difficult.

EstebanTheMagnificent · 03/11/2019 12:40

Another vote for the tuppence and crumble star snugs. They are so useful for car seat, sling etc.

SoyDora · 03/11/2019 12:44

Quick question TabbyMumz... if your children have children and you find yourself in the position of transporting them in the car, and your son/daughter says to you ‘please can you make sure they don’t wear coats in the car’, what will you do?

Horehound · 03/11/2019 12:55

Yes you should always remove coats or snowsuits as otherwise the straps will be too loose to safely constrain a child should you crash

Is that the same for us if we have a coat on?!

gemma19846 · 03/11/2019 13:09

Tabbymumz its also childish and DANGEROUS to go round telling people that leaving thick coats on babies in a car is good "judgement". I really hope you dont put your grandchildrens lives in danger in the same way

Aragog · 03/11/2019 13:12

Horehound - to an extent yes, it does have the same effect for adults as well as children. However the greater weight, more reaction from an adult, and the way a 3 point harness works on an adult means it can have a lesser impact. But essentially, yes. It can compromise an adult's safety too.

BertieBotts · 03/11/2019 13:35

I wasn't the one asking for stats, you were Confused I don't need stats to be able to see that wearing a puffy coat is incompatible with the safety advice that the harness needs to be snug to the child's body to work correctly.

The straps on the model in the video are not halfway down the dummy's shoulders if you look at the version I shared. They are too loose yes, and the seat is forward facing - it's possibly less of an issue when rear facing as you get a bit more leeway, but if they were that loose then actually I'd expect the child to come out regardless of seat direction.

How would you expect stats on whether anyone has died due to sliding out of a car seat with a coat on to be recorded? We sometimes collect stats about seatbelt use and car seat use (tends to be self report on admission to hospitals) but not about whether the car seat was being used correctly as this is self reported and most people don't necessarily know that they are using their car seat incorrectly.

If a child is ejected or moves further than expected out of a car seat how could an observer state that this was to do with their clothing or the seat installation or merely crash forces or anything else? Their focus is most likely on securing the accident site, rescuing any survivors and preserving dignity. First responders are also usually emergency workers or laypeople - they aren't trained car seat technicians or experts. Also the car seat has potentially moved during the crash, so it's difficult to say whether it was installed incorrectly or whether the forces of the crash have caused it to uninstall. There's no forensic investigation of a crash site to see exactly how injuries were caused in terms of physics moving the people around in a car. That would be of limited use which is probably why it is not done. Also, there were 15 children killed in cars in the UK in 2018 - it's such a small number that each case would be very individual and potentially harmful to a family's privacy. If a particular family wished to share the story of their child's death in order to raise awareness, that would be their choice, but I would imagine this must be extremely painful and difficult to process for a lot of families and opening yourself up to all sorts of ridiculous comments on the internet would not be the way I would want to deal with things if I lost a child.

But this is why we have crash tests - so we can simulate different types of car seat misuse in a lab to see which are more problematic than others. We know that a large proportion of parents misuse car seats because of spot checks, which is why modern car seats have plenty of features designed to reduce misuse - isofix for one, indicators about correct tightness of various features, a couple of seats on the market even have self-tightening harnesses now.

One last thought - if you were going to do a bungee or parachute jump, would you be happy for the safety harness/parachute to be secured over a puffy, slippery coat? Or would you expect the organiser of the jump to insist on lightweight clothing only? That's about the kind of level of force you should be imagining when you think of a severe car accident. I've not done a bunjee/parachute myself, but I've done rope climbing where you wear a harness and they ask for outer clothing to come off so that the harness can get a snug fit.

TabbyMumz · 03/11/2019 15:28

"I dont understand why you wouldnt do something as simple astaking a coat off, when it could prevent death"....
Because I think it's over exagerated. You can easily tighten the straps to suit

BertieBotts · 03/11/2019 15:29

OK - I've found reference of it happening in Canada:

www.tc.gc.ca/en/services/road/defects-recalls-vehicles-tires-child-car-seats/alerts-notices/third-party-aftermarket-products-children-restraint-systems.html

This is due to the use of an after market product rather than a coat, but the problem with the coat is the same as the problem with an after market add on.

The laws in Canada prohibit the safety company from identifying the exact item, which is why it appears vague.

TabbyMumz · 03/11/2019 15:32

Chankleybore......I'm not advising anybody. If you'd read the thread you will see that I believe people should do what they like. People are adults on here and can make their own decisions.

TabbyMumz · 03/11/2019 15:38

Gemma, I'm a pretty far way off having grandchildren by which point im sure there will be lots more trivial stuff to be worrying about. tell me Gemma, are you not able to tighten the straps on your car seat? Are you not able to endure they are tight enough?

BertieBotts · 03/11/2019 15:45

A case alluded to in New York:

13wham.com/news/local/puffy-winter-coats-could-pose-danger-for-kids-while-in-car-seats

What I didn't know, that I've now learned by reading all these reports - the fabrics and foams and padding in car seats are required by the various car seat standards to have a certain level of non-compressibility. So if you put the fabric parts of a car seat into one of those vacuum bags, they would hardly compress at all. Whereas your child's coat will. If you've ever used those bags you'll know that the amount you can compress by hand is much less than the amount you compress it with vacuum force. That's the difference and the problem. OK, it could be a potential problem rather than a repeatedly proven one, but it's such a simple thing to alleviate.

TabbyMumz · 03/11/2019 15:47

Bertiebotts....that advice around coats says "when wearing winter clothing ensure the harness is tightened to ensure a tight fit"......which is what I did.

TabbyMumz · 03/11/2019 15:49

It also recommends not putting anything behind the baby like a cushioned blanket.

BertieBotts · 03/11/2019 15:57

Which is fine, as long as it's just as tight as it would be without the coat. The problem is that most of the time this is very difficult to achieve. What do you think about the "strap test" people have mentioned several times on this thread? Useful or irrelevant?

I do think some level of this is idiot-proofing since many people do their children's straps up too loose to begin with. And if you double this with a coat then they're going to be even more loose, which is a much bigger problem. But I do see that it's much more difficult to get a harness tight to the body when the child is wearing a coat, even if you are pulling it as tight as it can possibly go.

Celebelly · 03/11/2019 16:03

I also have doubts that people will adjust straps to account for coats/not coats every time they use the seat, particularly as some are more fiddly to adjust than others. It's reasonably likely that people in a hurry will just put their child in and fasten the straps however they were last left and imagine it's 'good enough'.

TabbyMumz · 03/11/2019 18:00

"What do you think about the "strap test" people have mentioned several times on this thread? Useful or irrelevant?"....
I've already said what I think of that. The examples I've seen is where people dont seem to tighten the straps very much over the coat at all, so when they take the coat off and strap them in again, they are surprised to see the straps are loose. Well surprise surprise, they would be. Whereas if you tighten the straps with the coat on sufficently in the first place there will be very little difference. Plus a lot depends on the type of coat. I could argue that they are more snug to the straps and more secure with a coat on, than without, depending on the size of the child of course. There is also a train of thought that more padding reduce the straps digging in to the body more in an accident. I saw a programme once where after an accident, the strap mark's could clearly be seen across the body in a man who wore no coat, but in a man who wore a thick coat, there was less damage. Plus with some of these puffa style coats nowadays, you can squeeze them flat between two fingers, so you can easily do that with a strap just aswell.
And finally, lots of people on here have advocated a special type of blanket that lies between the child and the seat, but the advice posted seems to say nothing like that should be used.

gemma19846 · 03/11/2019 19:00

Yes Tabbymumz i take off their coats THEN tighten their straps to keep them safe 🤷‍♀️ You are obviously right and the rest of the world is wrong 🙄🙄🙄

Please create an account

To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.

This thread is closed and is no longer accepting replies. Click here to start a new thread.