£125 vs £25 car seats- what is the actual difference?

[lelarose]

I see Asda are selling car seats for 9 month+ for £25 and kiddicare,com have ones at £36, etc. And the ones in mother care cost £125 odds. Just wondering what is the actual difference? Obviously am prepared to pay more if they are safer, but surely they all have to comply to certain safety standards?

Has anyone experience of the cheaper ones?

Getting away from the whole rf v ff debate I have looked at the Asda seats both 0-9m and 9+m and to be honest they both look pretty crap. The 0-9m is very light and flimsy and the 9m+ looks a bit bog-standard.
If money is tight then obviously you go for the best car seat in your price range however cheap it is.

Be careful when going to independent shops for advice. I went to our local experienced car seat/pram shop and they told me that rear facing seats are not sold in the UK and that Britax and Maxi Cosi don't do one as they are no good. Both blatant lies which I found out when I went to another pram shop and he showed me the Britax one. I eventually got a recaro polaric and it is great, about £200

I agree that poorly fitted seats, rf or ff are then no good but of all the seats I have had for 4 dc's it is the forward facing that were harder to fit. The dealer I got the recaro off will refit mine for as long as I have the receipt

And why is isofix not safe?
We use it and it is great for ease of fitting. I know my sis was confused and wanted to use the seatbelt with it but you don't need to

If both installation methods (ISOFix/seat belt) are used with a seat then extra crash forces can be exerted on the frame of the seat and the seat may not perform as expected and possibly break/fail. It's a choice of either/or not both together.

Some people have reservations about ISOFix or LATCH as it is known in the US as there can be failures with the anchors that may not be easily spotted except on inspection - and how many of us check the installation of our seats each time we use them. Super LATCH is apparently more prone to failures (SL is used for seats for children 40lbs+).

ah thats correct about the weight limit on the carseat i linked to truthsweet - apologies, however it would be a good forward facing seat for the money,but i would keep your lo in the cabrio for a while (16-18m) so long as they are under 13kg.

It's easy to get wrong - just one character different. Mothercare do on their website (well at least they did until someone made a complaint to TS).

Also, I bought a Nania combi seat from Kiddicare years ago with the express purpose of rfing (had a light toddler at 11kg) but she was already to heavy to rf in it (was to be a spare car seat).

Thanks all for the links and other info.

Have to say, it never ceases to amaze me how you can start on thread on pretty much any random topic on this site and folk will always manage to have an arguement!

Cheers anyway for your replies. My partner did ask today about the rear facing seats for older kids so where do their legs go then? Maybe we are both equally thick but I kind of thought he had a point.

Can you tell I am a first time mother?!

i have pics on my profile of my rear-facers. no problem with legs!

i think it's also important to remember that there is a difference between just meeting safety standards, and far exceeding safety standards.

you may well find that the more expensive seats are more expensive because they have had more rigorous testing and because they have more safety features than the "basic" seats.

Without getting into the argument about ff v rf, I have access to the latest Which report and the £40 best buy was a Hauck Zero Plus for £47, 0+ (up to 13kg). Concord, Britax, Kiddy, Cybex and Graco also feature on the table with plenty at £80 mark. FWIW, you can often buy car seats at great prices from TKMaxx, I've got ones recommended by which there for half recc. price.

I do believe you get what you pay for in terms of features (e.g. recline), comfort, padding, ease of use and safety. I've had/bought about a dozen car seats with 4 dc and stick to maxi cosi as I have to hand them down and they're sturdy, easy to use, easy to fit and comfortable with great safety records. If a brand appears on the which list year after year, I think there's something in it!

Oh, they just cut their legs off

They just sit with their legs bent and resting against the rear seat. DD2 sleeps loads better in the rf as she is comfier, also in the ff maxi cosi we borrowed she was terrified by the way it restrained her when we braked sharply