Multimac Car Seat experience

[user1468099599]

Has anyone purchased a multimac car seat recently? I am having difficulty arranging a viewing (they come to your house to demonstrate the car seat).

I would love to hear other people's experience with the company as I'm getting very poor communication from them.

Multimac car seats transform the back of your car into 3 or 4 child seats without having to buy a new car or trying to fit in several high back seats/baby seats.

I've had a difficult time getting hold of them too, I tried to arrange them to come out and never heard back. Annoying!

I haven't used one personally, but honestly, I think the seat is an innovative idea but is actually a very poor solution. It's extremely expensive once you've added on all the extras and if you look at the photos of the crash testing with 4 12 year old sized dummies, they look really cramped. Plus there is no side impact protection and as soon as your oldest child reaches 12 years old you'll have to uninstall the whole system.

It's probably worth it if you have triplets or twins very close in age to other child(ren) and/or an extremely tight budget car wise, but other than that I think it would be safer, cheaper and more convenient to just buy separate car seats for the children and possibly upgrade your car to a 7 seater.

While I can see your concerns, a lot of your information isn't correct. Firstly, for someone like me with four young children, if you add up the cost I'll be paying out on car seats it isn't much more to just get the multimac. There are side protections available depending on the age of the child. And there are also adapters that you can upgrade the seat to fit an adult (on most models). The safety standards on a lot of car seats is actually very scary to see what can pass their tests but this one checks out safety wise.

I have a seven seater car already but I worry more about having children in the back seat as they're so close to the back of the car that i think it's really dangerous.

Yes, side impact protection on the forward facing seat up to age 6 only. Whereas my tall 7yo has full side impact protection in his high backed booster.

There is very little side impact on the rear facing module and this only goes up to 13kg unlike extended rear facing seats. A few years ago they had a promise of an extended rear facing clip-in "coming soon" but this doesn't seem to have materialised.

As the smaller seats are only 330mm across it would have to be an extremely slim adult to fit in there - I'm slim myself (8 stone) but my hips wouldn't fit in that space. They fit within the 400mm size of the "superclub" seat, but anyone bigger would struggle.

Lastly I don't see any evidence that they've passed more than the standard ECE r44/04 crash test. It certainly uses the bench approach of these tests. Though I appreciate it's an impressive feat that it can pass these with so many different configurations, it doesn't mean that it passes well. Many manufacturers such as Britax and Maxi Cosi use higher stress tests including a side impact test and involve crashing the seat within an actual car to ascertain how far the dummy if thrown and whether it makes contact with the vehicle itself. I also think this is likely to be very expensive for Multimac which is probably why they don't do it. Britax can test one seat in one or two configurations and sell millions. Multimac have to test theirs in 11 configurations and probably sell a much smaller number.

I don't think it's necessarily terrible. I think it must be very sturdy to manage all of this, and that certainly gives me more confidence in it than a Nania seat for example. I just think that its claims of being a wonder system which solves all problems is marketing speak.

Of course the problem you mention with seven seaters and children being too close to the back of the car is also a serious problem. So it's difficult for parents in that situation to decide. You have to weigh up the pros and cons of each system really.

I can't comment on the seat itself yet as I haven't received it but I can't say I'm happy with the service received from the company so far. We ordered our seat in mid May and were told it would be delivered second week in July. I contacted them in that week and was told there'd been delays in production and delivery would be put back but given no idea how long or offered any form of apology. We're now a further month waiting and we receive an email saying the seat 'may' be dispatched in 'week 31'. Contacted them by phone as we really need it for a family holiday next week and was told yes it was ready and would probably be with us by Friday 'if' it was dispatched the following day, again no offer of any kind of apology and as yet no confirmation of dispatch. I'd expect more when you consider the cost of these seats.

Despite not being informed of dispatch we did receive our multimac on the Friday as stated.

Have to say we are very pleased with it. The unit fits neatly in to the back seats and is very firmly secured. It is quite heavy so would generally require 2 people to fit but we fitted ours ourselves and it was fairly straight forward.
There is plenty of room in the seats for the kids to grow in to but ours is a 3 seater superclub model so I wouldn't know if the same could be said for the 4 seater versions.

The seats appear to be comfortable and well padded with the additional head rests (yvla) providing good side support for naps.

Whilst doable I wouldn't want to be switching this unit between cars with any kind of regularity due to its bulk and weight.

Hi PadrePablo - what are the seats like for adults to sit in. Is it just the two outside seats that take adults?

Thanks

Hi user1472415409, I tried sitting in one of the outer seats yesterday and with the head rest removed it was doable however my head was against the roof of the car because of the additional height (mitsubishi outlander). I wouldn't be overly confident that the seat insert would cope too well with frequent use by an adult either. I'm average height and weight but wouldn't want to be doing anything other than very short journeys in it. We wouldn't intend to have any adults in the seats ourselves. As far as I remember it as only the two outer seats that they stated could take an adult

Hi PadrePablo - thanks for the info that's very helpful - it was a Outlander I would be putting one in if I getone.

Hi there

I am selling our Multimac due to our children outgrowing it if anyone is interested.?
It's a 4 seater and I've got 4 sets of headrests and a baby seat.
We live in West Yorkshire and you would need to collect please.
Let me know if you're interested??
Kind regards
Sabrina

I've messaged you Sabrina

Hi S4bsn,
I presume you have probably sold your multimac by now but we are looking for one to buy at present. Our car would fit the largest 4 seater 1320 model & we would need a baby seat also. Anyone wishing to sell please contact me - by email or tel 07970 297553 . thanks A

Are you still looking, McKiernan? I am putting our 4 seater on eBay tonight. We do have 2 minimacs but they have been in our garage for ages so not sure if they're in good enough condition to sell - would need to investigate. PM me if you're interested.

I've pm'd you as we're after one :) thanks!

...don't suppose anyone's got another one back there...? We've got a 5yo and a set of twins arriving soon....

Maritz - our 4-seater is on eBay if you want to take a look. Only one babyseat (minimac) being sold with it though.

Thanks for the heads up bellabelly! Am watching closely....

grin

Oops - I meant !

Hiya I'm after buying a 4 seater multi Mac with 2 baby seats also was wondering if everyone on here sold there? Or anyone selling?

Hi there, not selling unfortunately, but just be careful with the baby seat - the Minimac. There are no problems, but if you are getting two and fitting them into a 1320 (the biggest 4 seater), make sure you are aware that one of the berths in the middle needs the Minimac-R.