Car seat help

[RedPoppy345]

Hi all,

I'm so baffled at the moment, I don't know how those who have picked their car seats have done it.

After spending a day researching into which car seat and pushchair I want and almost shortlisting a few, I feel like I'm back at square 1 again.

I am looking for a car seat with an isofix swivel base (initially narrowed down to Joie and cybex cloud z - not sure if there are others) and a 0+ car seat. But then I read how some pushchairs can come with a carrycot and it may be possible to fix that to the car seat?! What now puts me off the cloud z car seat is that it's not completely flat and I will be doing car journeys to my parents who are an hour's drive away which is over the 30 min allowed time for that age.

So my question, is there a swivel car seat which I can use for baby to lie flat till approx 6m with a carry handle (bonus if it can be used for overnight sleeping) that can also be affixed to the pushchair. Happy to buy whatever adaptors I need for this. Would this fall under group 0? Can you go straight into group 1 car seats once they are too big for the carrycot?

I was initially looking at the iCandy peach pushchair which would be compatible with the cybex cloud z base.

Doesn't help that all the shops are closed at the moment and anxiety has kicked in that I'm completely unprepared for my first DC. Just want it to be safe, practical and as "multi-purpose" as possible.

Will appreciate any advice you all have.

TIA!

Maybe @BertieBotts can help.

They are really confusing. No idea what's best. I can say what I did which was got a maxi cosi cabriofix and base (on sale at the time, easy to carry with handle and fitted the pram) then replaced the whole lot with a Britax Romer (all in one with base, swivels, does not leave car) when she was 18 months.

There are some Carrycots that are also a car seat—called a car cot—I believe some of them can be used for overnight sleeping but they aren’t as safe as RF car seats, as while some do score rather well the dummy can move around a lot in the cot. The car cot’s can only be used with their own pushchair, eg Maxi Cosi Jade can only be used on MC pushchairs and the Jane matrix can only be used on Jane prams. These are the only two that I know about. In theory you can go straight to a group 1 car seat, yet a rear facing one would be better.

Some car seats do have a somewhat lie flat, such as the Joie I-level can recline but not flat to 180°. Joie i-level doesn’t have a swivel base and is isofix only, there’s also the Nuna arra which is similar. Cybex cloud z is the only infant carrier that swivels hut generally it is easy to take the infant carrier of the base and turn it for easy loading anyway.

Lullaby trust seems to say that two hours is fine but I’ve seen half an hour for

Thank you so much for your reply. Would you say the swivel bases are a bit gimmicky then?

If it's easy with the standard bases, I'm happy to go for one of them. It just seemed easy with the swivel base and time saving to be able to grab the infant carrier on the go and click and turn back into place when ready to leave.

Would a group 0+ seat be ok for 1 hours drive though? Is the slight incline safe enough? Or is the incline only a problem if they're sleeping?

Which car seat comes highly recommended in that case? As I've seen comments to leave them rear facing until approx 15 months? It'd be good to have a fixed base as unlikely to keep swopping cars and have a seat from birth till 15 months then keep the same base but group 1 seat to upgrade to when the time comes.

I suppose then would it be best to stick to a completely separate pushchair and carry cot too and not worry about compatibility?

In theory, yes they are a bit of a gimmick, especially since bases are generally so expensive! And group 1 seats don't tend to need bases anyway! But, some bases can take the next stage car seat, called “modular” seats, BeSafe, Joie, Maxi Cosi and Cybex do this with only the cybex having the second stage swivel on base Z. These can be good but then if you have DC2 soon, you probably won’t be able to use the toddler seat and infant seat at the same time (unless you seatbelt the infant seat in), so you’d probably have to get another car seat for DC1, or more long lasting a 25KG seat. With the modular seats though, if you tend to swap cars a lot and leave one base in each car it’s easier to transport as you only click the seat on and off.

I’ve only actually seen the half an hour rule or MN, as when I looked at the lullaby trust it said up to 2 hours, nothing about the half an hour rule.

I think you said you’re getting an iCandy peach? That does come with a carrycot and car seat adaptors so you can put the car seat on if one of the following brands:
Maxi Cosi
BeSafe
Joie
Nuna
Cybex
Recaro (Zero.1 elite and Dalia elite need an interim adaptor)

Hi sorry, didn't see tag earlier. You have about three different questions so I'll try and go into all of them!

Lie flat position/recline
The 30 minute time limit (which is just a recommendation anyway) is only for the first 4 weeks. And this is most likely cautious for full term babies, as the study which led to this recommendation was done using premature and low birth weight babies. Will you be driving to your parents' in that time? If so maybe it's best just to stop once on the way, take DC out for 5 mins, continue. The reason the incline can be a problem is that if the baby's chin is on their chest, it's hard for them to take in enough oxygen. That's not an immediate danger, but if they're in that position for long enough then it will start to reduce their oxygen saturation levels which is dangerous over time.

You are mainly looking to avoid the chin on chest position, but any foward curve of the baby's neck is non ideal. This is caused partly by the angle of the car seat, and partly because of the curved shape of infant seats, and/or inserts which push the head forwards.

There are some properly lie flat cots that you can legally use in the car but if approved to the older regulation, they don't need to be crash tested. This isn't always made clear. The newer regulation ones do, but in any case they tend to be really expensive and/or only compatible with specific brand prams, and you can only use them until your child starts to roll over. Some people love them but I think for most people the cost/benefit ratio just isn't there.

The Cybex Cloud can't lie flat in the car, only on the buggy/outside of the car, so won't help with the positioning for longer drives. Although I actually find the shape of the inserts tends to give quite good positioning anyway, as the body insert is boosted higher than the head one.

There are three which do lie flat(ter) in the car - Joie i-Level, Nuna Arra, and the new Maxi Cosi Marble. There's no specific research that says you can ignore the time limits, but obviously you can use your judgement and make a decision for yourself.

The other option rather than a lie flat seat is to look at seats which have inserts or are shaped in such a way that they keep the baby flatter - I find the Maxi Cosi Pebble is good for this and Avionaut Ultralite and Britax Babysafe 2 i-size.

One other thing to bear in mind (sorry!!) is the slope of the rear seats in your car - sometimes if they have a steep incline that can affect the fit and angle of any seat, so you might want to look at this before you go any further into looking at specific seats.

Time/lasting
If you want the car seat to last at least 15 months you need one with a height limit over 80cm, preferably over 85cm. Some are smaller and don't last the first year. However this isn't necessarily a problem as you can get loads of seats now which rear face for the next stage as well, so if you need to change seats before 15m you can get a rear facing one, or one that does both directions.

Swivel/base
The Cybex is the only base that swivels. There are a couple of seats by Recaro which are bigger rotating seats that have a smaller baby carrier insert into the top of them, but neither are lie flat. But what you describe - being able to click the seat easily on and off the base - you don't need a swivel for that, that would apply to absolutely any car seat base, and most infant car seats have bases available.

Hope that helps. Happy to go into more detail (😬) on anything.