Budget end car seats

[Thegirlhasnamechanged]

Do budget car seats that aren’t extremely unsafe exist?! I feel like I’ve gone down a black hole of car seats and am no clearer for it.

car seat would be used once a week by Grandma to pick children up from childcare and understandably cannot afford to spend £100+ per seat due to having to buy one for each child and they wouldn’t get much use. Looking at group 1/2/3 as DC are 2 and 4 but 4 year old is 94cm/11kg so not big enough to use the regular seat belt. 2 year old is 82cm/10kg so plenty of growing room before he can go in a group 2

grandmas car doesn’t have isofix so not an option to leave our car seats in the nursery storage area as ours are isofix.

im ready to sack off the search and just go with the inconvenience of public transport but Grandma is quite determined to get a seat.

does such thing exist?

the closest I’ve found is the Joie Elevate / Elevate 2.0 but because it’s so different from the ones we have in our car I’m just not sure how convinced I am

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MNHQ

Are they still rear facing in your car?

I went down the same rabbit hole and ended up with the Joie Stages (DS was only 1 at the time). My understanding is that Joie is one of the better brands. The have also brought Graco so they now have basically the same seats with cheaper fabrics to bring down the price a bit.

grandmas car doesn’t have isofix so not an option to leave our car seats in the nursery storage area as ours are isofix.

You probably already have but it's worth double checking this - some isofix seats can also be fitted with a seatbelt.

How far is she driving them and what kind of roads? I’m keen on having good car seats but if she’s driving them 5-10 minutes through slow roads I wouldn’t worry too much about the car seat spec compared to if she’s going on faster roads and / or a longer drive. I think Joie is one of the cheaper brands that still offers a reasonable quality seat. I know they say don’t buy second hand but could you ask around friends if anyone is getting rid of a toddler seat, if you know who it’s coming from and trust they haven’t had any accidents?

2 year old is still rear facing and 4 year old is currently forward facing (bad ear infection may or may not be causing her to vomit rear facing or massive coincidence) but ideally will be going back rear facing when antibiotics have finished - unless the ear thing was nothing to do with it.

Both are in I-spin safe and as far as I could see these are definitely isofix only but if you know otherwise please let me know ☺️

it’s not a far drive from nursery as it’s just under 3 miles away but is on country roads with a 60 limit. Grandma is a pretty safe driver but you see some bonkers driving on those roads from other drivers

I don't really like the Elevate TBH. The main issue with it being if Grandma's seatbelts aren't really deep set in the seat you'll get a loose fit on it, which is no good, but it's also just very basic in general and it is likely that it offers very basic safety.

What about Joie Steadi R129? It should fit your eldest for another year, maybe even two forward facing, your youngest can be rear facing as long as needed. Once the eldest outgrows, then you can get a cheap but decent high backed booster for the older child and the youngest can keep using it.

If you need 2x seats now so they can both go together, then I'd get Britax Evolva for the eldest as this is more substantial than the Joie Elevate, and also converts into a booster. None of these cheaper 123 seats are simple to switch from harness to booster mode though, so no use as a single seat once eldest is too big for the harness.

Not quite as cheap as the Elevate as an option, but still not crazy, and not so much of a step down in safety.

You could also look at the original Joie Steadi, or Joie Stages (Graco Enhance is the same seat) if you need it cheaper than the R129, but I'd personally opt for the R129 version if you are likely to FF long term because they have improved the FF fitting method in the new version, and I think it's worth the extra £50, but appreciate it is a jump up.

The i-spin seats are isofix only. Actually at 94cm and 11kg your 4yo has at least another couple of years if not longer to reach the minimum for a high backed booster. Longer than this to reach the maximum on an 18kg/105cm limit seat. Joie Stages has a long backrest and would probably accommodate him well in a 5 point harness (preferably rear facing).

Sorry will stop the spam now 😅but have just thought - actually, if you need 2x seats, are happy to FF eldest, and want to pay less than £100 per seat, go for:

Britax Evolva for eldest
Joie Tilt or Graco Extend (same seat different covers) for youngest.

My thinking is - the tilt is shorter in the shell, but since your LOs are both on the smaller side, the youngest can possibly use this rear facing until approx 3-4 years old, by which point they can swap into the Evolva in the harnessed mode, because your eldest should be 15kg by then and be able to use a high back.

Extended rear facing didn't exist when mine were small. They had forward facing seats with harnesses that could be removed once they were 25kg. Group 123. Seen them on sale recently for £60 or so. They attached with a seat belt whilst using the harness as isofix wasn't widely available either.

As far as safety, my dd1 was in a motorway accident and was fine safely secured in the above seat (obviously we replaced it) remember the fit to the car is the most important thing, it needs to be snug against the back etc. a badly fitted seat is not safe whatever the ratings