Second/travel car seat - Graco Extend R129?

[Merrow]

I have an absolutely titchy DS2 - he's 15 months (12 corrected) and just growing out of 3-6 month clothes. I think he's 0.9 centile for height. I'm looking for a second car seat for travel / leaving with my parents and wondered if he should still be in an infant carrier or whether we could move to the next stage?

We have an axkid that DS1 will be out of next year for our own car, so something lightweight(ish) that could fit it a number of cars and we could take on holiday would be ideal. I'd like him to be rear-facing as long as possible, but considering his size I can't say I'm worried about him outgrowing an 18kg seat that early, and I saw that the Graco Extend LX R129 was £80 on Amazon. I thought Graco were considered pretty good and had the same safety standards as Joie, but I can't find out much about this particular seat. If it's no good I'll obviously pay more, but if it's safe and a bargain then that would be better!

Thanks

[BertieBotts]

Yes it's a really good option! It's very similar to Joie Steadi R129 :) Has the new R129 safety standard as well so even better than some of the other Joie seats.

[BertieBotts]

That said, you can absolutely still use an infant carrier as long as he fits into it - there is nothing unsafe about them at a certain age. They tend to be more portable for travel so can be a good option too. I have heard of people using infant carriers for occasional use (and children on small centiles) past age 2, rarely even past age 3.

[Merrow]

Thanks! We have the Avionaut pixel pro as his main seat, but I don't fancy it getting chucked around in the hold/ potentially lost. I remember vaguely reading something about infant carriers being one of the safest seats, but I wasn't sure if that was just because they fit babies well rather than anything intrinsically better about them.

If the Graco one is good then we'll get that, as I remember with DS1 (who, in contrast, is I think 97th centile for height) there was a really awkward time where nothing that was the right size for him and rear facing was actually in any way portable.

[BertieBotts]

Yes exactly - the idea that they are safer is a huge generalisation. I can go into it if you want but it's probably not very interesting

The Graco will be fine as long as he can sit up unaided which I'm sure at 15 months he can! I can't think that there will be any signficant differences in crash safety as the belt path is similar - the Graco is probably a bit more upright, which is slightly advantageous. So your only advantage of the Pixel will be the weight and pram compatability.

[Merrow]

Actually, I'm geeky enough to be interested if you wouldn't mind!

[BertieBotts]

Ha no worries, me too

I think basically it comes from a couple of different things.

First off an outdated one - when all you could get in the UK were forward facing seats, people said keep them in their infant carrier as long as you possibly can, to avoid forward facing too soon - this obviously doesn't apply if you're moving to a rear facing seat.

Then there's an argument about recline - basically the recline in infant seats is much more than the recline in next stage seats, whether you're talking old-fashioned forward facing seats, or the Nordic style seats which used to start at 9kg, like Axkid Minikid. Actually, even Minikid is sort of an exception here because it doesn't have the 9kg minimum, but most seats of that type did, and as you know with the Minikid, it's really not suitable from birth - they need to be tall enough and also the angle is much more upright, it's really designed for toddlers or at the least an older baby who is sitting well by themselves. So there's an argument that just because your baby is 9kg and the seat is rear facing, it's not a good idea to use a seat like that upright when they are only 6 months old or so. This is a bit of a niche one which you'd basically hear in some Northern European countries where they have this very big thing about babies' backs neeing the correct support until 9-10 months when they can sit on their own and not sitting them up too early as they say it causes scoliosis (which is unlikely, I think).

Anyway, that one is actually outdated as well - you don't get those seats which start at 9kg any more. The majority of the seats on the market these days are combo like the Graco which can do from birth (theoretically) up to 18kg/105cm so they recline perfectly fine for a 6 month old, even though sometimes those seats don't give a great fit for a tiny baby (under 3-4 months). And the most modern seats like the Minikid 4, those go from 61cm so they are designed for a baby who can sit with support and do have more recline compared to the older Minikid.

So then the last one which I think is probably what people say now - basically what they mean is that the infant stage of car seat, it really doesn't matter hugely which one you get because they all tend to do really well in independent testing like the ADAC tests. It's probably because they all have a very similar design and the design hasn't changed hugely since the late 1990s - we see the same belt path, the same harness style and similar shape of seat. It just works really well. The only thing that has significantly changed today is the inserts and the use of a headrest, plus much deeper side impact protection - but even the deep side wings have been standard for about 10-15 years. In terms of actual crash protection, you can't get much better than this for younger babies - they are easy to protect because they are small (a larger weight is more unwieldy for rear facing, and forward facing is less protective) and the seats have to be rear facing by law and they all have this same belt path with the anti-rebound (or a base with a support leg).

Even seats from companies like Team Tex/Nania and Cosatto where their other car seats in other categories haven't done very well in the ADAC tests tend to do fine in the infant carrier category. So that's what people mean when they say the infant stage is "safer" - it's not really that there's something inherently safer about those seats, it's more that the design of them is all very similar and doesn't tend to go wrong very often. Whereas when you're choosing a seat for the second stage, it's not so true that you can go for anything - there is much more variance in the quality and crash safety performance. (HBBs are in between - there are some differences in performamce, they don't matter as much as in the toddler stage).

This all gets lost in translation though and people say stuff like the infant carriers "are tested to the same standard" which doesn't mean anything, all seats are tested to the same standards, or even "tested to a higher standard" which is definitely a misunderstanding.

The reality is probably just that toddler seats have the hardest job of all because you have to restrain this fairly heavy, large child within the seat itself AND you have to restrain the seat to the car, and in doing both of those things there is a much wider margin for error. Infant carriers are easy to get right because infants are light and not difficult to restrain, HBBs are easy to get right because the seat is mostly a pre-crash belt positioner, with the seatbelt doing most of the work. Toddler seats are hard to do well, so you should pick a company who have a good track record. This Graco is Joie and they are good. Much better RF than FF, but you want to use it rear facing anyway, so no problem.

[Caspianberg]

The Graco extend is a good travel option.
FYI we have the original, so not the r129. We also bought as a non isofix option for travel.
I have just taken it out of the loft to sell as no longer need. My Ds is just turning 4 years, he’s 104cm and still fit in the Graco with plenty of space tbh. So it’s not that small a shell. It’s probably bigger height wise than his isofix maxi cosi. He’s also under 18kg still so theoretically could use a while longer

We are just selling as it’s been fine travelling with hiring cars and as second seat when grandparents visit with hire car. But now he’s older I’m swapping to a high back booster for next travels as lighter and more compact which we need as will be travelling half trip via train.

[Merrow]

Thanks @BertieBotts, that's really helpful! The point about the alternative to an infant carrier being forward facing makes so much sense as to why it's trotted out that they're safer.

Just to pick your brain some more, do you think it's worth getting a HBB for travel or is it fine to hire them? I've avoided hiring them after we had a really bad experience with a place which had a list of all their car seat models and let us choose a specific one, and then we turned up to a completely different reality. But that was when DS1 was 2, and he's now big (117cm, 21kg) so we've accepted that on holiday he'll be in a HBB as we're not faffing about with tethers. If they're much of a muchness safety wise then we can hire them with the car.

Having said that, my parents would be happy to have a folding HBB as it would be easier for them to store (they currently have two bulky HBB for my older nieces), so if still better to take your own then that's fine as it would definitely be used.

[BertieBotts]

I simplified that a bit - I'd say for basic safety, for infant carriers it doesn't matter what you get, for high backed boosters it matters a bit what you get, for the toddler stage it matters a lot.

HBBs basically all do the same thing in terms of routing the seatbelt, but if you look at crash tests you do see a fair bit of difference between the flimsy ones and the better-performing ones. You can also get really poor belt routing in some of the cheaper, especially combination ones, where it puts the lap belt too high up on the child's tummy which causes a problem.

But you can still get some cheaper HBB which are fine - at a very basic level, it comes down to the lap belt position. Ideally with a seatbelt you want the lap belt to be in contact with your pelvis because it's a very strong bone. On a child without a booster seat, it's not over their pelvis, it's over their tummy, which is soft and squishy and full of stuff that will bleed if you put enough force on it, so you really want to check that lap belt position is good with any kind of booster seat.

Then the HBB's secondary function is positioning the shoulder belt. Some combination, especially cheaper, older ones are a problem here, especially in countries like Greece/Portugal/Cyprus etc where they don't have a very strong car seat culture and the designs that are sold there are often the cheapest/more outdated types. Or in the US they still use this type quite a lot. Because what you got in older type HBBs was the shoulder belt guide was fixed and doesn't move, or it's sort of on top of the seat. This is a problem because it's too high for younger children using the seat and too low for older children using the seat.

The majority of HBB seats on sale in the UK have a headrest which moves up and down and the belt guide is attached to the headrest so it can move too. That's a much better design. But sometimes when you hire a seat abroad you won't have this option.

Then the last function of the HBB is to offer head and body protection in a side impact. If this is made well it can have a good protective effect. Some of the crash tests with the best seats for this are really impressive. But on the other end some of the cheaper/basic or not so well made seats they offer little to no protection in a side impact. Without this you might as well have a backless booster. And if the high back booster is damaged or has been thrown around a lot then this side/head protection can easily get damaged which again it wouldn't be able to do the same job either.

So personally, I'd probably take your own HBB when the time comes too. I have used one with a car share scheme, and I was fine with it - it was in good condition and a good model with good safety features plus DS1 was technically tall enough not to need one. But car hire places have such a reputation for providing old, outdated or even broken seats that I just wouldn't trust it. You might as well even just bring your own backless one in that case.