High back booster advice

[LGBirmingham]

Ds has nearly outgrown his maxi cosi mica. Trying to sus out what to buy early so we have time to get the right thing. The mica was a good seat but not great for ds who is average size but with a longer back so will outgrow it a bit sooner than we expected.

Cozy n safe high back boosters seem very good value but are they any good? Does anyone have experience? Ideally we onlycwant to buy one seat to see him through now. We have an Arthur for my mum's car and happy with that but he doesn't use it very often so it doesn't really get any wear and tear.

Otherwise we'd probably get a maxi cosi again or a britax. Anyone have any advice?

Remember their growth slows right down, and tends to mostly be in the legs, so even if he only has a centimetre or so to go you could have six months left in the seat. It's roughly 6cm total height growth per year but they do lose the toddler dumpiness and get really leggy. If you did want to continue in the harness then you get another 2cm ish from a Britax seat so that could be another 6-12 months and if you want longer then the Joie Bold is a good option.

I measured my 2.5yo's seat and he's at 34cm strap height right now. So only another 5cm until his seat is outgrown but I reckon it will be another 2 years ish if he's the same size as his brother. Maybe a bit longer as I remember him fitting in the infant seat for longer. It's all a very inexact science though. Keep an eye on him, it's not the end of the world if the straps are less than 1cm below the shoulder so you can go with that for a few days while waiting for a replacement if he has a sudden growth spurt, you're ok to let him go right up to the limit.

That's true, he could just grow a lot in the legs and not in the torso so actually be fine for a while. We'll definitely try and max this seat out for now.

Yeah it makes sense :)

BTW just to add another experience - DS2 sleeps really well in the Advansafix and has slept in it a few times, reclined/not reclined, even though he had mostly stopped napping in the car by the time we moved him into this. The photo with no straps on is where we had stopped and undone his straps and he STILL didn't wake up - though to be fair to him this was right at the end of a cross Europe drive. He was nearly 4 in both of these pictures. No recline because it didn't fit reclined next to the baby seat! I think he fitted into the harness until he was about 4.5. Personally I much prefer this harness to the Joie one, I find Joie a pain even though we do also have a Joie seat (Spin 360) and I do think it's a great seat for the price. The Advansafix actually seems to support sleep better than the Joie 360 Spin which we get head flop in. Maybe our back seats are quite reclined.

The Britaxes are a bit less padded than Maxi Cosi or Cybex. Both of those brands are very plush and comfy. Though the "Pro" version claims to have some extra comfort features.

The Joie Bold is massively huger than other harnessed seats - basically with most of the 123 type seats, they have some kind of mechanism that stops the headrest going up past a certain point when the harness is in, then when you convert it to a booster you undo that mechanism and the headrest goes up much higher up to the size of a 10-12 year old. The Joie Bold doesn't have this mechanism, so the harness can be moved with the headrest right up to the height of a 10 year old, even though you probably wouldn't use it this long in most cases. All the Joie seats which convert to booster are like that. It is an unusual feature, and useful to know if you have tall-but-light children or ever need a car seat without top tether.

If you did want Joie Bold (sorry to put a spanner in the works) you might want to get it sooner rather than later though, because the newer version which is the i-Bold is limited to 105cm on the harness, though I do think that is a regulatory limit and not a physical one, I haven't seen it in person so I can't check. If I happen to get to a Smyths any time soon, then I will see if they have it, but I am not planning to go there currently, and nowhere else stocks it where I am now.

Yes of course, I'll have a look in the daylight tomorrow for you no problem!

@ninebiscuits Thank you

@BertieBotts you have a very cute child! Is the advansa fix still really heavy and bulky like a toddler seat or is it closer to a booster?

You've mentioned buying non isize versions of seats a few times. I'm a little concerned about that because of the side impact protection thing. Do you not think that's an issue?

Children are only safe in a high backed booster when they are able to sit correctly without slouching/slipping their arm over the seatbelt/leaning forwards or to the side etc. even when asleep, which most kids aren't ready for until at least age 5-6. It's also recommended that they are at least 105cm/18kg to physically fit a high backed booster properly.
By far the safest option for a 3 year old is a rear facing seat. At his age his cervical vertebrae will not have fully ossified (typically happens somewhere between age 4 and 6). In a crash while forward facing, his proportionately oversized toddler head would be thrown forward at high speed, which could result in the soft unossified cartilage in his cervical spine pulling apart, resulting in dislocation of the cervical vertebrae and catastrophic spinal cord injury. If he was rear facing in a crash his head and body would just be pushed backwards into the car seat, massively reducing the load on his neck, and significantly reducing the risk of serious injury or death.

There are rear facing seats that can last until 125cm/36kg, including the BeSafe Stretch, the Axkid Minikid 4, the Axkid Movekid, Britax MaxSafe Pro and Britax Safeway M. Most kids would get to age 6+ in these seats, by which stage they would usually be ready for a high backed booster.
If you are adamant that he must forward face, then the only harnessed seat that will take him beyond 105cm/18kg would be the Joie Bold/Bold R (but NOT the new I-Bold which is just a 105cm/18kg seat). These go to 125cm/25kg.

It's only the Joie Bold / Cozy n Safe Hudson that you'd want the non i-size version of.

This is because in their R44 versions, they have 25kg weight limit harness and no standing height limit.

I forgot this page exists (most of these seats are no longer sold) - it has max harness heights for both of these seats. https://csftl.org/european-car-seats-25-kg-weight-limit-seats/

But for whatever reason (maybe to do with getting the i-size certification) both Joie and Cozy n Safe when they have updated these seat models to the R129 approved version, they have limited the harness to 105cm only - via the approval, so it's up to you as a parent to monitor your child's height and stop using the harness at that size, I don't know whether they are closer to the 37-39cm max height like other 105cm/18kg limit seats.

You do get this sometimes, for example the Britax Advansafix 2 and 3 both had a 25kg harness limit, though it was still only 39cm tall (!) but the Advansafix 4 suddenly dropped down to an 18kg limit. And originally Britax Two Way Elite was approved to 25kg both RF and FF but then in 2013 they re-released it and changed the FF harnessed weight limit to 18kg.

I think (but not 100% sure) this is to do with crash testing guidelines getting stricter over time, because you will always get a worse-looking result when you use a higher-weight dummy, and I can't think of any other reason to downgrade a weight or height limit, aside from when regulations put caps on it, e.g. the i-size thing.

The i-size Joie Bold harness limit is 105cm / 22kg, and the i-size Cozy n Safe Hudson is 105cm / 18kg (so it's not extended harness at all!)

It's nothing to do in these cases with the non i-size versions being better, it's about them having the extended harnessing capacity. These i-size seats offer no advantage over any other i-size 123 type seat, so you might as well stick with the ones with a proven safety record. The side impact protection on Cozy n Safe Hudson looks fairly minimal, no crash test to back this up so just a hunch. It is a budget focused not a safety focused brand. Joie Bold got quite a good rating for side impact crash testing with the ADAC testing, but didn't do so well for frontal impact. However, this might be due to the higher weight dummy being used. There are barely any 25kg forward facing harness seats which have even been through the ADAC testing so it's really hard to compare.

Essentially, if you want a harness over ~40cm torso height then you're in slim pickings when it comes to options. It comes down to whether you want something with a better safety rating, or whether the harnessing itself is more important, as it would be for example if you have a just-turned 3yo who is already 40cm torso height, or a child who needs a harness for much longer, because of behavioural difficulties or SEN causing problems with using a seatbelt. I don't personally agree that children must be harnessed up to age 5 or 6, there is very little evidence supporting this, though if you personally prefer it or just want to minimise risk as far as humanly possible, then yes there are options which will do this - the best ones are rear facing. If you're already forward facing and prefer to continue then this argument is much less clear cut.

Certainly at 3y3m / 15kg / 98cm, I would not want to switch to booster but I realise you don't want to do this yet. With his stats it's difficult to judge, because he has so much growth room in terms of chart numbers, but if he's physically butting up against the top of the harness limit then you might run into torso height issues while he is still quite some way off 18kg and 105cm. Would 2cm extra be enough to alleviate that? Potentially, but I wouldn't like to promise anything, and it would be annoying if you prefer a pure HBB and he only ends up using the harness for a couple of months anyway. Most likely, waiting to see where he is when you get to the limit of your seat, and/or visiting a shop and trying him in different seats in person is the best way to do it unless you want to go for it and get Joie Bold so you know you can continue to harness no question.

One thing you might not have thought of - is he potty trained? Once they come out of nappies, you can gain a centimetre or two because of the nappy. But again we are really splitting hairs here.

I would say it's in between. It feels closer to a premium HBB like Cybex Solution T or a basic toddler seat, like the belt fitted ones. Somewhere in between these.

It's not bulky like a spin seat, or light like a basic HBB. I find it much easier to move around even though it still weighs 11kg. HBBs do tend to be lighter than this.

You'll probably use whatever you get next for the best part of a decade - it's definitely worth going to a shop and getting a feel for different models, especially since you have time. The weight and the mechanisms and the size. John Lewis usually have a few different models if you don't have an independent nursery specialist near you, and tend to be trained better than Halfords.

Joie Bold actually looks slimmer than you'd think even though the dimensions of it on paper are enormous. That is a heavy/bulky seat though.

@BertieBotts you make lots of good points about all the different reasons to chose different seats with different features. I guess a harness in the short term probably is more important than the side impact protection.

I've looked at the red book and he is roughly 50th centile for both height and weight currently. So if he follows that trajectory he won't get to 105cm/18kg until after he is 4. So in some respects it wouldn't matter buying an isize Hudson or Bold, just as long as the harness can keep on going higher to accommodate his torso, as by the time he outgrows the harness by their definition he will be more comfortably old enough for the seatbelt.

Yes he is potty trained unfortunately. That was a good shout though!

There is always the option that after the Mica is outgrown to borrow the Cozy n Safe Arthur from my mum's car for a while and buy a high back booster for her car. Then switch them back around when he gets to 18kg which is also the limit for the harness in that seat. He goes in her car very infrequently on very short journeys and I'm always sitting in the back with him so would be able to monitor any messing with the seatbelt.

I'm pretty sure the Arthur head rest just keeps on going up even with the harness on. Would need to double check though.

A child really needs a harnessed seat until they can be trusted to sit up straight in a seat throughout the journey without pulling on the seatbelt or otherwise fiddling with it, and it's unlikely that your child will be mature enough to travel safely in a high backed booster in a few months time. I don't think either of my two have been capable of doing that until they were at least five years old, although they were both heavy enough to be moved into a HBB by the time they reached three years old! My advice would be to use your existing seat for as long as your child is within the height/weight restrictions. For your next seat I'd recommend looking into the Joie Bold. It is a harnessed seat up until 25kg which converts to a high backed booster when necessary and should last until you no longer need a car seat, although you do need a suitable tether point for it in your car. If you eventually do need a high backed booster I'd recommend Britax because they have high safety standards and are good for tall children. The Britax kid fix 2 has side impact protection and a router to make sure the lap belt sits in the right place, which is particularly important if you need to move a child into a high back booster earlier than normal.

Yes very true about the 105cm limit not being an issue most likely.

Good idea to swap the Arthur if you still need to harness when mica is outgrown. It avoids the issue of trying to find a suitable 123 seat that ticks all the different boxes, and means you can focus on getting the best HBB.

By the way I'm not sure about the extra crotch piece thing being particularly relevant for younger ages. It might be that it's good if they are prone to wriggling around, which could overlap with age of course. Some companies claim they don't include one because their seats are designed to position a lap belt well without it. My impression when they were first available was that they are more of a reassurance thing for parents who are concerned that their child isn't really old enough to move to just a seatbelt and would prefer to harness them longer, but I know that Britax in particular say that it reduces force on the hips by up to 25%. I never found out compared to what, though.

@LGBirmingham - we have the Maxi cosi mica.
I actually find it large and Ds took ages to outgrow between 3-4. Ds is 104cm and just turning 4, so I think you will easily get 6-9 months extra out of it.

I have just swapped him to the Maxi cosi rodifix pro2. It’s really good quality high back booster, the belt fits nicely and isn’t loose as kind of clips on at neck part of seat. It also has two tilt reclines So they can still nap in car better.

@Caspianberg that would be great if it lasts us that long. It just depends if he grows in the torso or the legs as @BertieBotts said. I think he will be ok for another cm of Torso growth.

@LGBirmingham - my Ds was always ahead of scales for height growth from newborn, but as others said by 3 years it slowed down. So where as he would grown 5cm in 2 months at say 1 year, it took a whole year+ to grow 5cm after 3 years.
My Ds still just about fits in the Mica, and he’s in 5 year old (110cm) clothes wise.

Just wanted to update as it annoys me when I'm reading old threads to find an answer to a parenting issue I'm having and the op doesn't come back.

We're a couple of months on and DS had a growth spurt not long after I started this thread, he also caught back up with his weight from before the periods of sickness. He's 3.5 now and 100cm tall and roughly 16.5kgs. But @BertieBotts was right nearly all of the growth was in his legs, he used to always be a size down in trousers but now he perfectly fits in age 3-4.

He can probably grow upto 1cm in the torso and then I think the seat will be outgrown. But I think it will get us through the summer and much closer to 4 years old (and 105cms overall height) than previously anticipated. But even if we have to change seats in the next couple of months at least we know that he now meets the minimum requirements for a highbacked booster which is very reassuring.

Thanks for all the help everyone. Hopefully this thread helps anyone with the same concerns I had as well.

I really hope you reconsider getting a high backed booster, as this will not protect your son in a crash at all. In fact hed probably just catapult out of it completely.
please look up crash tests with different types of seats. Forward facing is less than ideal, but a high backed booster is even less so.
my son is the same age and pretty much exactly the same weight/heigh as yours and he will not be in a high backed booster until minimum 6/7 years old.
its 5x safer to put your child rear facing. It’s never too late to turn them back. It’s not worth risking your child’s life for a more convenient seat