Car seat recommendations please - rear facing, seatbelt, small old car!

[ShyOrange]

Hi all,
We need a new car seat for my 16mo, but have some specific requirements to consider! I’ve got myself confused with all the reviews/WHICH. Would hugely appreciate any thoughts!

• DS is 95th centile for height, and 60th for weight
• Rear facing
• Seatbelt secure, as we have no isofix
• Small, old car! (2005 Fiat Panda)

We only do short journeys in it (5 mins to the supermarket; 5 mins to nursery 3 x a week etc). Other times he’s in a Joie spin isofix in the Qashqai. We are not too concerned about it being all stages, as we know it compromises some features, plus not likely to find an all stages one that meets all our requirements (mainly due to the small car!). We also don’t anticipate having this car in a couple of years. We have been directed towards the Joie Tilt/stages or a Graco one. Can anyone recommend them/prefer any others? Many thanks in advance!

Wondered if the ever-knowledgeable @BertieBotts might have any thoughts (although know you must be v busy and get asked a lot!!)

Hi OP.
Id be wary of the ones you’re looking at as not only are they quite bulky, the harness limit on them is only 105cm, which if your son remains on the 95th centile for height, he’s likely to outgrow it way before he’s ready for a HBB.
I’d have a look at the Axkid Minikid 4. 125cm harness limit, ERF and relatively compact fit for a small car.

We've had three Axkid Minikids for two kids in two cars and we've fit them in some pretty small cars including a three-door 2005 Fiesta and a Toyota Aygo courtesy car.

Do you have a budget? Axkid Minikid 2 would be the obvious choice, but if that's too expensive, I'd go to your nearest Halfords and ask to fit check Joie Stages, Graco Extend R129, Graco Slimfit R129 and Halfords Impala. I don't think they sell the Joie Tilt any more but in any case, it's similar to the Extend and Impala.

The Impala and Extend (and Tilt) probably won't last you long enough but they are vv cheap and should last a couple of years until you change the car.

The Minikid is worth investing in as it can be swapped to the main car if/when you change the smaller car. With a DC on high centiles, you might find the Joie 360 lacks leg room after too long. It is very generous on shoulder room, though, so should last you height wise.

If it's the Joie i-Spin you have, you will come up against an issue when DS hits 105cm as Family says.

I wouldn't worry too much about which results, as long as the seat is rear facing.

Thanks so much all for taking the time to reply!
I think the Axkid looks great but is a little out of our budget at the minute.

@bertiebotts really appreciate the suggestions - we will take a trip to Halfords today to fit check them. If they are much-of-a-muchness fit wise, are there any from that list that you’d particularly go for? Or are they pretty much on a par?

Thanks again

I don't know much about the Impala or how it performs safety wise. It is very cheap - but it is rear facing and meets the newer safety standard. Arguably, if the seat is rear facing and securely fitted and it meets a safety standard, then it's perfectly fine and is likely to offer good protection. I think the thing which would concern me with longevity is the position of the seatbelt when it's installed - you wouldn't want it to rest on the child's head.

Graco Extend R129 / Joie Steadi R129 are I believe the same seat. They are well made, look like they fit DC snugly (this is good) and meet the newer safety standard but some MNers have said they don't last to the advertised 105cm - more like 98-100cm, because the headrest doesn't go up very high.

Graco Slimfit R129/Joie Every Stage R129 (Again I believe a copy of each other) have a much larger harness capacity, but are limited to the 105cm standing height. They also have decent weight capacity at 21kg in the rear facing mode. However they are quite bulky front to back, I understand. You also may experience issues if the seatbelts are short.

Joie Stages is an older model, the older safety standard R44, which means that you can go over the 105cm height as it doesn't have a height limit. It is limited to 18kg weight capacity. It can sometimes be cheaper due to being older. IIRC Joie Convoy for Halfords is the same seat as Joie Stages. Again you can come up against issues if you have short seatbelts or a lack of space front to back. There is a "short seatbelt method" to install.

I wouldn't say any particularly is better than the other - it just depends what you want/need and like out of the features, price, feel of them to use etc. With seatbelt fit it can be a bit getting the right seat for the car, more so than isofix.

You'll want to look out for buckle crunch which is where the hard part of the seatbelt/buckle lies over a hard plastic or metal piece of the car seat - this is not allowed and means your installation is not safe. So try them in the actual car if you are able to. Hopefully Halfords' staff are trained in this, but I've heard some bizarre stories about people's fitting experiences there.

Axkid Minikid 2 is cheaper than Minikid 4, but the Halfords seats are around £100 or less so may be better short term options if you are on a tight budget.

@BertieBotts I can’t begin to thank you enough for taking the time to reply in this way to a stranger on the internet. You are a wealth of knowledge! I really appreciate your responses; they have been so helpful.

We tried the Graco slimfit, but it was too big to fit in between the back seat and the front passenger. We swerved the Graco Extend due to the slightly lower height limit (and a tall kiddo) and in the end went with the Joie Stages. It literally just fit behind the passenger seat and ticks all the other boxes for us in this car. The man at Halfords was very helpful, although I was a bit unclear when he said the size limit on it was when the child’s legs were too long, and I couldn’t get much clarity on that?

No there's no limit to how long their legs can be, strange answer from him!

For Joie Stages, you can use it rear facing until the child is 18kg, or if their shoulders no longer fit under the headrest on the highest setting. But he will almost definitely reach 18kg before that happens, unless he is a beanpole. There is no height limit in centimetres because it's not an R129 seat. The older regulation R44 doesn't have height limits.

Perhaps he just thought you can't rear face once their legs get too long - it's a common myth but there really is no problem with long legs and rear facing. It's fitting into the harness properly which is important.

Sorry for the slow reply/message of thanks; we’ve all been struck down with a bug. On the other side now!
so I bought the Joie stages and… instantly regretted it. What a pain the way the seatbelt straps it in - I could only just about lift DS over the top! God knows how I was going to mange when he gets bigger.
Turns out I should’ve headed the wise words of everyone’s original suggestion… have borrowed some money from my mum and ordered the Axkid Minikid2. It arrives tomorrow!

Ah! Well I suppose you'll have the Stages for travel or occasional use in other people's cars, if you can't return it.

Thankfully a neighbour was keen to have it as I’d got a price match and a £5 discount which took the Stages down to £76. Looking forward to the Axkid arriving today!

Similar situation, we had a Joie Steadi, which was marvellous. Quite a small footprint so it fitted in our small old
car well, whereas we couldn’t fit a Stages in.