Car seat leaving marks on legs

[TunaJacket]

Not sure if this is the most appropriate place for this but anyway….

we have the joie 360 spin and find the straps leave marks on our little boys legs. does anyone else find this and what can I do about it?

Im not really sure if I’ve got the wrong inserts in (I’ve left the newborn inserts in but took the wedge out)

appreciate hearing your advice/experiences!

thank you 🙂

Is he the correct weight for the inserts? Are you doing the straps correctly? Are they too tight? Are his legs bars against them?

I have the same seat with no problems. Try playing with the different inserts and make sure the strap isn't too tight would be my first thought

It's really common with this seat, don't remove the inserts, most people remove them too early. It's an unusual seat and the inserts do put the straps into an odd position, but they won't fit properly if you take the inserts out. I took them out much too early with DS2 as didn't realise! Now I am a bit more familiar with it, I've got DS3 in (age 12m) with both the bottom inserts in and am OK with the fit now. This is how it should look. It is different to the way the harness fits in most other car seats. The third photo is DS2 when he was 18mo in the seat and he really should have had inserts in - there was such a big gap at his tummy and you can see his head is really pushed forwards here. You usually get a gap at the tummy with any 5 point harness seat, but this is extreme and I realise now it's because he should have still had the wedge and possibly body insert too.

If he's wearing shorts you need to make sure you pull the material through so it's protecting his legs from the straps. I also found it helps to make them completely loose when you click it in, then tighten little by little adjusting it through from the legs to the shoulder straps and then removing the slack from there. It doesn't need to be as tight as you can possibly pull it, you just need to remove the slack. This video is helpful too:

I've noticed this but have a maxi cosi mica...fits fine everywhere else but the straps at the legs seem to be at an awkward angle

Actually now I've watched that video again, she does say if the buckle is hard to do up then you should take the wedge out 😅Oh it's a confusing seat. Anyway I feel like DS2 does fit better than DS3 did back in the day. If we have problems I'll take them out.

It doesn't matter, it's just like sock marks.

The wedge is the last thing to come out so you need to put it back in under the insert. It will keep the seatbelt off the soft tissue of the stomach and put it where it needs to be on the tops of the legs.

How old is your DS? Is he forward or rear facing?

I've just got this seat and found this post as I thought I was putting my almost 5 month old in wrong. The only thing I've removed is the newborn headrest. I still have the body part of the newborn insert in and the wedge. The first picture you've posted of your boy in the seat, are the straps designed to go around the legs like that or should it be at the hips? My boy looks exactly like yours does in the seat I just wasn't sure if the straps were to go around his legs like that?

The inserts you have sound right for a 5 month old. You can take the body insert out at around 8-9 months and the wedge insert usually 12-15 months. But it does vary based on the body shape.

In my picture, the straps are on his hips, well, in terms of how car seat experts talk about hips - what they really mean is the pelvis (as in the bony bit of hip you can feel at the side, this is part of your pelvis). And to differentiate hip from waist. You want the lap strap on the hip, not the waist. It's not hips as opposed to legs, because tops of legs is also OK as long as it's in contact with the pelvis.

If you see for example the picture at the top of this article, the straps are across the little girl's tummy. They aren't on her hips at all, even though the harness looks more like you'd expect a 5 point harness to look (like an upside down star). https://www.madeformums.com/reviews/joie-i-spin-360-review/

Think about where their pelvis is, if you think about the shape of a pelvis it's sort of an upside down trapezium. The thing is, if you take the body boosting inserts out too early, the straps basically go across their tummy which is not what you want. All car seat lap straps and car seatbelts too when you get to that stage are designed to engage with the pelvis as this is a strong solid part of the body, whereas if they are on the tummy instead, this is soft/squishy and much more easily injured. It's less important when rear facing, because the seat shell will take the majority of the impact so the position of the straps is less important but they will still be contained by the straps on the rebound phase of an impact so it is worth having them right.

I think this is just because the insert is so bulky in this seat, which means that the buckle sits very far up when the insert is removed too early, but also makes it look very strange and not what we expect when we think of a 5-point harness, when used with the insert with an older baby. It does look strange compared with other seats TBH. I think this is why a lot of the infant carrier type seats only have a 3-point harness, because it's hard to get the pelvis engaged properly when they are in that reclined position.

The other thing is that with a 5mo, you'll find if you take the inserts out too early their head will fall forwards when they fall asleep. So it is worth keeping them in for that reason.

You can always send photos to Joie if you're ever unsure and they should be able to advise you :)

Forgot to attach this which Joie have sent to other customers but is not in their manual (I wish it was!)

Gotcha, thank you so much. I was just so worried as I thought I had him in wrong. I expected the harness to be a little higher but makes sense as you say in terms of a collision god forbid. We've taken our first trip this morning and yeah they're located at the pelvic area. He looks as your boy does in his seat. I'm a first time mum with this new seat and just thought it looked odd and stumbled across this thread which was reassuring. I haven't removed anything other than the newborn headrest as I did watch a lot of YouTube videos that mentioned the age ranges on the inserts and that the wedge was the last bit to come out. I just couldn't clearly see the positioning of the straps. Thanks so much for the reply :)

The inserts come out in this order -
Head support
Side cushions
Wedge

My skinny 2.5 year old still needs the wedge, so definitely put it back in!