3 door car - car seats

[MamaSleep]

Hello,

I’ve got a three door car and currently have the car seat which came in a bundle with the pram in the back. I have no intention to sell/upgrade my car - my DH has a family car which we use at weekends/for trips etc.

I am looking for advice on my next car seat. We don’t use my car very often with DD (we walk/use public transport) but I would like a car seat so we have that option.

I do have ISOFix in the front so could turn airbags off and have her in the front if that would be an option.

I Ideally want a seat I’m not going to have to replace for a few years… any ideas??

Sorry no recommendations but I have a friend who has a 3 door ford Ka with 2 children seats in the back for her 1 and 3 yo! No idea what seat she has but there are definitely seats out there that can fit your needs!

I would suggest a 360 spin car seat. So you can strap baby in facing forward facing and then rotate them round to rear facing. I have almost 2 year olds who fight me everytime I put them in the car. So would find it impossible to strap in rear facing in a 3 door car (its virtually impossible in a 5 door!) That's if you want to do rear facing? Or if baby is over 15 months you can have them forward facing, although reccomended to do rear facing. I have the joie 360 spin in husbands car and maxi cosi eco pro in my car. These are both 360 spin seats which go from birth to 4 years. The joie is much bigger (wider) than the maxi cosi so the maxi cosi might be better for you. They both spin and recline well for napping in the car. Although they are both isofix... have you not got iso fix in the back?

Thank you! That is super helpful. Yes ISOFix in the back. Good idea about to strap in forwards and then spin around!

If you're looking at spin seats for 3 door cars you need to check 3 things -

First where the position of the button to spin the seat is. If it's under the child's feet this is no good.

Second whether it has some kind of mechanism to stop people turning it forward too soon and whether this can be overridden - e.g. one of the Cybex ones won't turn forward facing until the headrest is in a certain position which is meant to be indicative of a child who is the right height.

Third whether you can actually turn it while it's installed in your car - the backs of these seats stick out, so trying to turn it with the child facing the middle might not physically work. Trying to turn with the child facing the outside edge can be an issue if they are too young to understand an instruction to hold their legs up.

You can fit an ERF seat in the front. You can also fit an ERF seat behind the driver, then put the front seat forward, sit into the back seat with child on your lap to get them in.