Car seats - please help very confused

[berrycravings]

I have spent the last few weeks searching for a carseat and am really struggling. I have a seperate pushchair as I decided a travel system was not for me, so for my question I only need help with the car seat itself. I am thinking of going for the Maxi-Cosi Cabirofix seat. Having done some reading it says it can either be used with the cars 3 point seat belt system or with an easy base (around £80 extra).

My question is, what is the difference for me using the the 3 point seat belt way or the base? Safety is my number 1 priority so will happily purchase the easybase if I need to. However as I am not planning to keep baby in the carseat and I will not need to be taking the seat in and out of the car that much (planning to use a sling and not drive very often). So do not need to easily take the car seat out of the car which I know is one benefit of the base.

Any help appreciated as I want to make the right decision.

Can i ask a couple of stupid questions? I have a 12yr old fiesta, baby due in 3 months and travel system on order at mothercare, so ive not got it yet to read the instructions.

As my car is a pensioner, will i get a base to fit?

If so, how exactly do they work, how do you fit them?

Finally, finally pregnancy brain has kicked in and ive forgoteen what else i was gonna ask

Basically, can you lovely lot give me a step by step idiots guide please?

Kelly, if your car has short seatbelts then often a seatbelt-fitted base is better than fitting the carseat with the seatbelt by itself, as it uses a shorter length of belt that way.

If it's a Maxi cosi/Britax/etc seat coming with your travel system you can usually download the manual on the maxi cosi (or whichever brand) website.

BTW, I didn't mean to imply earlier that all older cars have short seatbelts, just that more modern cars take carseats into account and tend to have longer ones. Some older cars will have long enough seatbelts anyway. (Most, to be honest :))

You can always go into Mothercare/Halfords/etc anyway and ask to try their display model of the seat you have on order, in your car. They should be able to give you a demonstration.

The videos at www.childcarseats.org.uk are really good too.

1catherine1, I also have an original Ford Ka. Just wanted to warn you that it's quite hard to get a car seat that fits properly. The maxicosi cabriofix plus base was ok in the front, but mothercare wouldn't pass any of the car seats we tried in the back seat. The back seats slope too much, and the seat belts are quite short too. It's definitely worth getting advice from the shops as they demonstrated how dangerous a badly fitting seat could be - was v. scary... Manufacturer's websites are not always accurate either, they are just guidelines - we are even having problems trying to get a seat to fit my DHs Volvo (no isofix either), and the websites say his car should fit the seats we wanted to buy. It's a Volvo ffs, how can a car seat not fit properly!

Thanks, Catherine, that's useful stuff.

Kelly, I also have a pensioner of a car, mine is 1998 and I have no clue. I have a Maxi Cosi Cabriofix and I'm thinking of just taking it to Halfords and asking them to show me how it works/sell me the appropriate gubbins.

I'm so clueless.