Baby car seat - Sports car bucket seats

[sharon2016]

Hi, we have been to Mothercare and John Lewis today to get the maxi cosi pebble plus and base fitted. However I am really confused from what the two stores said. John Lewis said because our car (BMW x1 m sport) has 'bucket' sports seats in the back, that we couldn't buy any of their baby seats, the seat/base would clip in fine, but because our sports car style seats are so dipped, it meant the baby seat would sit at 60 degrees up rather than the safe 45 degrees up. However, we then went to two mothercare stores and both said the seat was perfectly safe for our car.

Sorry if that don't make any sense, I'm just so confused with which advice to go with!!

Has anyone got similar style seats in their car and had any problems?

Thanks! X

Personally I'd be more inclined to trust JL than Mothercare on car seats (I've had shocking advice from them in the past) but the best thing to do is to call the In Car Safety Centre in Milton Keynes, tell them what car you have and ask what they recommend. It might be that you're better off belting the seat rather than using Isofix, as that gives you a bit more flexibility in terms of fitting.

You could also look on the website for the seat you want and see if there is a list of which cars it will fit. Some have this...

Yes, John Lewis are right. If you have sloped back seats the car seat will be too upright for a young baby and may cause their head to loll forward and restrict breathing. With an older baby this isn't so much of an issue as heh can lift their own head if needed. You can get a belted base instead and use a wedge underneath to level it out. You can't do this with isofix as the angle is set.

We have sloped/bucket style seats in our car. We found that most car seats for but the baby is more upright than they should be. DS' head used to flop forward sometimes which freaked me out.

We are getting a more family friendly car this time around

Babies r Us will go out to your car with you with a demo model of the car seat and go through a safety checklist. They might be able to advise you.

We have bucket seats- we went to kiddicare to try some out before buying. Have the exact same seat and isofix you have mentioned and it's absolutely fine! Ds's head doesn't loll forward at all!

Go with JL. Many seatbelt secured carriers are just as safe as isofix (as per Which) but will allow you to redress some of the angle you get with the bucket seat if you use isofix.

We had this issue and have ended up buying two seats, the second after realising our poor newborns head was lolling forward quite badly! We visited an independent retailer, who fitted the Cybex Aton Q + base into our car as the isofix fittings pivot unlike our first base which did not. We still needed a towel rolled up underneath to support it all where the seat itself was so tiled! Feel free to PM me if this doesn't make much sense!

Go to the in car safety centre. There's one in Milton Keynes and one in Essex. I wouldn't trust advice from mothercare. I've heard shocking advice from their fitters. They are not adequately trained in my opinion.

Don't know about bucket seats but would be dubious of relying on the advice in Mothercare. They aren't experts on car seats.

Thanks for the advice everyone, I am glad I asked! I am going to go to the safety centre in Essex as its near me and sounds like they will give better advice. The people in Mothercare seemed so blasse whereas John Lewis were really good and even told me to download an app to measure the degree of the deep. Fingers crossed I can find something suitable and not end up buying a new car!