Isofix?? Sorry if this has been overdone!

[fruityb]

We need a car seat and are looking at maxi cosi as it's compatible with our chassis from the pushchair/pram combo. Or the cybex one, which is quite funky.

I am looking at isofix bases, and while I think they'll be a time saver and a lot less faffy than buckling in a car seat, I don't have the isofix wotsits in my car. My OH does, but I don't want to drive his car as it's enormous.

Is isofix worth it? Does a base exist that can be buckled in with a seatbelt, not fastened in using the isofix wotsits? Are they safer or is it more of a convenience thing?

Buying a new car for isofix seems rather ridiculous to me!

Maxi Cosi do (or certainly did) the easyfix base. It's isofix or attaches with a seatbelt and then the cabriofix clicks into it.

Isofix is generally safer because it's always attached to the car and so it's not really possible to put the seat in wrong. It's not difficult to belt in a seat but a bit more concentrations needed each time to check it's belted right.

It's well worth taking a free trial of Which? for this. They review loads of car seats and explain lots of the stuff too. We used them to get our seats. Isofix is safer but there are also plenty of safe belted seats, they just are often less safe because its easier to mess up belting them in each time. But some isofix seats rated lower so it doesn't automatically mean safer iyswim.

We had one that does both as our campervan hasn't got isofix but our car does.
But ours was just a carseat, not a clip into the pram thingy.

Thank you - will look into the easyfix. The girl in M and P said it wasn't necessarily safer, just easier to get right with isofix - as you said jobrum. Didn't know about that from Which so will look into that as well.

I'm into single figures and am keen to get one as anything could happen in the coming weeks!

Another option is to look at getting isofix bars fitted to you car. We bought an old Volvo as second car, which didn't have isofix but paid the dealer to add it - from memory it was only about £80 so not crazy.

Ah interesting! Didn't know you could do that!

The Cybex Aton Q is basically as safe using a seatbelt (not even a belted base, just seatbelt) as it is isofix as long as you make sure you do it properly (isn't difficult). It's compatible with quite a few pram chassis with adaptors and is also very flat. Might be worth a look. As others have said, isofix just makes it much easier to get it right. I'd be a bit careful about retrofitting isofix to your car, personally I wouldn't do it. Highly recommend Which guide for car seats, at least as a starting point.

We have the Aton Q and it's really easy to fit with just a seatbelt. We do have the isofix Base in DP's car, which is brilliant, and I would recommend it if you can. But there's no way we could afford extra bases for my car, DM's and MIL's, so seatbelt it is, and we don't have any problems, just takes a little longer double checking it's fitted properly.

Isofix definitely seems the way forward. I've spent ages in shops playing around lol

Ps - we've also gone for maxi cosy over the Cybex in the end - I loved the Cybex Q cloud - was gutted at how heavy it was, unrealisticly so, especially by time a baby is in there! The maxi cosy was so much lighter

:)

We got Isofix bars off eBay and DP fitted them. Dead simple, they were £10-15 each I think.