Useful info from Which? about 3 car seats in various cars

[TheHouseofMirth]

here

Had no idea you can't disable front air bag on a Zafira!

thanks THoM that's interesting. Just shows what a minefield the whole 3 carseats thing is. Does anyone know if you really can fit 3 hi back boosters in a vauxhall astra, they say sufficient space but des that mean a bit of squeeze?

You can't in our Vauxhall Astra.

Thanks rubbish.

it all depends on which seats you use too.
i can fit a group 1 (or a cabriofix) in with 2 high backed boosters.but havent tried 2 high backed boosters

that should say i havent tried 3 highbacked boosters

we easily fit 2 boosters and a booster cushion into our astra (55 plate) (used for extra friends kids).
I am sure you could fit 3 accross we have the graco seats.

Sarah

Why can't they all make their back seats big enough and have done with it?! We are looking for a new car now and normally I would love this kind of grand-scale shopping but actually it is no fun at all.

It's driving me nuts HofM too, we just want a dull car, small as poss which will take 3 carseats. We have a peugeot 307 which will not take the baby seat in the front or middle back seats and to get all 5 of us in takes 5 mins as the car seats land up on top of the seat belt thingies. It has soooo much wasted space at the doors. Anyone want to share shortlists? Ours is cit picasso, fiat multipla, mazda premacy. We've been wondering about a PT cruiser as the seat is very wide and flat. Anyone tried?

moomoo - why wont the babyseat fit in your car???

i've had my 3 in a corsa/astra/focus/mgzr and now my vectra.no probs.

we put the maxi-cosi cabriofix in the middle with a britax high backed booster at either side and its worked fine for us:)

my sister has a 307 and fits 3 seats in hers :)

saz it's because the seatbelt isn't long enough in the front seat or the middle back seat!!!!!So since the 2 hi back boosters won't fit next to each other dc1 goes in the front (airbag off) dc2 in the middle back, baby behind passenger and poor parent behind driver. This is the only way it works and when I googled narrow hi back booster I got the ones we have (britax hiliner). Crap car. I think it will be easy peasy with the 9 to 18 kg seat in the middle back, but we're sticking with rearfacing to 13kg if poss.What's annoying about the 3 seats problem is that different ages of the 'same' car have subtley diff seats which makes a massive diff in doing up seat belts.

we have the britax hi-liner's too,

which babyseat do you have?
the cabriofix base doesnt need as long a seatbelt as just the seat, would it fit between the other two though?
also britax used to do a babyseat that had an alternative belt routing for cars with a short seatbelt,dont know if this is still available.

i know completely what you mean about different models of the same car having different seats,

problem we are finding now is the older 2 (ages 5yo and nearly 7yo) have their headrests higher now,and they cant go any higher as the headrest actually touches the side on the car,it physically cant go any higher,not sure how we are going to solve that,as really dont want to have to put the oldest on just a booster yet.

Now I am confused. I thought you could have a forward facing booster seat in the front of your car with the airbag not disabled if it was as far back as it could go. Am sure I read that on an official website.

Yes you can missorinoco but that means if dh is driving , I have to sit in the back. I don't like it in the back!

saz I just don't want to start spending money on belted bases and suchlike as mostly if dh isn't with us I use the other car which is a citroen saxo and the britax baby safe fits nicely in it. What we need is a new car as I hate the 307.I'm looking for a car that EASILY fits the carseats in, no wriggling seatbelt catches in under the next carseat, and all 3 dc on the backseat, me relaxing in the passenger seat.

Phew, thanks.

We have a Focus C Max. Fits the baby seat in the middle no problem. If this confuses you, my earlier post was related to the "normal" Focus I drive.

We took all the car seats with us to test the cars though. Zafira looked plausible but DH didn't like it for some random reason. Focus C Max is good but very sensible and unexciting. Feels like the sensible shoes ones mother used to make one wear to school.