[mahamum]

DS is 2 1/2 yrs old. DD will be 1 in Sept.
I plan on buying a new seat for DS and giving his old one to DD.

Question is, what car seat do I get for him. I definitely want a 5 point harness/booster seat combo.

Does it make a difference if the weight goes up to 100 lbs, or is 80 lbs sufficient?

What do you recommend?
Thanks

 

[natashaccat]

I'm not really sure on the weight thing, I'll be interested in what folks say on that.

Do you expect you DS to get really big? I ask because my 4 yo is pretty average in size but tallish and she weighs about 40 lbs. My current carseat maxes out at 65 lbs which I fully expect to not happen prior to her turning about 6 at which point I'll probably move her to a booster.

Sorry, not much help with the size thing but I did want to pipe in on brands...you'll probably get lots of reccomendations for Britax because Britax's are AWESOME! When dd1 was little money was pretty tight and I bought an ALPHA Omega and now that I've tried the BRITAX I just shudder that I had her in such a crappy fitting carseat.

FWIW the Britax Wizard fits perfectly both front and rear facing in my Toyota Rav 4, and my 2006 Honda Civic. This carseat looks huge but it's somehow designed to give a really good fit in smaller cars.

 

[lasciate]

I recommend not buying a harness/booster combo. Nearly all of them only harness up to 40 pounds and many children will outgrow the harness by height before weight, leaving a very small child who is not ready for a belt positioning booster.

Britax seats are highly recommended. If your DS is already forwardfacing you can buy him a Britax Regent which will keep him *harnessed* until 80 pounds. After he outgrows that you can get him an inexpensive belt positioning booster, but that is years away.

 

[alegna]

What does he weigh now? If he's smaller- say under 30 lbs, I'd go for the boulevard and put him rear-facing for awhile longer. If he's over 30 lbs (the boulevard can rear-face up to 33lbs) I'd go with the regent.

-Angela

 

[Emma's_Mommy]

my mother in law has a highback booster seat that comes with a 5 point harness that she uses when she watched DD.

It's a cosco and was not that expensive at wal-mart.

 

[Lovinmy2babies+1]

Most combos only go to 40 pounds harnessed, then a booster to 80 or 100 lb. Most kids reach 40 pounds before they are mature enough for a booster. If you have the money, I suggest getting a Britax that harnesses a child until 65 pounds. There is also the Sunshine Kids Radian that harnesses to 65 pounds. For a lower budget, the Apex also harnesses to 65 pounds.

 

[mahamum]

Ooops! I forgot to say my ds is almost 29 lbs. There are sooo many seats to choose from, its really all too much!

: He is front facing now, so I don't want to turn him back, he would freak out! I was really sooooo uneducated about the whole rear facing aspect. I thought once they were 1 yr and 20 lbs, you had to turn them around, his ped. never mentioned anything about him being able to stay rear facing either.

:

It sounds like I should check out the Britax and the Cosco models.

Thanks everyone for taking the time to educate me!

 

[thepeach80]

At 29# and 2.5 I doubt he'll hit 40# before 4. Another good measurement is his torso. Have him sit on the floor against a wall and measure from the floor to his shoulders. There are actually a few good 40# combo seats out there that do make good boosters and some kids will get plenty of use out of them and make it to 4 in the harness etc. There of course are always the higher limit weight seats as well which will generally last longer. At this point I wouldn't worry about the 80 or 100#, it's just one of those things you'll never know till they get bigger so pick a good seat for NOW, not then. Do you have a budget? What car do you drive? On a side note, I turned my oldest ffing at 11 mos and back to rfing at 26 mos. lol He stayed that way till he got too big at 33-34 mos and loved every minute of rfing. He still asks to sit in Evan's seat, but it's just not safe for him.

 

[Throkmorton]

I wouldn't recommend the Cosco models, just because the harness slots are kind of short, and there are taller seats (which will last longer) out there.
Take a look at the Evenflo Bolero or Generations if the Britax are out of your price range. They harness to 40 lbs and make pretty good boosters afterwards.

 

[faythe]

one thing to keep in mind is that there are two weight limits for the combo seats - one for the harness, usually 40 lbs, the other for actual seat when used as a booster

 

[ssolberg99]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lovinmy2babies+1 Most kids reach 40 pounds before they are mature enough for a booster. If you have the money, I suggest getting a Britax that harnesses a child until 65 pounds. There is also the Sunshine Kids Radian that harnesses to 65 pounds. For a lower budget, the Apex also harnesses to 65 pounds.

:

Just remember that the Apex 65 NEEDS to be supported by your car seat headrest...so fit is the key. Also, I've heard the Britax Regent is huge, so again, fit is the key.

 

[rubelin]

If you are on a very tight budget, the best harnessed/booster combo I found was the Evenflo Bolero/Generations. It's the same seat, but called the Bolero at Kmart for about $90 and called the Generations at Target adn elsewehre for about $100 and comes with a fancy seat pad that you'll never use

It has the highest harness slots of any of them (Maybe the CarGo booster is about the same) and the headrest goes higher than everything. It still only has a harnessed weight of 40 lbs, but at least your child won't outgrow the height until they hit 40 lbs. It's also really easy to tighten/loosen the harness, which is good for us, since it's for my sister's car and she is really bad about tightening the harness correctly.

We got one as a spare for our Britax Regent. I'm a bit of a Britax "snob" and I'm pretty happy with it.