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Child Car Seats?

14K views 34 replies 21 participants last post by  SMG1 
#1 ·
Anyone have kids in car seats in their WK2? I'm considering buying a WK2 (probably wait until I can order a '14 at the end of the year, probably do an Overland with Hemi).

I have a 15 month old now and my wife and I plan to try for another in the near future, so this truck will have to be somewhat workable with 2 car seats.

My wife's '11 Honda Ody. is the primary people mover in our family, but I have to have my vehicle set up to safely do it too as needed.

Right now my son is rear facing in my (current generation) Pathfinder in a Sunshine Kids Radian XTSL, in the middle. It is big (long) enough that it actually touches the front seats slightly ("bracing" is OK in the Pathfinder because mine doesn't have side airbags). With two seats back there, rear facing, in the Pathfinder I'd have to move the front seats up closer than I'd like for a comfortable driving position.

Anyone have any real-world experience running around with a couple of car seats?
 
#2 · (Edited)
We currently only have one rear facing seat in the WK2. We originally had a larger seat in the middle and it was just too big. I then secured it on the passenger side and even though it was the best way, the passenger front seat had to be moved too far forward.
So we ended up buying a car seat designed for a small car. I know that sounds silly in a somewhat large SUV, but there was just no other way.
P.S. The rear seat backs do recline in the new WK2's which helps so that the car seat can go back just a little furthur, but its still an issue with the front seats.

I cant wait to be able to turn the seat around, but my wife says she wants it rear facing for as long as possible. I guess I cant argue with her since its for the safety of our child.

To give you an idea here is a picture of our child seat in the WK2. I have the passenger seat moved back as far as possible and probably up against the child seat a little too much. When I sit in that seat my knees are pretty close to touching the glove box. My wife fits fine there though. My wife says the diono radian would work in the Jeep as long as you use the angle adjusters. You can have one mounted in the middle and the second one behind the passenger seat. She has that car seast in her Accord and its narrow enough that when its mounted in the middle it can fit between her two seats and still allow you to move back far enough. Besides the car seats though, rear seat legroom is great in the WK2.




 
#5 ·
My wife says the diono radian would work in the Jeep as long as you use the angle adjusters. You can have one mounted in the middle and the second one behind the passenger seat. She has that car seast in her Accord and its narrow enough that when its mounted in the middle it can fit between her two seats and still allow you to move back far enough. Besides the car seats though, rear seat legroom is great in the WK2.
Thanks for the response.

So now I have a huge favor to ask. Any chance you could try out her Radian in your truck and see if it fits? The seat I'm using in my Pathfinder is actually the same seat (Sunshine Kids became Diono a few months ago) as hers.

We love the car seat (I just ordered the Diono RXT for my wife's ride, event thought she has a Britax Blvd. 70 in there now - we just like my Radian a lot better).

Realistically, if it would work well in the center, the next kid could go in the Chicco KeyFit 30 infant seat that our son used to use, and by the time he needed the bigger convertible seat, our son would be front facing.

As you can tell I'm trying to find a way to buy a WK2 instead of a Tahoe/Yukon.
 
#3 · (Edited)
We have 2 front facing seats in the back and they fit great. Our oldest (3) sits behind the passenger seat since he needs a little more leg room, but my wife can move the seat far enough forward that he can not reach and she still fits without touching the dash. I'll try to snap a few pics for you later - we have 2 Britax Boulevard seats installed.
 
#7 · (Edited)
We have a Graco Smart Seat All-in-one, and our son is 10 month old, roughly 31" tall.

http://www.gracobaby.com/Products/Pages/ProductDetails.aspx?ProductID=1802320

I was all ready to face the seat forward for this convertible seat last month when our boy hit 20lb+, but our pediatrician recommended that because of his neck strenth (or lack there of), it will be safe to keep him facing back until he is about 18 month old. Rear facing takes up alot of room, but that's how we have the seat right now.

Just like Jame's situation in the previous post, the front passenger side seat must be moved forward quite a bit. Just as a reference, my wife is 5'4", and she is fine with this setting, but I do not want to sit there being 5'10", and the driver side in this picture is set for my comfort.

It's not the biggest SUV in the world, but we are good with it with the size of our family. One thing that helps alot, is the fact that the doors open really wide on WK2, which makes getting in easy for my wife, and putting my son into the chair a breeze. As James mentioned above, don't forget to recline the rear seats, it will give you a couple of inches at the top where the child seat may come in contact with the front seats.

With Graco Smart Seat, you also have the option of picking up another base. We have a base installed on a Corolla, and we swap the seat between our two cars. We opted for this configuration because I realized getting to the child seat anchors on my WK2 was really tough, and I did not want to fiddle with it every time we swap the seat, nor buy a seat for both cars.

It's also good to look for a child seat narrow enough that you can lower the other side for increased cargo space. We've already made several trips to Lowe's like this.
 

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#8 ·
We have a Graco Smart Seat All-in-one, and our son is 10 month old, roughly 22" tall.

http://www.gracobaby.com/Products/Pages/ProductDetails.aspx?ProductID=1802320

I was all ready to face the seat forward for this convertible seat last month when our boy hit 20lb+, but our pediatrician recommended that because of his neck strenth (or lack there of), it will be safe to keep him facing back until he is about 18 month old. Rear facing takes up alot of room, but that's how we have the seat right now.

Just like Jame's situation in the previous post, the front passenger side seat must be moved forward quite a bit. Just as a reference, my wife is 5'4", and she is fine with this setting, but I do not want to sit there being 5'10", and the driver side in this picture is set for my comfort.

It's not the biggest SUV in the world, but we are good with it with the size of our family. One thing that helps alot, is the fact that the doors open really wide on WK2, which makes getting in easy for my wife, and putting my son into the chair a breeze. As James mentioned above, don't forget to recline the rear seats, it will give you a couple of inches at the top where the child seat may come in contact with the front seats.

With Graco Smart Seat, you also have the option of picking up another base. We have a base installed on a Corolla, and we swap the seat between our two cars. We opted for this configuration because I realized getting to the child seat anchors on my WK2 was really tough, and I did not want to fiddle with it every time we swap the seat, nor buy a seat for both cars.

It's also good to look for a child seat narrow enough that you can lower the other side for increased cargo space. We've already made several trips to Lowe's like this.
Thanks Added Rep!:thumbsup:
 
#9 ·
We use the Chico Key-fit 30 on our 2 month old. We love the car seat. Very easy in and out and very light. It also scored very well in crash tests. We put it behind the passenger seat. It fits snug with the passenger seat in a normal riding position.


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#10 ·
We have the KeyFit 30 as well, it is a great seat!

I'm looking to pick up a '12 (or '14) GC Limited. My 6 month old is now riding in a Britax Boulevard 70CS, and I have not been able to test fit that in the GC, anyone here with that seat? If so, do you have any issues with it? We'll probably keep her rear facing until she is 2 (as new guidlines suggest), and are not planning for a second child until after that. I think the GC will be large enough for us with two car seats in the second row, especially as a secondary family hauler. We use my wife's 2011 Highlander as the primary family hauler, and my 2010 A4 pretty much stays parked other than me driving to work, as it is simply too small. As much as I love my Audi, I can't wait to get into a GC!
 
#11 ·
I have 3 across in mine. 2 FF and a RF infant seat. Works out fine if u ask me. And if u have a van and only need 2 in there You should be good to go.. Our wk2 is our primary family hauler and it works good for us.. Just unloaded 3 kids, a double stroller, umbrella stroller, 2 suitcases, various bags, bumbo seat, etc from a weekend trip.. Worked great. It was pretty loaded up in the cargo area but I still had plenty of floor space if I needed to stuff anymore in there lol...
 
#13 ·
I don't know if I'd agree with that. We had a Britax Blvd. 70 in my wife's car and a Radian in mine. We just ordered another Radian to use in her's. The Britax doesn't feel nearly as solid (I bet it's 10lbs lighter than the steel framed Radian). My 15 month old son seems a whole lot more comfortable in the Radian - he would fight you abotu 1/2 the time to try to avoid going in the Britax but hasn't had a problem in the Radian.

Both are in the $250-300 ballpark - but I'd recommend the Radian.

When our son was smaller, we used Chicco Keyfit 30. It was great when he was light enough to actually detach it from the base and carry him in it. I think we ditched it at about 9 months (just before a 9 hour, each direction, road trip) to give him a little more room in the bigger convertible seat.
 
#14 · (Edited)
My husband and I also have a key fit 30 for our three and a half month old and it is behind the passenger seat and works fine. I'm 5'9" and my husband is 6' and even he is fine in the passenger side.

While we go on trips we move the car seat to the middle do I can recline my seat and we never have to move the seats forward in the middle. If it wasn't so hard for me to get his car seat in and out from the middle it would probably stay there. ?



 
#15 ·
Anyone have input on what they do to protect the seats with the car seats? I think I saw a towel under the car seat in one of the pics. Any other protection methods used? Wife and I are expecting our first and were wondering how to keep the back seat as clean as possible as well as protecting the leather from the car seats...

Are there any good seat covers we could use in the back?

Any input would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Kevin
 
#26 ·
I've got 3 baby seats in the back of my GC Overland. I use old towels underneath "Little Car Baby Seat Grippers" (probably similar to the brand others here mention). Had it for 6 months now and took them out for a boys weekend away and was pleased to see no evidence of the baby seats being there. Previously I had a Jeep Commander limited with towels only under the baby seats and there were some indentations left behind.
 
#27 ·
The current recommendation is that a child stays rear facing until 2. It is also infinitely safer to keep a child in a 5-point harness seat for as long as possible. I have a Britax Frontier 85 SICD that is good until 85 lbs.

Secondly, you must know the weight limit of the LATCH system in your vehicle. The rule is that if it's not clearly stated in plain english in your vehicle's manual, assume the total limit is 45 lbs.

For Chrysler products since 2010, the limit on the anchors is 65 lbs. That is inclusive of the child AND seat. My 44 lb. son is in a 20+ lb seat, so there's no using the LATCH system.

To touch on what someone mentioned earlier, a rear facing seat should NEVER brace against the seat back of the front seat. They are designed to bounce to absorb crash forces.

Seatbelt installation is not any less safe than the LATCH. It's just made for convenience's sake.

With any child restraint, the goal is to minimize movement of the base at the belt path down to 1" in either direction. Any more and it's not a correct installation.

I didn't read all the pages of responses, but I've seen my share of injured or potentially injured children from improperly installed seats (and most of them are). I am a certified Child Restraint System installer as well.
 
#31 ·
Nothing is "infinitely" safer than a three point harness. The car seat industry would only have you believe that.

Your other points I do agree with for most.

But as for me, my 1 year old is going to face front just like her brother did at 1. Pointing a kid backwards is, to me, a form of slow torture. I read the data on safety, not the sales pitches, so dont lecture me please. Life is about weighing risks and benefit... I am buying the better side impact seat to mitigate some of the side impact risk, as that is higher in front facing.

I do have the frontier 85 sicd on order, how do you like that?
 
#32 ·
We're parents. We make the decisions we believe to be best and safest for our children. I believe a 5 point harness is safer than a 3 point belt. "Infinitely" was used figuratively.

My son is 3.5 and 45 pounds. He's staying in the harness as long as I can keep him in it, even though he can be seated in a BPB when he turns 4 in six months. I've seen enough little ones unscathed in crashes that you'd think they "should" have been seriously injured because they were seated in restraints that were properly installed. Conversely, I've seen little ones get hurt in seemingly minor crashes because their restraint was installed to the parents' standard, not that of the industry.

I like the seat. I think the side airbag stuff is a sales pitch itself, to be honest. It makes the seat really large. You'll have to compress the side "airbag" to fold the split seat. If it offers any additional protection, it's worth the bucks, which is why I bought it. You can't put a price on the potential mitigation of injury to our children.
 
#33 ·
Thanks. I just installed it last night. I agree with your points. The side airbags are basically plastic canisters of air! I do like the Britax Advocate sort of "staged" harness, looks like it has give built into it to decrease peak decel G's.

Another thing I do (which means we basically never put the seat down, is have a relatively secure barrier between cargo and passengers, because in a rollover, everything goes everywhere...

I totally agree that 5 point is better than 3 for several reasons, one being the kid can't get out! I have a 6 point with HANS in my car for track days and except for a rollover and cave-in, it sure seems it is safer!
 
#34 ·
Another thing I do (which means we basically never put the seat down, is have a relatively secure barrier between cargo and passengers, because in a rollover, everything goes everywhere...

!
I just re-installed my rollup cargo cover prior to a roadtrip for this very reason. I plan on leaving it installed.
 
#35 ·
I've got the Britax Roundabout 55 for our 1 year-old:



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