ARFUR

I have been told that rear facing kids seats are available for the Impreza, (attatched to the back seat, with lap belt).Does anyone know where I could get one or have any experience of use.Twin addition to family means this or a people carrier .Help.

bruceh

Yeah, but the kids tend to whinge a bit when you shut the boot lid and leave them in the dark

Seriously though, I presume that you're talking about a 5dr. If so, I'd be surprised if you could fit in these type of seats. There's quite an angle to the back seats, and not an awful lot of room in there. But I've been wrong plenty of times before!

If you find any, I'd be interested to know as well. Good luck in your hunt. Trading down to a people carrier would be a sad day for you indeed, I bet.

JohnS

iTrader: (1)

Hmmm,

I regularly use have two child seats in the back, one of them a rear facing one. You might just be able to squeeze a third one in between, but it would be a very tight fit.

What happens in 6 - 9 months time when your baby outgrows the rear facing seat and needs to get a forward facing one ?

bruceh

I'm confused now.

Arfur, I thought you were talking about those type of seats which you sometimes see in Volvo Estates, etc. Rear facing but fixed to the BACK of the rear seat in the luggage area (so kids can put their tongues out at all the cars you've just overtaken!).

Now, after JohnS's reply, I'm not sure if I misunderstood or not. If so, my apologies.

kevin l moyle

would it not be easier and safer to get passenger airbag disconnected,
i could not drive around with baby in back facing backwards on lap belt only

James DT

JohnS, I have tried to get my baby seat fixed in the middle of the rear seat, so two people could sit in the back whilse the new edition could be rearward facing in the front(dont worry, no airbags). Unfortuntely the middle seat belt is to short!

Is it OK to get seat belts modified or will my dealer laugh at such a dangerous suggestion.

Andy, Thanks for the tip, I love the idea of kiddy recaro's and will research the subject.

James DT

Sorry, double post.

[This message has been edited by James DT (edited 19-05-99).]

bruceh

I think there's a serious (mis)interpretation problem here of what Arfur is asking. Could you clarify a bit, Arfur?

andymac

Slightly off the main thread but...

I went looking for alternative seats a while ago and as I'm in Leamington Spa, I went to Reccaro's head office where they've got the lot (didn't quite fit into some of the pukka touring car seats ). They now do a child seat from (I think) 9 months to 10 years ('cos in Germany you have to have your child in proper seats until age 10 I think). It expands length ways and width and depth with loads of extra bits of padding etc.

So you can have your Reccaros in the front (yeah and pay £175 for the subframe prodrive) and kiddie reccaro's in the back.

cheers

Andy
(in no way affiliated with reccaro)

andymac

They're about £100 odd quid (maybe £110) but they look dead smart. Have a look at the Recaro web site at www.recaro.com

I'm sure that your childs formative years should be spent in such luxury. I know I had a britax 4 point harness in our mini when I was young - maybe that's where the car thing comes from !

cheers

Andy

James DT

Thanks Andy,

Nice seats and still cheaper than what I paid for Britax Elite (135 quid).

The kids will be very happy

dave meadows

As for the original post, if you did mean an extra set of seats in the load carrying area, forget it.

I believe the whole area on most cars is designed to crumple under impact to provide the correct protection to proper rear seat passengers.

Even the cars/mpvs marketed as having seven seats scare me. I sat in the back row of an MPV taxi recently and i was "way" too close to other cars bonnets for comfort.

Anybody advise on the accuracy of this ?

ARFUR

To clarify original post - an extra kid seat for the load area ( 5 door) , was what I was enquiring about.
Since post my Subaru dealer have come back with a rear-facing fold-up kids seat with lap belt. Cost -£360.00 / lap belt -£25.00
Fitting ? .

I understand the points on safety ,but where does this place ie. Volvo /Renault who both provide 2 x rear facing fold down seats in estate cars , or even 4 x jeeps with side facing fold down seats ?

Rick Dyer

Anecdotally I had a Merc estate with rear facing seats which pop up. I was turning right one day and a ten ton HGV didn't see me and hit me doing ca. 20mph pushing me into the oncoming traffic where each front headlight was hit by a car doing 40mph. I walked away from this accident and bought another identical car because I had walked away from this accident. The lorry hit just at the bottom of the rear windscreen and pushed both sloping pillars in about a six inches. The kids in the back would have been showered with glass but would have been unhurt by quite a forceful crash. What point am I trying to make? Well I think that the kids are safer in the back of an estate like that than in the back of a car/people carrier where the back of their heads are an inch from the rear windscreen! Check out those sort of cars when you are next on the motorway and think about the lorry behind them. Paranoia?
If you have a Scooby you love driving so do yourself a favour and don't buy a people carrier get yourself an estate car - if they don't have optional rear seats then look in any AutoTrader in the estates section and you'll find companies which sell rear seats for 'any estate car' don't know if it incldes 5-door Scoobies.