Choosing the Right Baby Car Seat – A Checklist

When considering the hold of car seats for a baby there are many factors to take into account, such as price, design, guarantee and safety ratings. These points are often well covered by manufacturers and retailers in their literature. Though, we have included some additional factors below which many parents don't consider (until its too late!) In addition, make sure you know how to fit baby car seats accurately prior to hold.

Ease of removal and decent

• How heavy is the seat? many seats weigh over 25lbs, this can be hard to manoeuvre into the car and hard to adjust to a snug fit once inside.
• Can you easily remove/fit the seat lacking straining? Now and again a combination of the size of the seat and narrow door openings on less vital cars, can make it really awkward to position seat accurately
• Are the headrests/backrests/tensioning systems simple to adjust? Do you constantly have to refer to the manual for every small adjustment required, or are all adjustments intuitive and straightforward?
• Is it simple to quickly get a snug fit? Is it hard to fit seat snugly due to the shape/size of your rear seats, some cars have very narrow seats which makes it hard to fit some baby seats lacking fouling seat belt buckles and gear. If you have 3 children which all demand baby seats - can you fit all three across your rear bench? Many cars cannot.

Ease of use

• Are straps simple to loosen/tense up? If you adjust straps every journey to ensure right fit (as you must do), is this simple and straightforward to do, or frustrating, hard and annoying?
• Is it simple to place child in seat comfortably? Some baby seats have considerable side bolster protection - which is fantastic! Though, it can be hard - depending on car model - to manoeuvre child around these side bolsters and fit them into seat lacking being a contortionist!
• Are there any extra convenience features like one handed strap adjustment? The best modern car seats are full of features like these and are worth paying extra for. Presume the rain is pouring down, you are laden with shopping, are late (as usual) and have to spend 5 minutes getting soaked to the skin while baby is screaming as you fumble with car seat gear!
• Can you adjust backrest from sleeping/sitting positions smoothly (so you don't wake your child!) Excellent baby car seats have smooth damped adjustment mechanisms allowing you to adjust seat lacking disturbing baby.

Cleaning

• Will the fabric colour show up every grubby finger mark? We all know that the seat will get dirty - with young children this is impracticable to avoid! So you want to choose a seat that does not show up every small mark and look grubby nearly at once.
• Can you remove the fabric and wash in washing apparatus? (a fantastic feature). The better seats will have this option and it makes life much simpler.
• Does the manual give clear instructions on cleaning? On many seats you are paying extra for fancy fabric designs such as Disney characters. You need to know just so how to clean the seat to avoid ruining the fabric.

Author: Gina Alessia
Condition Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: How Gripping Difficulty Cookers Work