Child car seats

[tjvpga]

I am a little surprised that RV's don't have the latch system for child car seats. What do people traveling with small children do?

[ependydad]

Just like the old days- for the seat belt to lock and pull like holy hannah. You can get seat belts just as tight as the latch system. When my daughter was born (she's 10 now), we used the center seat in our Durango because it was safer than being beside of a door. The problem was, there wasn't a latch system for that seat. We could rock the SUV by grabbing the car seat and shaking it. There wasn't any movement at the base of the seat.

If you go online, you can actually find "professional car seat installers". No, I don't make that up (yes, I know back in the 60s kids road on the back deck of their daddy's station wagon). We paid for her to teach us to install car seats properly. We've actually had friends bring their seats and cars to us to help install them. You could likely find someone local that does it and have them install it.

Harder to find are car seat inspections done by the fire department. Once you get that bad boy installed, contact your local FD and see if it is something that they offer. I'm sure the fire fighters would love a few minutes in the RV to check it out (the camper and the seat ).

[Kaadk]

Originally Posted by ependydad

Just like the old days- for the seat belt to lock and pull like holy hannah. You can get seat belts just as tight as the latch system. When my daughter was born (she's 10 now), we used the center seat in our Durango because it was safer than being beside of a door. The problem was, there wasn't a latch system for that seat. We could rock the SUV by grabbing the car seat and shaking it. There wasn't any movement at the base of the seat.

If you go online, you can actually find "professional car seat installers". No, I don't make that up (yes, I know back in the 60s kids road on the back deck of their daddy's station wagon). We paid for her to teach us to install car seats properly. We've actually had friends bring their seats and cars to us to help install them. You could likely find someone local that does it and have them install it.

Harder to find are car seat inspections done by the fire department. Once you get that bad boy installed, contact your local FD and see if it is something that they offer. I'm sure the fire fighters would love a few minutes in the RV to check it out (the camper and the seat ).

Police do the car seat inspections around here. They have set days but I hear you can also just show up at the station and ask "Can somebody please come validate my car seat?". They'll be more than happy to.

My 1500 has 3 latch points across the back seat so I could put the car seats anywhere. But in the DW's minivan the latch was only on the middle row stow and go seats. Whenever the kids get moved to the back seat we just use the seat belts to retain the car seats. As long as the seat belts have a locking retractor then you can use them for a car seat. Just pull it all the way out and gently let it retract. If you hear a click and then can't pull it out anymore, you've got a locking retractor. Lock the car seat down (using the car seat's directions) and let the retractor snug it all up. If done right, the car seat shouldn't be able to move until the belt gets unbuckled.

If you got old school manual belts with just a strap you pull, then you can sometimes still use those. Just kneel on the seat and then pull like hell. If it's tight enough it won't come loose. Those of course you'll want to have inspected.

[mark0224]

Our sheriff's dept had a class on how to properly install a car seat because so many are not installed right. You might be able to go to your Dept and ask for info on motor home installation. They probably would be stumped but would like this so they know how, most people haven't thought about it.

[Oakman]

As ependydad posted, use the seatbelt. Back when our daughter was young seatbelts were the proper way to secure a car seat. Properly done the car seat was rock solid.

Our daughter is in her 30's so I didn't even know vehicles came with a latch system for car seats.

[alparmer]

We just use the lap belt on the car seat for our 2 year old. We feel it is secured enough to protect him since he is strapped in with a 4 point type of belt in there.