By Child’s Age
The baby car seats are homologated by weight of the baby. Of course, a baby car seat is an element with a certain structure, and as such its resistance has a limit, in this case, the weight of the baby who has to sit on it. A car, for example, also has a maximum weight that is capable of moving or towing, and a building or bridge also have a maximum weight that they can withstand.
However, the most important criterion for choosing the type of baby car seat, and whether it will be front or back, has to be the age of the child. The most important thing is to attend to the physical development of the child are head, neck and muscles, because the older the child is, the more developed he will be, and the younger he is, the more fragile his neck.
The height of the child is also an important factor in choosing the right type of baby car seat, and it is a matter of logic, if the child has grown so much that he leaves the baby car seat, it will not protect properly. The most important thing to do is to make sure that the child’s head does not protrude from the back of the chair.
It is best to take the child backwards the longer the better. It is advisable that a child under four years of age should not go forward, but with his back, and in any case, it is strongly advisable that a child under two years of age never go head-on, but always on his or her back.
In addition to age, and looking at the particular case of each child, we will have to look at the weight. If the child has grown a lot, and weighs a lot, even if he is still a few years old, if it turns out that the baby car seat is no longer worth it by weight, there is no other choice but to move to the next size of the baby car seat.
ISOFIX Anchorage
A baby car seat with more technology, better manufacture, or more expensive will not protect the child if it is not well placed, anchored and secured to the car seat and this is a no-brainer.
Nowadays, ISOFIX anchorage baby car seats are being extended. This anchor, which consists of two attachment points that go in the lower back of the chair, is very fast, comfortable and easy. The seat is anchored directly to steel supports attached to the car frame, which appear through holes in the seat.
These two points have to be complemented with a third anchor point of the chair, which may be higher or lower. The top is a hook with rope or cable that goes over the back of the car seat, below the headrest, and down to a hitch on the back of the back, already inside the trunk, and is known as top tether. The lower one is a foot of support that leaves the base of the chair, and that adjusts to support perfectly in the floor of the car.
An ISOFIX baby car seat will never use the car safety belt to anchor. Nowadays there are chairs that combine the posterior ISOFIX anchorages with the belt, but they are not exactly ISOFIX.
In the old days, children’s car seat that were not ISOFIX, and which were fastened with the seat belt of the car, were more common. It is important to stop to read and understand perfectly the instructions of fastening the seat, and where and how to pass, fasten and tighten the seat belt, so that the seat is perfectly fastened. If it has a roll-over safety bow, it must be adjusted against the backrest to prevent the baby car seat from wobbling.
