Help! Child & Baby Seats in a Defender 90 Station Wagon?

Now I have the important thing out of the way, i.e. the purchase of a lovely TD5 D90 Station Wagon, I need to fit the family in it.

I have been using a (recommended) rear facing baby seat in the front passenger seat for my little one, which has served me extremely well, up until now.

My little one is getting a lot less little very rapidly and I need a baby/child seat that will fit both the car and the child (in either the front or the back).

Has anyone overcome this issue or does anyone have any constructive advice or options for me?

Many thanks in advance, fellow Land Rovers, for any help you may give.

I'll be interested if anyone has any advice on this as well. My little one is 8 months and growing fast! My rear facing seat will soon be redundant as well !

Well, we think we may have an answer to this!

We have ordered a Maxi-Cosi Priori Baby seat for 9 months to 4 years. We received the tip off from some new folk in the area who use one in their D110 ('03 model) both on the bench and front seat, apparently with no problems.

I must warn you that we haven't personally tested it on a D90, nor I believe have Land Rover certified it, and I don't think Maxi-Cosi have either, so this post is for your information only and is not a recommendation in any way. You use this information at your own risk.

A further point of note, I hear on the grapevine that Maxi-Cosi are discontinuing this particular seat early next year and don't plan to make anything similar. This is probably because this particular seat has a lower safety rating than their other products however it does comply with ECE R44/03 (yeah, like I really know what that means ).

Thanks for the tip vault. When yours arrives please let me know how you get on and I may stick an order in for the same seat...

Well, we finally took delivery of a Maxi-Cosi Priori car seat (in fetching red).

The original company who took our order did not have any in stock despite indications to the contrary on their web site. This then led to some confusion on their part over the different Maxi-Cosi products and why exactly we had to have the Priori and only the Priori.

That said, we have one now and it certainly appears to be the correct dimensions for the D90 front passenger seat, even if it seems to be somewhat throne like.

Good hunting!

Caveat: I haven't tried it out and about - my daughter is still too small - so again I have only my neighbour's word on the subject.

Best regards to all!

I have one of these (about 5 years old) and can confirm that it does fit in the back fold up seats of my D90 - you do have to pull the belt very tight to make it secure.

Is a child safe in the back of a defender?

With the inward facing seats I am not sure what is recomended or advised..

Is there any info from LR? What do you all do?

Thanks,

Jeff

Hi all,

Time has moved on and my daughter is 18months old now. We have been using the seat for quite some time now with great success , but only in the front passenger seat. Personally I am not going to try the side-facing rear seats with the child seat as I just don't feel comfortable with that setup.

There are some minor pros and cons:
Child gets a fabulous elevated view of the surroundings
Comical sight for other road users (especially folks in busses)
Driver can see the child easily

Child gets harder and harder to get into the seat the longer and heavier they get
You or your partner will be spending a lot of time in the back side facing seats (in my case this can bring on intense car sickness within seconds if i do anything other than stare out of the front window - difficult if the sun visor is down!)

When baby 2 comes along and you have a pregnant partner it becomes less and less plesant to get in and out of the D90, front or back and lifting baby 1 in and out is a greater challenge.

My solution is going to be to buy another car. I will probably have to sell my current D90 to release enough money to do this, consequently the budget for the replacement D90/110 isn't much and it does need to be able to get me to work and back! So my advice to any prospective D90 owner is; buy a D110 instead .

ATB

Hi

I have had exactly the same problems but I went about it slightly differently, I took out my security box and installed a centre seat, I then installed a secureon 384 three point seat belt for the middle seat and it works well. It's a bit of a pain doing the centre belt up but at least I didn't have to sell the car, oh and of course the children are safe.

I have two girls (3 1/2 and 20 months) and we use a normal britax child seat in the passenger seat for the youngest and I have a Graco rally sport seat in the middle for the eldest child. The girls love it and other drivers seem to find it amusing when we are going along. It is a bit tight for space but I am 6'4" and 15 stone.

The car passed it's MOT since I installed the belt and securon supplied instructions so I assume all legal and safe. You can see the belt on the exmoor trim web site. It shows a newer model LR90 without the bulkhead between the seats and the load space and suggests the belt goes in the load space. I fitted mine behind the centre seat, cab side of the bulkhead and it's fine.

I hope this was of use.
Russell.

lest face it the Defender 90 is ,safety wise, about as bad a choice you can make if you have more than one child. I have two five year old twins who bot want to join me in the front ( I have had the centre console removed and a centre seat put in)...This is much safer than them in the back...but in the event of an accident , you need to remeber to get the gear stick into fifth and out the way !. I will have to look at the 3 point belt for the centre seat- what are you fixing the upper point of the belt too?

The third point is fixed behind the seat, the belt comes with re-inforced fixing plate.

Best Wishes
Russell.

Could anyone please post a picture of the child seats fitted and details of the three point belts please.

I am going to be needing a seat in about 6 months.

i always had a standard child seat in the front seat of my car and never had any problem with this, i checked with the police authority and they told me it was safer than putting them in side facing seats. i hope this is of help

We ended up with a 110 Defender Station wagon. Hey, if inward facing seats were OK for children, they could sit in the back of the series 3! View out is not so good.

Trailer?

I have some pics but they are too large to post. If you send your email address I can send them direct to you.

Russell.

We recently found out from our local garage that Exmoor Trim (Welcome to Exmoor Trim) do a central 3 point seat belt designed for the defender. We have ordered one and our bloke is fitting it for us. Thank goodness we can now put baby and 2 adults in front!

FFS and you opened a 3 year old post for what exactly??? If i was a suspicious bugger I'd think you were spamming for Exmoor trim.???

redhand said:

FFS and you opened a 3 year old post for what exactly??? If i was a suspicious bugger I'd think you were spamming for Exmoor trim.???

Click to expand...

at five hundred fookin squid a pop, i shud think so!!!