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Concerns raised over performance of Safety 1st harness adjuster
By Jeremiah | February 22, 2010 | 8 comments / Comment now
There has been a lot of great conversation surrounding our post earlier this month in which we did something we don't usually do: Recommend against a product (the Safety 1st Air Protect car seat) based solely on the track record of the company that developed it. Depending on whether or not you think that's an acceptable and precautionary position to take (obviously, we think it is), this bit of consumer reporting will strike you as either further evidence of our prescience, or just another blip on the radar for a large, well-meaning company that makes the occasional slip. Pun intended.
Presumably the four car seats this consumer activist located (and he declares himself just that - a consumer, not a car seat technician, safety expert, or representative of a competing brand) are all new, but that is not made explicit. Presumably he did not tamper with them, and does not have some hidden and nefarious agenda. Presumably he found the prospect of waiting however many months or years NHTSA and Dorel might enjoy discussing this issue unpalatable, and decided to take to the internet. There is now serious journalism afoot to get to the bottom of this issue, and NHTSA is under pressure to resolve it in some time frame that is shorter than nine years.
The question NHTSA must look at now is not just how widespread the faulty harness adjuster issue is within the Safety 1st Vantage - a car seat which would not be on the market today if the Vantage had not passed crash tests and met existing federal safety standards at the moment they were tested. It's what other Safety 1st seats use the same adjuster, what other seats in the Dorel Juvenile Group family of trusted brands use it, what other DJG seats use other harness adjusters made by the same, non-industry-leading parts supplier, and what other factors might make the world's least expensive car seats so inexpensive.
We haven't seen definitive evidence either way on whether the Air Protect uses this harness adjuster, and we aren't taking any bets on that. But we will be among the many others who will be looking into this question in the coming days.
If you missed our Feb. 9 post on the topic of Safety 1st's new Air Protect car seat, we went through some Dorel history and concluded with the uncomfortable conclusion that we really thought buying any car seat made by Dorel brands Safety 1st, Cosco, Maxi-Cosi, and Eddie Bauer - was a pretty bad idea, no matter how forward-thinking the company seems to be feeling today. We wrote:
To which one commenter responded with (among other good points): "I do appreciate you providing information about the politics behind everything, but as a parent, bottom-line, I want to know whether or not a product is safe."
What we were trying to say in our post is that looking at individual products in isolation - even if they pass existing tests or meet industry standards - will only take you so far. The rest is context. Sometimes it involves deeper context than anyone but true specialists have full access to, and surely context that involves nuance and the possibility of redemption - but something that reaches beyond the scope of a specific product and a specific test that was performed on it.
As for the potential hazard illustrated above, we'll keep you posted. You may be hearing about it from other news outlets very soon.
Presumably the four car seats this consumer activist located (and he declares himself just that - a consumer, not a car seat technician, safety expert, or representative of a competing brand) are all new, but that is not made explicit. Presumably he did not tamper with them, and does not have some hidden and nefarious agenda. Presumably he found the prospect of waiting however many months or years NHTSA and Dorel might enjoy discussing this issue unpalatable, and decided to take to the internet. There is now serious journalism afoot to get to the bottom of this issue, and NHTSA is under pressure to resolve it in some time frame that is shorter than nine years.
The question NHTSA must look at now is not just how widespread the faulty harness adjuster issue is within the Safety 1st Vantage - a car seat which would not be on the market today if the Vantage had not passed crash tests and met existing federal safety standards at the moment they were tested. It's what other Safety 1st seats use the same adjuster, what other seats in the Dorel Juvenile Group family of trusted brands use it, what other DJG seats use other harness adjusters made by the same, non-industry-leading parts supplier, and what other factors might make the world's least expensive car seats so inexpensive.
We haven't seen definitive evidence either way on whether the Air Protect uses this harness adjuster, and we aren't taking any bets on that. But we will be among the many others who will be looking into this question in the coming days.
If you missed our Feb. 9 post on the topic of Safety 1st's new Air Protect car seat, we went through some Dorel history and concluded with the uncomfortable conclusion that we really thought buying any car seat made by Dorel brands Safety 1st, Cosco, Maxi-Cosi, and Eddie Bauer - was a pretty bad idea, no matter how forward-thinking the company seems to be feeling today. We wrote:
"As much as we applaud Dorel's efforts to make forward progress in car seat safety, we shudder to think that an innovative design alone would encourage safety-conscious parents to buy car seats made by the Dorel Juvenile Group. ... Good design is meaningless without both consistent execution on the production line and the integrity to swiftly correct errors and place children's safety above all other goals. When a company can't deliver all three, we'd encourage you to look further when it comes to trusting companies to protect your children from harm."
To which one commenter responded with (among other good points): "I do appreciate you providing information about the politics behind everything, but as a parent, bottom-line, I want to know whether or not a product is safe."
What we were trying to say in our post is that looking at individual products in isolation - even if they pass existing tests or meet industry standards - will only take you so far. The rest is context. Sometimes it involves deeper context than anyone but true specialists have full access to, and surely context that involves nuance and the possibility of redemption - but something that reaches beyond the scope of a specific product and a specific test that was performed on it.
As for the potential hazard illustrated above, we'll keep you posted. You may be hearing about it from other news outlets very soon.
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After posting this on my Facebook, I received a comment back that at least one person was able to duplicate this with her Vantage seat. She is calling Dorel and the NHTSA and no longer using the seat. There are techs and other members over at car-seat.org who have found the same defect in their seats. One had posted a youtube video she took of a 2005 model Cosco Touriva with the same issue. I also recall reading of a Cosco Scenera. Hopefully parents reading this who have a Dorel seat will check their seats and if there’s failure report it to the NHTSA and Dorel.
The problem is, all car seat manufacturers have had VERY significant problems. Dorel has had its fair share of problems. It was also the first company to come out with a 35 lb limit rear facing seat, is the only company to produce a convertible car seat that costs only $40, and was the 1st or 2nd company to produce a 40 lb limit rear facing seat. This does not negate it’s problems, but shows you cannot paint a single company with one bold brush stroke.
All of the larger, established companies have had large scale recalls due to failures. Britax, for instance, has sold a seat in the US that outright failed Canadian testing. One of it’s seats, on a study commissioned by Transport Canada, failed multiple times (the harness pulled out of the shell). According to the NHTSA’s numbers, in multiple categories and on multiple seats, it’s numbers are just barely passing. And this isn’t to single out Britax- there are other companies, INCLUDING Dorel, who have multiple serious problems. The people who work for these companies hop from company to company, also.
These companies aren’t the Red Cross, they are profit driven companies. Unfortunately, the NHTSA appears to be so disorganized and so friendly with these companies it is unable to regulate them effectively.
If the harness adjuster is failing on 75% of all Vantage seats, then we should be seeing crash test dummies fly out in testing. It’s probably a smaller subset.
ts and Nicole, thanks for your comments.
Nicole, we assume (as you do) that this is not a 75% failure issue. Obviously, even a much smaller percentage of failures would be unacceptable to everyone involved.
Do you know what the requirements are for follow-up testing of seats after their initial pre-market tests? Do they need to be conducted again on an annual, biannual, etc. basis? Or does one set of tests cover the product until/unless there are modifications declared?
With Dorel, as we wrote in our initial post on the Air Protect seat, our concerns are not just with initial designs and engineering, but quality control in extended production. Any light you could shed for us and readers on this process would be very helpful!
Car seat testing tends to be hidden from the public for various reasons- it isn’t as transparent as car testing. The last published crash test results I can find from the NHTSA for the Vantage are from 2005. However, every year many Dorel seats have been tested, many likely using the same harness adjuster and webbing. In addition seats are crash tested periodically- both formally and informally. When cars are tested, for example, they often have a child restraint or booster installed. How car seats are manufactured is suppose to be very controlled (seats have been recalled for having padding a fraction of an inch too thick) therefore if the seat passes in 2005, it should continue to pass unless there is a quality control issue.
The vantage was actually one of the seats crashed during the recent Transport Canada study- you can see the video and results here http://www.tc.gc.ca/eng/roadsafety/safedrivers-childsafety-programs-testing-harness-vantage-975.htm . The study wasn’t looking at individual seat performance, however. Reading the entirety of the study is very interesting for anyone interested in car seat safety.
Thank you for posting this! Since seeing this video, I have become much more vigilant about checking the harness on my Cosco Scenera.
You know what? About 2/3 of the time, I can pull the harness strap right back out after I’ve adjusted it to be tight. Every time I put my daughter in it now, I have to re-adjust several times before it will hold.
I think I need to go get a new car seat. And contact the NHTSA.
While we are on the topic of car-seat manufacturers, I would love to see you ask some probing questions to Britax, a brand I know you love and trust for your child.
There has been some disturbing crash test footage performed by Transport Canada. These were real cars that were crashed - not some test bench.
The company has yet to publish a statement in response to these results. If anyone is going to get them to talk, it would be you.
Anitra- you need to discontinue use of your Scenera immediately and contact the NHTSA as well as Dorel Juvenile Products. If the harness adjuster on your seat is failing it needs to be investigated, and you need a new seat.
Good news! I contacted Dorel, and they are going to pick up my old Scenera and give me a new one with a modified design.
But I still never would have thought to check the shoulder straps this way had it not been for this video.