Daughter is 9 months old, and can’t wait to get her out on a bike. Been looking out for a child carrier, Hamax, Topeak and City Limo all look good. Any reccomendations? Going to fit it to an old Kona Fire Mountain HT (16″ Frame).

I have been given a child carrier from friends who did not use it. It is a Kooki, appears to be manufactured in Germany and looks not too disimilar to some of the Hamax seats. Found no references on here, but google returns lots of hits from Argos, Amazon, Halfords and Netmums. It received good reviews on those sites, but wonder what is tried and tested on here.

I did find Kooki labelled under the Canyon brand on the UKBike web site.

Recommendations and thoughts appreciated, thanks.

davieg – i bought a topeak one and fitted to my 1996 kona hei hei. my 15 month old son is the coolest retrobike baby ever – fact!
but on a more serious note i can only manage to ride 4 miles with him on the back. the raised centre of gravity is horrible. you end up constantly leaning forward to compensate for the rear weight (approx 20kg) that your hands and nuts go numb.

i wish i had spent my money on a trailer baby carrier.

one the plus side my son loves it!

hth

One thing to consider is vibration. At the smaller end of things, kids are better in a tube mounted/sprung seat. Once they reach say 2, they’d be better in a rack mounted seat – but they can be a bit juddery off road.

I use a Hamax Kiss child seat on the back of my Cindercone, I don’t do anything too rough but round Richmond Park my 18 month old loves it.

I got the seat from eBay but ended up buying a different bracket as the standard one was too short/low and rubbed on the rear tyre (short frame adapter).

Can’t recommend it enough, and the Hamax system has enough flex in it to reduce impact from bumps for the little one out back.

– Jon

i’ve used a WeeRide for both of my sons – highly recommended.

I have a wee ride mounted in front of me, far safer, but if you are on the road, cars approaching from behind dont know you have a child on board.
Seeing how much my Daughter moves around in it looking and pointing at stuff, I much prefer her to be between my arms 😀
She loves going out in it, but I could do with some Mary Bars ideally !!

Having used the Halfords version of a Hamax Kiss, I would recommend one because it has a decent lightweight seat for the child with adjustable straps. The sprung steel mount is forgiving and way more comfortable than rack mounted seats. It allows the seat to be removed with one press of a button, leaving only a smallish bracket on the seat tube. There is no need for a rack for mounting and it fits full suss frames provided they have a round seat tube, just pump the shock up to compensate for the extra weight.

We’ve used a hamax one a year or so now but it can get a bit bouncy if you go over any lumps and now he’s getting bigger (14kg) i have to be more careful stopping with that much weight behind me. often go the sherwood pines for raz with the boy and he normally falls asleep after half an hour 😉 when he gets bigger we’ll go back to the trail option and he’ll have a little sister next summer as well for company

go for the type where the kids sits on the front between your arms, much more sociable and fun. and the bike balances better too so it is more predictable.
I have twins so need two ! one on the back, one on the front. eventually they grew out of the one on the front 🙁

I’ve got a Croozer Trailer. More expensive, but really brilliant fun. Keeps them lovely and warm in winter, and shaded in summer, can make a big difference to how practical things are – I’ve been out on trailer rides with snow still on the ground next to the road and temperatures at about zero with no cold baby problems (in Scandinavia they sell bike trailers with a ski attachment!).

Added bonus is that you can stick a baby in the trailer with the baby sling from somewhere between 12 weeks – 6 months, whereas with the bike seats you’ve got a few months still before you’re supposed to use them (mostly from at least age 1 I think).

It is easy to do long rides with the trailer – I’ve done 40 hilly miles across Derbyshire with it (Belper -> Tissington -> Parsley Hay -> Bolehill -> Belper if you know the area). The main limiting factor is how often you need to stop for playground / running around time, picnics, nappy changes etc. It has a massive boot for carrying food / nappies / clothes & other baby related gubbins (I bought a stair gate once and managed to fit stair gate + baby inside the trailer, it really is massive). Most babies seem to sleep well in trailers.

I also went on a big (15 miles or so I guess) ride across Berlin on Tuesday with a hired bike and a rear bike seat, and it seemed fine for our 14 month old, she was fast asleep in it for half the time. Only pain is that when she was awake, there was a constant poking / pulling at my clothes and things, as grabbing daddy is the funniest game in the world. I still prefer the trailer generally, but I can see the bike seat has a convenience advantage.

If I get a baby seat of my own I think I’ll get the loct one or similar once she is two (http://www.loct.co.uk/) as I always preferred the front seat as a kid, and it’d allow for more off road riding.

Joe

Unfortunately you cannot actually buy a loct anymore.

On the front all the way – you can interact with them share the view talk to them properly etc. This is the one me and the wife have used for the last few years and no problems. Just make sure you’ve got a reasonable head tube length to clamp it on to.
[url=http://www.wiggle.co.uk/ok-baby-orion-child-seat/]wiggle[/url]
After that you can get a really simple bit of kit that is cheap as chips but I can’t remember the brand name. Essentially its a saddle with a wire back rest and seat belt that clamps onto your top tube and has a couple of bits of steel that clamp round the rown tube for foot pegs.
Ah the wonders of google – its called a Leco child seat – all for £20. Just pop a couple of old grips on the centre of your bars between the stem clamp and the controls for them to hang on to with out getting too cold in the winter.
leco on amazon

Unfortunately you cannot actually buy a loct anymore.

Balls. That leco one looks similar but not as nice. Any other options for not massive front mounted seats? I’ve seen the weeride etc but they are gigantic. My dad used to have just a little seat for me, small enough that it worked fine even on a drop bar road bike.

I’ve been using one of these for a year or so on my daily commute – I drop my daughter at nursery on the way. It’s been faultless. It’s also very quick and easy to install/remove.