As *they* advise you can never trust the history of a 2nd hand baby car seat, what happens to all the prefectly good ones that have never been crashed, I assume there’s a big recycling market / servcie for them or are there huge piles of the things sat in Landfill the world over?

A lot get passed around, most seem to end up in the path behind my house or chucked over the fence onto the railway.

In our case, they get passed on to people that know and trust you.

We got our travel system from the brother-in-law, and passed it onto my sister when we finished with it.

Car seat is a bit trickier. It adapts through the ages so it’ll be something like 9 or 10 years old by the time we finish with it.

We’ll sell it on eBay if it is still fit for purpose.

Would you buy one off ebay advertised as ‘not crashed’?

Nope. In fact her current car seat was one of the few things we bought new.

But we have the luxury of choice. They are expensive things and not everyone can afford new.

when our first child was born a couple of years ago we weren’t allowed to leave the maternity unit with him unless we proved that our car seat was brand new and unused..

this time round though standards must have slipped because the deputy midwife just lobbed our newborn at a passing bus from a second floor window..

I would buy a second hand one, so long as its possible to have a good look at it first. They are not mega complicated things, if you can get eyes on all the structural bits, looking for signs of fatigue, cracks, frays, etc. a lot use expanded polystyrene as the energy absorption medium, when that does its job it deforms and stays deformed.

Although, I can completely understand why anyone wouldn’t be confident enough to be sure. (suits me, keeps the rice of a second hand one low)

I did sell a car seat on eBay. it was a decent/expensive one and I wouldn’t have sold it if it had ever been in an accident. Don’t think I got a huge amount for it (they are heavy/bulky to post) but I suppose if you’re on £42000 a year and they’re gonna take your Child Benenfit away you have to slum it somehow….

I do see a lot being passed around friends and family these days.

When we’d finished with ours’ I just took it down the recycling centre, and left it with one of their guys – good condition so I guess someone used it.

TBH even the Maxi-cosi ones are about £300 all in which is cheap compared with how expensive some of the bugyy systems come in at

We have one out in the garage that hasn’t been used for a year now and is just taking up room.

Maybe I will do what b r has suggested.

When we’d finished with ours’ I just took it down the recycling centre, and left it with one of their guys – good condition so I guess someone used it.

I’d not be too sure about that – it probably got the plastic hacked out of it for recycling, that’s all.

I sell mine, they cost too much to be just thrown away.

I think that basic car seats should be provided free anyway. You wouldn’t buy a car nowadays if it didn’t have seat belts in it and car seats are the same , just larger versions of seat belts.

so long as its possible to have a good look at it first

Annoyingly most of the NCT and similar baby sales will not let you sell car seats – even though folk are free to examine and ask you questions.

Really, how many people are really going to be selfish enough to knowingly sell fatally compromised safety equipment for young children for the sake of a few quid?

£42000 a year and they’re gonna take your Child Benenfit away you have to slum it somehow…

😆

Looking at the amount of mud, food, snot and puke on ours, it’ll be treated as a biohazard if we ever try to sell it. Any potential buyer will need to de-contaminate it before they can worry about crash damage!

Word of warning…

My Mother, Nan, saving money as usual, decided to buy one second hand a reasonably new Britix one, cost her a few notes, from gumtree.

I decided to check it over before she used it to transport our little one.

Glad I did, as the previous owner had removed all the strappings, I asume to clean it and in their wisdom used zip ties to secure the main seat belts back into the chair, as they could not work out how it all went back together!

Britex back then, would not supply parts to fix second hand seats, they ask for the seat to go back to them for checking, I know why they do that now. 😉

To be fair we bought a brand new one, but are car seats just like helmets. The main padding is polystyrene so I guess like a helmet you could check it over for cracks, etc. I have pondered on this one myself as its great for the car seat makers to make sure everyone is reminded that you must buy brand new, bring on the sales. Bit like the bike manufacturers doing as little as possible to stop the stolen bike trade, must bring them in a ton of sales

Possibly another issue here. Car seats tend to bake in hot sunny cars all summer long, and freeze in the winter. This could well degrade the plastic and materials in it, and I think this is the reason they suggest 5 years max age for a car seat iirc.

Some thing in life you have to pay up for…. this is one of those things.

Get 2nd hand everything else … not this.

Hopefully it will be a massive waste of money for you and will never be used for it’s real propose.

I guess you have to ask if you’d buy a 2nd hand bike helmet, probably not and as good ones are getting on for £100 now (and more) they make car seats and bases look like good value given what you get for your money.

will/pieface – why the interest? with child?>

I’m using 2nd hand baby & toddler seats, previously owned by my sister so I know the history and condition.

If you can get hold of one from a trustworthy source it’s worth it, especially the baby seat as it’s a big expense for the 8 or 9 months before they go up to the next size seat.

We were fortunate in that family and several friends have young kids, so we’ve been inundated with free 2nd hand stuff.

@cruzheckler

Yep, had 20 week scan yesterday, now need to do some shopping / scrounging.

But also interested in what happens to all these seats.

Happily used one off freecycle for 6 months. Did check it over before use, and my daughter has travelled about 300 miles in it so I am happy it’s not that big a risk. Just bought a maxicosi for £26 off evilbay, again Will check it over when i collect. The first one will go back on freecycle probably.