We all know that car seats protect our children while they are riding in the car. Sometimes we might moan and despise the car seat for the extra hassle they present, but we know they are important. Do you know why or how? Since not all crashes are equal, do you know how to evaluate a crash to determine if your car seat needs to be replaced?
Car seats play an important role in protecting your child during a crash. These seats absorb much of the impact, shield the child from damage, and ensure their little bodies remain in a stable position. All this work during the crash can weaken it and reduce its ability to protect your child in the future, even if it shows no visible damage.
How does the car seat protect my child during a crash?
A car seat protects a child in many different ways. Each component of the car seat works together to both perform its unique function as well as support the other components of the seat.
Starting with the most visible, and largest, part of the seat is the hard outer plastic shell. This shell’s primary task is to hold everything together. It keeps everything in its place so that the seat doesn’t just fall apart. During a crash though, this shell also performs three other important tasks:
- Flexes slightly to help absorb some of the impact. It can’t flex and absorb much, but every little bit counts.
- Provides a hard barrier around your child to shield them from debris that might be flying around.
- Creates a safe cocoon around your child so that their fragile little bodies can remain in a safe and sturdy position. Even though their bodies
Underneath of the hard shell is a lot of firm, shock-absorbing, foam. This foam can compress during an accident and absorb a lot of the impact. Because it is shielded from damage by the hard outer shell, it can focus on absorbing all the crash impact it can. All the force of the crash that the foam can absorb is force that doesn’t make it to your baby, so this is a vitally important component.
Next comes the harness, or restraint system. This part of the car seat is what keeps your child inside the car seat. Without this, your child would fly out and receive none of the protections offered by the shell and absorbing foam. Typically a car seat will have a three or five point harness. By having so many straps touching so many different areas of your child’s body, the harness can make sure that your child remains stable.
Why would I need to replace a car seat after a crash?
There’s a lot that goes on in a car seat during a crash, and the seat is never the same afterwards. Even if there’s no visible damage to the seat, there still could be problems. A crash can severely weaken the seat and cause it to provide less protection in the future.
Remember that impact-absorbing foam? Well after it compresses during a crash, it never fully expands back. It’s always going to be more compressed than it was before, which means it cannot absorb as much impact as before.
Remember how the hard outer shell flexes? Hard plastic generally doesn’t like to flex and when it does, it is weakened. This weakened plastic is far more likely to crack and fail than it ever was before the crash.
In addition to all of that, there’s the fact that most car seats are only crash rated for one crash. I did not find any company that regularly tested their car seats for multiple crashes. Even if they did, there’s so many factors when it comes to a crash, that there’s no telling how your crash impacted your particular seat.
After all that though, I have an exception. If your crash was minor, you don’t need to replace the car seat. It’s been shown that minor crashes do not exert enough force on a car seat to impair its protective abilities. How can you know if your crash is minor? Well read on…
How do I know if I need to replace the car seat after the crash?
In the past, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration would recommend that you replace any car seat that has been in any crash. Recently though they revised this recommendation. Now they have stated that car seats can still perform well after minor crashes.
So what is a minor crash? To help prevent any confusion, they have provided very clear guidelines. To be considered as a minor crash, it must meet all of the following criteria:
- Your vehicle was able to be driven away from the crash site
- The door nearest to your baby’s car seat was undamaged. If the car seat is equally distant to multiple doors, then example all of the relevant doors.
- No occupant of the vehicle was injured.
- The airbags of your vehicle did not deploy. Of course this only applies if your vehicle has airbags installed.
- You can see no visible damage to the car seat.
If your crash meets ALL of those criteria, then you don’t need to replace your car seat. However if you fail even slightly in just one category, it’s still recommended that you replace the car seat.
What should I consider when replacing the car seat?
First off, you should see if the car seat is covered by insurance. Since this is an important piece of safety equipment, insurance companies will usually cover the cost of replacement. Unfortunately not all insurance companies will replace the car seat for you, so be sure to check this.
Secondly, you should consider the current stage your child is in. If your child was soon going to outgrow their car seat anyway, then you should consider replacing the seat with one for their next stage. Make sure the car seat will meet all the current needs of your child, but also ensure that it will meet the needs of your child in the future.
What should I do with the old car seat after I replace it?
After a car seat has been in a crash that is more than minor, it should never again be used as a car seat. You need to either find an organization who can handle this for you, or you should disable the seat yourself.
Some cities across the United States offer recycling programs which will take your seat and recycle its components into new products. You can check RecycleYourCarSeat.org
to find a location near you.
If you are unable to find a convenient location to recycle your car seat, then you can dispose of it yourself. As I said earlier, you’ll need to make sure no one can take your seat out of the trash and use it for another child. You can do this by:
- Remove the fabric liner and dispose of that separately
- Remove the safety harness and dispose of that separately. You should also consider cutting the straps.
- If there are other pieces you can easily remove from the shell, you should do so.