Here am I, a relatively new mother, longing to get out from behind the pram and back onto her bicycle, looking out for the time when her child is old enough to sit on the bike too. So why is it that it took me until I was given a hand-me-down bike seat to spend an entire evening online weighing up the alternatives? And now, months later, having finally bought a tiddly helmet, I have actually attempted to put the bike seat on the bike. Falling at the first hurdle I have found I can't even get it on over the luggage rack so I am returning to that old list of favourites. Let's take a closer look! Whilst our hand me down is to be fitted behind the rider, all of these are for front-loaded children. Instinct tells me that this is a great idea, providing head-on collisions are not a feature of our road experience.
In general in this position on the bike the child is in a kind of recumbent position, with legs strapped into modern day stocks. The first one here has the child's legs flung far forward and kept immobile, leading me to think that you'll need a very "biddable" child (as my mum would say) to tolerate this. This is the i-bert safe-T-seat. Although it's american and all about safety, the whole thing and your child cantilevers off the stem of the bike. This seems a bit far-fetched to me but it's not the only model to do so....
£72.99 on ebay
Next, the anthropomorphicly named Rabbit seat is clumsy looking but I'll try not to let that put me off. This seems to rely on gravity and fixes to the crossbar.
£51.08
The Bobike is probably Dutch and has that aura of confident if slightly geeky design whilst flying in a higher aesthetic stratosphere than our own UK efforts (with a price that reflects that). They have chosen to go for stem-mounting as well so it must be all right.
£90
The Hamax is Norwegian and judging by their standard of living we can probably assume that the design has reached the apex of comfort and safety although without too much thought given to design flair.
£55.99
And lastly in my selection, another animal-named product is the kangaroo, the only one complete with headrest for toddlers who nod off at the wheel. For us I think that is going a bit too far. By the time a child is strong enough to support a helmet he or she is over 1 year old and probably also by then having only one nap a day which is likely to be from about 2-3 hours long. Following this train of thought, therefore, I would not expect to need the headrest unless going on a 20-30 mile scenic trek complete with food provisions, all-weather clothing, GPS and first aid box etc etc, an unlikely picture at the moment for us. The fixing method seems to involve the installation of an independent bridge. Conclusion, then, nice idea Kangaroos but we'll pass having whittled it down to the above four options.
£69.99
I am coming down in favour of the Rabbit, although if price was no object it would probably be the bobike, the two polar extremes of style. My only reservation is that I wont have enough room for my legs to actually turn the pedals comfortably, thus negating the whole exercise. Time for an internet trawl to see who has actually used these seats and can compare them.
Even better, tell me if you have?
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