Britax B-Safe vs Chicco Cortina in the CX5

[j3rmz]

So I can't decide which car seat to get for our little one that's on the way. We plan on getting the travel system of either one, so car seat plus click in stroller. The Britax B-Agile B-Safe travel system is the same price as the Chicco Cortina ~$350.

1) Which one did you all prefer and why?
2) Did you mount the seat in the middle even though the hooks are on the side seats?
3) Do you have any problems fitting the stroller in the trunk?
4) If you didn't like these 2, what other model/brands do you recommend that's in the same price range?

 

[stw]

Checkout this recent thread that talks about infant seats:
http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/showthread.php?123828440-Baby-Seats-in-CX-5

1) We got the B-Safe. It got good safety reviews. We really like the accompanying stroller (B-Agile). It is very maneuverable, and maybe the best part is how amazingly easy it is to break down. You click one button and pull the strap...wham, it's collapsed. The easy break down sounds trivial, but when you've been hauling the kid around, anything that makes it easier to load up is a great feature.

2) On the CX-5, we do mount it in the middle. Right now, I am using the middle seat belt rather than the LATCH anchors. The link I provided above talks more about that. In any case, we found out that you *can* use the LATCH anchors for it.

3) Stroller is easy to fit, even in the trunk of my wife's previous car (2003 Accord).

 

[shinjyo]

Don't know how old is your little one. mine is just over 6 months and we get the CX-5 because of the baby.
We did very thru testing. I even borrowed my friend's carseat when we check out the CX-5, Q5, Rogue, Evoque. Of course we ended with the CX because it's the most practical best looking one.

For carseat, I believe you might want to go with the best safety and the lightest possible. This applies to stroller too. That's why we didn't get travel system.
At the end, I am glad that I went with graco snugride because it's very easy to move inside/out. My friend went with Peperego infant seat, looks good but dead heavy.

For the stoller, I decided to go with a sort of umbrella stroller called Inlesgina Zippy, not that many people has it, but the graco infant seat goes on it perfectly with a pair of strip to hold down, and it can fold like an umbrella stroller, putting into my trunk is super easy compare to britax or peperego. And our stroller can even stand up itself after folded to save space, not many can do it.

We did look at the Britax B-Agile and thought we will get it. But my friend got it and said the infant seat is too heavy to move around.

My feel is after 6 months with our first baby, I think we go out with him in the infant seat and stroller more than I thought. We plan to keep him in rear facing infant seat as long as possible until he outgrow which is still another couple months before I switch to a convertible seat and use the stroller alone. But before that, the weight of the infant seat does matter. It's kind of painful when you don't get enough sleep and still have to move a heavy seat with 15-20lb baby inside.

I do mount it in the middle.

My 2 cents.