Protecting my seats from child seats

Mattlikesbikes

Tremor Fiend
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I'm not talking regular seat covers.

Starting to prep my Tundra for resale and pulled out the child seat (full size for a 3yo) and the dent in the bottom foam is legit.

Until she grows up and gets into a booster (years out), any suggestions for protecting the seat foam and heating elements under a child seat?

I had a spills tray under the seat, but it did nothing for the foam. It seems like I need something rigid(ish) to help spread the pressure of the seat out from just the edge/lip of the seat bottom.

What has worked for others?
 
Anything to distribute the load of the contact points across more surface area will work. Large piece of thick rubber sheet?
 
unfortunately anything you put under the car seat will prevent the seat from functioning and performing properly in the event of a collision.
Your little ones safety is more important that a puckered seat. The seats will return to normal eventually.
And I get not wanting messed up seats. I’ve had 3 car seats installed in all my cars and don’t like the marks, but I’d rather have potential ugly seats for a bit and safe kiddos
 
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I've used a Britax rubber mat under the Britax one4life seat and it worked pretty good. No "denting" that I could see but the seat foam was definitely more compressed in that area. I also have a cover craft Ford rear seat cover under the Britax rubber mat because the rubber mats can damage certain types of leather (especially in hotter climates).
 
unfortunately anything you put under the car seat will prevent the seat from functioning and performing properly in the event of a collision.
Your little ones safety is more important that a puckered seat. The seats will return to normal eventually.
And I get not wanting messed up seats. I’ve had 3 car seats installed in all my cars and don’t like the marks, but I’d rather have potential ugly seats for a bit and safe kiddos
I've looked into this because I hate the four little impressions from each corner of the car seat on my F-150's rear seats and would echo the above. The vast majority of the car seat manufacturers say not to use any kind of seat cover, mat, towel, etc. under the car seat because it won't perform as intended. I've had the car seats out of my F-150 for a few weeks now and the "dents" have definitely improved but are still there so I'm just going to have to trade it in as-is.
 
I'm not talking regular seat covers.

Starting to prep my Tundra for resale and pulled out the child seat (full size for a 3yo) and the dent in the bottom foam is legit.

Until she grows up and gets into a booster (years out), any suggestions for protecting the seat foam and heating elements under a child seat?

I had a spills tray under the seat, but it did nothing for the foam. It seems like I need something rigid(ish) to help spread the pressure of the seat out from just the edge/lip of the seat bottom.

What has worked for others?

The best way to handle this is to remove the carseat every few days or even every day. It's annoying, but you can get pretty good at reconnecting everything quickly after a ton of practice.
 
let it bake in the sun without the seats installed, when it gets hot massage the foam. Sometimes they regain their shape.
body-massage-gi-joe.gif
 
I take my boy's car seat out every few weeks when we're just hanging out at home. The seat foam bounces back after a few hours
 
I'm not talking regular seat covers.

Starting to prep my Tundra for resale and pulled out the child seat (full size for a 3yo) and the dent in the bottom foam is legit.

Until she grows up and gets into a booster (years out), any suggestions for protecting the seat foam and heating elements under a child seat?

I had a spills tray under the seat, but it did nothing for the foam. It seems like I need something rigid(ish) to help spread the pressure of the seat out from just the edge/lip of the seat bottom.

What has worked for others?
I bought a set of old school surplus military medical wool blankets in OD green. It was super cool! Plus if there was an issue where I needed a warm blanked, I had one.

They looked like this: https://www.sportsmansguide.com/pro...lus-embroidered-medical-blanket-new?a=2083117

Mine seemed thicker....
 
They make a heavy / thick rubber mat for this. Its kinda like a floor mat, but its heavier, keeps the spills at bay, and also the rough plastic on the bottom of the carseat from jacking up the truck seat. We used to get them at Baby's R Us, which was a branch of Toys R Us. you can probably find them on Amazon or maybe even one of the Car Seat Mfg websites. I buckled the seats in tight, climbing in and putting a knee in the seat to push it down and buckle it and with these mats, you couldn't tell they were there after we took them out.
 
Anyone familiar with these from Ford:

1633787129771.png

Maintains the 40/60 and (not shown here) available with arm rest function. Seem thinner than neoprene, so may still allow heat to work. I wonder how close to the new Baja they are and if they will stand out. I like the one piece bottom/top as it keeps crap out of the crack. That said, these fold in such a way that the crack is accessible (vs my Tundra). So maybe moot.
 
Our car seat has a base that uses the latch attachment points. When the car seat (with child) isn’t installed I loosen the latch. No issues.
 
D6041F33-6588-4631-833F-EF5D855ABD1A.jpeg
Just pulled this one out of my Tundra and the seat held up well the last couple years. I will be using it in my new truck when it gets here.

Munchkin Brica Elite Seat Guardian Car Seat Protector​

 
unfortunately anything you put under the car seat will prevent the seat from functioning and performing properly in the event of a collision.

No it won't. There are carseat protector products out there that are essentially rubber pads that have been crash tested and they pass...
 
Anyone familiar with these from Ford:

View attachment 36241
Maintains the 40/60 and (not shown here) available with arm rest function. Seem thinner than neoprene, so may still allow heat to work. I wonder how close to the new Baja they are and if they will stand out. I like the one piece bottom/top as it keeps crap out of the crack. That said, these fold in such a way that the crack is accessible (vs my Tundra). So maybe moot.
I've got this under a rubber car seat mat and it works well. It's a cordura-like material.
 
I'm not talking regular seat covers.

Starting to prep my Tundra for resale and pulled out the child seat (full size for a 3yo) and the dent in the bottom foam is legit.

Until she grows up and gets into a booster (years out), any suggestions for protecting the seat foam and heating elements under a child seat?

I had a spills tray under the seat, but it did nothing for the foam. It seems like I need something rigid(ish) to help spread the pressure of the seat out from just the edge/lip of the seat bottom.

What has worked for others?

I have these, bought them after I saw the leather in my wife's car do the same thing, and didn't want to deal. I purposefully left my kids' seats in for the past month, and lines are SIGNIFICANTLY reduced (now just pressure from this rubber plate).

Will it affect performance of the car-seat? No. This is just a semi-rigid piece of thick rubber to distribute the contact points. Bottom is flat. Don't have pics on me (it's late and I'm lazy and it's cold), but tomorrow I'll take some of my setup and will post them.
 
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