Porsche Enthusiasts Club Forum

We ask this question periodically on this forum, but i need to know what the definitive word is on carrying children in a 944 or 968?

Can i take my children to school in the back on my 944 turbo which is fitted with rear seatbelts, but without child seats?

The reason i ask, is that my wifes current car is making me go mental. My thoughts are to buy her a 968 sport to use to and from work and to take the children to/from school. Would that be legal?

You don't say how old your children are. Yes but you need booster seats to comply with the law. If you get the cheap polystyrene ones on ebay they are easy to shape to fit the seat so there is no gap at the back. I thinned mine down as well using a bread knife. If it looks right the police will leave you alone. The rules are based on the weight of the child not there age & the police don't carry scales! Thats for children 36mths old+ or over a certain weight. My 2 & a half year old was fine on a booster seat. She had more legroom than in the baby seat & was more comfortable. So long as I didn't nail it! Leg room is the limiting factor.

Thanks JJ.

Yes, the vital and missing information is the ages. They are 8 and 6 years old.
From your response, it seems that they might be ok in the back of one of these.

One of our local club members uses his 928 for the school run with his twins of similar age. Just shaped the booster seats to fit, like J.J. done. They will be legal with a booster seat.

Hi Rav,

This problem has been bugging me for some time too. I temporarily overcame it by using my daughter's existing car seat and
getting my wife to put her seat forward, but I'll be honest it's not an ideal solution and when my daughter gets older I
foresaw that we'd have problems. To avoid the inevitable I came up with a solution, which I hope to have ready by next weekend.

The problem with booster seats as you'll see from this picture is you child's head is likely to be above the top of the seat
and in the event of an accident they're likely to sustain at best severe whiplash.



The solution is to add a headrest to the rear seat. The metal bar in the picture is actually the inside of a Mitsubishi headrest
that I removed all the foam from. If you de-construct the rear set you'll see that you can safely drill two holes through the
top of it, in which to secure the two headrest supports. The top of the seat is an inverted 'L' so the bars from the
headrest sit behind the seat out of harms way. They'll be covered by something (haven't worked that bit out yet). This
isn't an exact photo but it will give you an idea.



I don't know what the rear seat is made of but it seems pretty strong as my drill took a while to get through it, so I'm
not worried about the headrest coming lose or breaking.

A local company has fabricated the headrest for me by welding a thin metal plate onto the bar and covering it in foam. I
can't show you the finished results just yet as it's back them to get upholstered. The headrest is almost as wide as the
seat so my daughter can rest her head on it even when she's sleeping.

In case anyone is wondering, the reason the seat is black is simply because I was going to get the upholster to upholster
the black seat after I'd made all the changes. That was until I found out the cost of doing it.

When I get it back I'll post some pictures, assuming it doesn't look to awful.

Hi Rav,

I forgot to mention. You have to be careful about the height of the booster seat because the seat belt anchors
are quite high and for the seatbelt to work properly the child needs to be sitting high otherwise they can slide
under the belt. This is easier to see than explain.

Halfords actually refused to sell me a seat because they didn't think it suited the car and the guy was good enough
to explain why.

Regards,

RDO

Hi RDO,

Thanks for the reply. Your headrest idea looking great. I am interested to see the booster seats that you are using. I work in Farnborough and drive home through Fleet. Perhaps we could meet up so i can have a look?

You need to stop putting pictures up, finish the project and patent it. Honestly, even if you only recover your costs through selling them. You could sell loads in the USA. Great idea and necessity is really the mother of all inventions. I'll be your financial advisor and marketing manger.

Hi Rav,

After I've had time to install the headrest you're welcome to come around to have a look. One thing I've noticed is
my daughter is quite small and the booster seat forces her back away from the back of the seat. I was thinking
of putting something behind her back, but in hindsight it maybe simpler to make a smaller booster seat. How hard
can it be?

Hi Lee944,

I think the cost will put people off buying it, it's not going to be cheap.

Regards,

RDO

To be legal the booster seat has to be no more than half an inch thick. Far better & safer to thin it down with a bread knife. The trouble is the law wasn't written for 2+2 cars. The Police understand this & if the belt is in the right place on the child & the child is properly restrained they will leave you alone. The seat back rest has a good head restraint built in.

Hi J.J,

I've never seen a booster seat less than about 3 inches thick and when I mean thick I actually mean high.

This link shows what's on offer at Halfords, not that I found these to be a suitable fit.

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stor ... _langId_-1

They also have to conform to UN ECE Regulation 44.03 so I don't think I'll be making one. LOL

All the best,

RDO

Blimey, just read all this out of curiosity and now I wonder.
I'm taking my niece to Spain in September.
She is 12 years old but very small for her age and can be easily mistaken for someone much younger.

Bloody hell do I need to think about a booster seat too?

Me and my sister used to get in the back of my mum and dads 924 and 928 with out kiddy seats but that was back then and not now.

HitmanHack kindly sent me this site: http://www.childcarseats.org.uk/law/

A quick look seems to suggest that if your kids are under 12-13 years old and over 135cm in height, they can sit in the back of a 924/944/968 without any booster but they need to have belts.
Under 135cm and its a bit touch and go really. I am more worried about the dangers of whiplash after some of the earlier posts.

Have a look and see what you think?

Your not reading my Post! I bought a cheap polystyrene booster seat from ebay. Then took a bread knife to it to make it work. (Stuck the labels back on afterwards!) Completely reshaped it to fit the back seat snugly. Thinned it right down so that the belt was in the right place on the child. As I said the law wasn't written for the 2+2 so if you attempt to comply (the main thing is the belt & seat does the job.) Then the Police will leave you alone. I never had any problem. There are modern cars with the same problem. Like the older model Vauxal Tigre. There even worse as adults can squeeze in but there head is touching the rear screen. Ouch. You can buy very thin booster seats designed for the 2+2 Toyotas & they pop up on ebay sometimes but will need reshaping just the same. If you saw the seats there selling on ebay that comply with the law you wouldn't be worried.

Hi J.J,

Do you still have the details of the booster seat you bought so I can take a look?

Thanks,

RDO