Baby Trend Flex Lock Review

The Baby Trend car seat has served us very well for the first year of my daughter's life; It is only for rear-facing and is not convertible.  I've never worried about my daughter's safety and the car seat has been very easy to use. There are, however, a couple of drawbacks to the car seat that potential buyers might want to be aware of.

First, the car seat was very easy to install safely. It uses the LATCH system to install and attaches via strong buckles. In addition, when it comes time to remove the car seat base from the car, there is a button much like a seat belt button that releases the buckles attaching the base to the car. This really decreased my frustration when it came to removing the base from the car, either when moving it to a different location in the car or when we purchased a new car.

The buckle is safe and secure and does contain a feature where a dial on the back of the car seat allows the user to raise and lower the shoulder straps by turning the dial; this is a major improvement over the older system that required us to rethread the shoulder straps as baby grew.

I read one review (elsewhere) that commented on the placement of the button to remove the car seat from the base. This button is located near baby's feet, so you do have to insert your hand between the car seat and the back of the seat. But I didn't find that to be a problem, once I got used to it.

The only real problem we had with the car seat was raising and lowering the handle. I had a lot of trouble and largely gave up on it. I had to finesse the buttons just so, then jiggle the handle. It was frustrating enough that I would have seriously reconsidered making the purchase again. To be fair, I did not contact the manufacturer and can't be sure whether it was just a problem with our seat. But be aware of this potential drawback if you're considering this car seat.

All in all, it was a safe, comfortable car seat at a price we could afford. And it served us quite well!