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Get It Right Faster and Easier
What: Britax ClickTight
When: Birth to booster
Why: Make car seat installation simpler
Where: Amazon
I got my first car seat from Britax featuring their ClickTight lockoff panel system. I hadn’t been willing to spend the extra money before, but with yet another car seat install and a discount to offset the price increase, I decided to try it.
Boy, am I glad I did. We don’t have a LATCH option in the third row of our Mazda5 van, which means all car seat installations have to be done with the seat belt regardless of age or type. All of my kids also weigh too much to use the LATCH installation, even where it is available. And in the van, the back of the seat doesn’t recline, which can make getting a safe fit tricky even for the most experienced installer.
You can see the black seat belt going over the bright green belt path indicators if you look closely. The ClickTight mechanism closes down over the seat belt to get a tight installation.
ClickTight made all the difference in this compact space. I threaded the seat belt through the belt path, took in the slack, then used my weight to push down the ClickTight portion of the seat. It worked like a charm to keep the seat from budging.
ClickTight makes installation so much simpler I was willing to undo the mechanism just to take photos. Here you can see the seat belt more clearly underneath the opened ClickTight portion of the seat.
Rather than spending almost an hour trying to make sure the booster seat fit tightly without moving more than an inch in any direction, I installed it with the seat belt (our third row doesn’t have a LATCH option) as tight as I could manage. The Click Tight took care of the rest. I was more inclined to keep trying to get the best fit as well, since I didn’t have to struggle as much to get the car seat properly installed. It took several tries to get our Britax Grow With You Booster installed properly, but it required a lot less contorting and effort on my part.
The ClickTight mechanism isn’t as intuitive as you might think. Once you figure out how to open it, the rest works smoothly. Squeeze the two gray buttons together to release the ClickTight. I watched a couple videos online before I mastered the catch on the mechanism. Thread the seat belt through the correct path as usual and buckle the belt. Then lower the ClickTight and push it closed. The click lets you know it’s secure, though you will be able to tell. The ClickTight won’t stay down if it doesn’t catch properly.
You squeeze these two gray buttons together to release and lift the ClickTight mechanism. The seat belt then goes underneath through the belt path before clicking the ClickTight back into place.
ClickTight works great for anyone moving car seats back and forth between vehicles, for any rows without LATCH options, and for anyone who just gets sick of breaking fingernails and their backs trying to get the safest installation.
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