Is it possible to mount an infant car seat in the rear, in front of/connected to the strut bar? Or, as an alternate, a car seat in the front seat (the airbag sensor should shut off the dash mounted system). I'm considering picking one up (trading my normal MCS), but might have a little one on the way soon, and this poses an obstacle with the wife (obviously).

-PGT

 

actually, from the one Ive seen they HAVE a thing connected to the bar FOR a carseat. so I've been told atleast :p

 

a member here or a car you saw in person?

 

I'm just jumping in to say a big congrats! No idea about the bb in the GP tho

 

both actually. there is a silver thing on the bar on the passenger side.

 

oh, no congrats yet please!! that's putting the cart before the horse!!!!

 

I saw that today. I thought it was for mounting four point harnesses for the front seat occupants. Perhaps it's a LATCH connector for a front seat infant seat?

 

my buddy with the GP told me it was for an infant seat. because it was on the passenger side I kinda doubt its for the harness But I guess its possible.

 

It's a child seat connector.
It's NOT rated for harnesses!

Page 20 here:
http://www.gpmini.net/downloads/JCW_...ers_Manual.pdf
(not very clear but that's what the manual says!)

 

it was on the passenger's side. I didn't think to look at the other side to see if there's a matching one.

 

thanks! this is good news and one that was hard to discern otherwise.

 

Just bungee cord the little bugger to the bar.



Um..... no, I don't have a serious answer...

 

Then what are doing wasting time on the internet, you got work to do

 

 

I want to take off that hook. Dose anyone know were I can find some instructions to do that? Has anyone els dose this?

 

I'd think you pull the bar our and slide it off. shouldn't be too hard, but I don't have a GP to fool with, yet.

w00t!

 

I did. It will leave a tiny hole (IMO better then the stupid hook) I posted a couple of pictures of the after in this section check old threads


The bar doesn't slide off. It's actually very strong - but it's NOT for harness
I know first hand as I cannot do anything with mine

I don't mind the bar - If you carry packages keeps them in the back - and it's unique to the GP ...but it really doesn't have any purpose...

I am curious of how many people are going to carry an infant in the GP

FOUND IT

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ad.php?t=81204 picture of bar w/o hook

 

it wouldn't be the primary mode of transportation for us, but my wife works early morning, so I'd have the AM dropoff at the daycare responsibility and the GP would replace my '06 as a daily driver.

 

I don't know if the GP is the best choice as daily driver. We considered buying a 2nd GP but -although the commute from Capitol Hill to the Pentagon - Crystal City - is not too bad, a GP will suffer. Another thing to consider: the replacement parts are a pain to get. A DC GP owner (no a DCMM member ) just hit a pathole in the city and needed to replace the wheel ... what a pain and cost...

Of course, I come from an old fashion way mentality (maybe European) where a car (any car) with power stick shift would stay in a city traffic as little as possible...

I love your MINI - red mirrors and stripes - can you keep it and get the GP as well?

 

we have an '05 MCS Cabrio too that the wife drives. We can't have three of them!

We would replace the '06 with a GP and the wife might trade the Cabrio for another Subaru wagon (or maybe a BMW 535xi wagon ), since we sold the one we had last fall. I'd love to have a GP just for weekend fun duty and we could afford it, but the wife think's it's wasteful

thanks for the complement on the car...it's coming together nicely. MoS has a GP languishing on the lot and that triggered a conversation with them, since I've had so many issues from delivery on mine (minor cosmetic things they'd rather not deal with). In a sense, they 'owe me one', so might be a win/win.

I'm not so concerned about the GP as a daily driver - I had a hardcore suspension on a '91 CRX and drove all over NoVA and DC. I'd put the GP wheels in the shed and run normal non-runflats in a 16" size anyways. See the center cap below \/

 

[quote=Patagonian GT;1334445]we have an '05 MCS Cabrio too that the wife drives. We can't have three of them!




We do... two convertibles and the GP and if we had parking -in DC we managed to have two parking spaces ... we will buy a 4th MINI...

It's so hard to give up a Little One after is being with you for a while.
I' m still thinking to my first MCS '03 at times...

 

You have hit the nail on the head. By Law in the UK if you have no rear seat you need to have a bar between the back and the passenger compartment to keep luggage at bay. It has nothing to do with suspension etc. and is NOT a harness bar.

 

Hmm, who took that lovely picture lastrega

 

Here is another idea if you don't want to take off the hook. If you lay the passenger seat back too far, it hits that hook and it can mar the back of the seat. So we went to Petsmart and bought a red rubber "Kong" dog chew (be careful, there are different sizes - I think it was the middle size). It looks like a rattlesnake tail and it slipped on like a glove over the hook! Looks pretty cool too - matches the red mirror caps!

 

Regarding the original question on mounting an infant car seat in the back, I think it will require some sort of modification but I don't own a GP. Many infant car seats are "bucket" style where there is a hard plastic base that you securely strap into the seat with a seat belt in locked mode as opposed to being able to reel it in and out. The bucket seat then snaps in and out of this base. The seat has the 5 point harness that holds the child, not the base. This way you can easily carry the sleeping (or awake) child in the car seat with the handle instead or removing them like you do with a bigger child. The base stays put all the time. The ideal for this is the simple waist belt that you find in the back of some cars which you tighten down just by pulling it through the friction style clip. The modification would be to take a simple lap belt and bolt it to the floor/flat area where the rear seat would be similar to how it is down in its original vehicle. Then to mount the base with this belt. I think you'll probably have to borrow a seat and see where you would mount it and if the bar caused an obstruction. One difficult selling point to your wife might be that the child could bang into the bar if they were thrown backward (infant seats are rear-facing). This line of argument could be nullified with some nice red padding (to match the mirrors) like you would have on rollcage.

My wife and I roared around in my '73 BMW 2002 with a similar set up to the above but I also wasn't modifying a brand new GP to do this but a track/street car that wasn't pristine to begin with.

Good luck.