Child car seats vary in size, cost, and (presumably) comfort, but one thing that is supposed to remain constant is the way they latch in to your car or truck. Since the 2003 model year, federal regulations have required most new U.S.-sold vehicles to have such a hardware system, fittingly called LATCH, for Lower Anchors and Tethers for Children. But just because LATCH is mandated doesn’t mean it’s easy to use. That’s why the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) rates cars and trucks on their LATCH systems—and only a few vehicles have aced the tests.
“The whole purpose was to make it standard and easier for parents to use child restraints,” Jessica Jermakian, senior research engineer at IIHS, said of the LATCH ratings. The LATCH system boils down to a set of two lower anchors on the front side of a seat and one tether anchor behind it. The anchors typically are simple metal loops or hooks. Most car seats will have straps that clamp on to these anchors. Some child seats use the seatbelt in place of the lower anchors. But in most vehicles (convertibles are an exception) from the 2003 model year or newer, those LATCH fixtures will be there by law.
However, IIHS has found that in many vehicles, “the hardware was the same, but everything around the hardware was making it really difficult to use,” Jermakian said. “So we started rating it.” The ratings essentially weigh these factors:
Can’t Be Buried in the Cracks
For the lower anchors, IIHS looks at how deep they are in the crack between the bottom and back cushions, also known as the seat bight. A depth of 3/4 inch or less is considered easy to find. The organization also uses a tool to measure the force required to attach a car seat to the lower anchors. The ideal amount of force needed to attach a car seat’s strap to the LATCH system is 40 pounds or less. Finally, IIHS wants a clearance angle of at least 54 degrees around the lower anchors. Anything greater than that is considered easy to maneuver around. “What we were finding is, in many, many vehicles, they’re buried in the seat bight,” Jermakian said of lower anchors. Manufacturers demarcate the location with tabs or images to make it easier to locate them if they are not visible, as with the tab on the seatback pictured above.
Anchors You Can Find
IIHS says a tether anchor should be found on the vehicle’s rear deck behind the rear seats or on the top 85 percent of the seatback. The group rates a vehicle on whether there is other hardware around the tether anchor that could confuse people strapping in child seats. If there is other hardware present, IIHS says, the vehicle must have a label clearly denoting the tether anchor. “The problem is not that they’re hard to use,” Jermakian said of the tether anchors. “It’s that people don’t see them.”
Safety versus Style
So why don’t all vehicles just have prominent lower and tether anchors, making it easy to fasten child seats? “The feedback we’ve gotten from the automakers is that there had always been a battle between the safety people and styling people,” Jermakian said. Prominent lower anchors jutting out of a seat bight would be ideal for people using car seats, but automakers’ interior designers would balk at ugly metal loops sticking out, she said. “Absent real data or clear guidance on how to improve it, the safety people would lose that battle in the conference room,” Jermakian said, adding that the IIHS rating system gives more of an incentive for automakers to focus on safety and style.
The Good, the Marginal, and the Poor
On this front, one of the few standouts in the IIHS LATCH tests is the 2017 Audi Q7. In the middle row of the Audi Q7, each seat has a long, cushioned piece that easily pops out to reveal the lower anchors, fully exposed and ready for car-seat installation. All five rear seats in the new Audi Q7 have the hardware to secure a child seat, and their setup makes it easy to do so. This has found favor with IIHS; for 2017 models, the Audi Q7 is one of just five vehicles to get IIHS’s highest rating of Good+. The 2017 Prius Two, which also earned a Good+ rating, has large, open holes around the lower anchors, but they are covered by a Velcro-sealed fabric flap, so you can’t see the holes unless you go to install a child seat. (The other Good + winners were the Lexus RX and the Subaru Impreza sedan and wagon.)
The dozen new vehicles to get the IIHS Good rating were all from Toyota/Lexus and German automakers. A majority of vehicles rated by IIHS are deemed Acceptable or Marginal. Just eight 2017 models were given the lowest rating of Poor: the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra 1500 crew-cab models, the Ford Fiesta hatchback and sedan, the Hyundai Accent hatchback, the Infiniti Q70 and QX50, and the Subaru BRZ.
We recently had one Marginal-rated vehicle in our office, the 2017 Chrysler Pacifica, so we decided to have a closer look. Remember that IIHS-desired clearance angle of at least 54 degrees for lower anchors? The clearance angle in the Pacifica seemed like zero degrees. Those lower anchors are wedged in the seat bight pretty snug. However, the tether anchors on the middle-row bucket seats are clearly labeled. And they are labeled on the third-row seats as well, but they’re at the bottom of the bench and are flanked by other plastic pieces that, per IIHS concerns, could confuse car-seat users.
More Rows, More Options
Most people will not be swapping out car seats regularly. However, growing families will typically switch where in the vehicle they put them. For example, most parents will first put the child seat in the middle position of the rear seat—the safest place for it—then if they have more children they would switch the child seats to the two outboard positions of the rear seat, Jermakian said.
With all this considered, it is tough to get that top Good+ rating, but Jermakian said there is some flexibility on how automakers can achieve it. In two-row vehicles, the IIHS allows for lower anchors to be shared, as long as there is the option to buckle the child in the middle of the seat. For three-row vehicles, things get a little more strict to achieve a top IIHS rating, “because when parents buy three-row vehicles they want a little more flexibility in where they can put their kids,” Jermakian said. Those larger vehicles need top tethers in all rear seating positions, for example, and three sets of lower anchors.
Here are IIHS’s latest ratings of LATCH in 2017 vehicles, as of March 2017:
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