Go-Go Babyz Kidz Travelmate
by Go-Go Babyz
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List Price: Our Price: $79.95 You Save: $9.05 (10%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Baby Product See more product details |
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Baby Products Reviews of Go-Go Babyz Kidz Travelmate
Customer Review: Great product, can be better.
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a great product. We, like so many, got it before we went on a trip with our 18mo old. As most of you know baby gear creates 4x as much baggage. This Caddy helped us thru the airport.
We have a Britax car seat .. it fit perfectly on the caddy. It was a dream to roll around the airport, and my son loved riding in it. We had some problem getting thru security, because of the caddy, but the reomvable wheels helped a lot. The real draw back is attaching the seat when you get on the plane. I had hoped that I could remove the wheels, and leave the caddy attached to the seat. Threading the airplane seatbelt thru the car seat ... didn't work. You need to remove the caddy from the car seat. Removing the caddy takes time, especially when you've got a plane load of passangers waiting to get on the plane. The bolts provided are time consuming to get off before the flight and on after the flight. It would help if there was a quick release??? (keeping track of the bolts is another issue.)
When you get on the plane ask for a seat extender. Trip out bound, had a hard time pulling the slack in the seatbelt because the excess needed to be pulled back thru the car seat. (not possible with caddy, very hard to do without caddy.)
The removable wheels were tricky. (I got one that had a manufacturing defect.) Gogo Babies Customer Service overnighted a new wheel ... best customer service department I've ever delt with!
Bottom line... this will make getting around the airport easier, but once you get to your seat on the plane allow extra time to disassemble, and additional time to assemble once you land.
We'll continue to use this product but will look for improved models, that have a quick release feature, and hardware we don't need to keep track of .. we still havent found bunny or the sippy cup. If anyone flying southwest finds bunny....
Thanks.
Customer Review: Does not fit through the airplane isles, but handy if you are traveling with an another adult
Summary: 3 Stars
I recently traveled from Hawaii to DC with my seven-year-old, 11-month-old baby boy and my mother. I purchased a plane seat for my 22-pound little boy because I could not imagine holding him for 10+ hours on a plane. I purchased the Go-Go Kidz Travelmate to help us transport our heavy Britax Marathon Car Seat through the airport and onto the plane. For the most part, the Travelmate did make the process of getting a very heavy car seat through the airport to the plane more manageable. But, it takes several minutes to attach the Travelmate to the car seat, and once the Travelmate became disconnected from the seat.
The biggest disappointment was that the car seat and Travelmate did not fit through the isles of the 2 UA planes that we boarded. In all reality, the Travelmate makers have no control over the isle size of planes. But, thank goodness my mother was traveling with us. Upon boarding our plane and getting stuck in the isle, we had to take my son out of his car seat, my mother had to hold him, and I had to hoist our very heavy car seat over my head (along with my purse, and three other carry on bags) to get to our seats. I do not know what I would have done if my mother was not with me to hold the baby. Also, make certain that you do not loose the 3 parts that connect the Travelmate to the car seat which can easily happen during the chaos of travel.
I will probably use the Travelmate again if my husband is traveling with us next time. I strongly advise against taking the car seat onto the plane if you are the only adult in your traveling party - unless you can grow another pair of arms! This will be the case for my return flight to Hawaii w/o my mother. I really don't know how I am going to keep my very squirmy toddler safely restrained in his seat for the return flight to Hawaii - should be fun!
Customer Review: Excellent Product if traveling with both parents
Summary: 4 Stars
I recently bought this product as we were traveling from Chicago to Los Angeles with our 18 month daughter. The assembly was easy and our Graco Nautilus 3-in-1 worked perfectly with it. My daughter loved riding around in the airport in it. She thought it was fun and I got a lot of comments about it from other passengers. It was easy through security as I didn't have to take it apart and put it through the scanner...I explained to the TSA rep that our car seat was too large to fit through. They simply had me push it through and they used the wand on it as they had used in the past for our other strollers.
The real tricky part came when it was time to board the plane. It went fairly easily on our flight out because it was both my husband and I flying with our daughter. My husband simply carried the seat and I carried our daughter. The handle pushed down and was easy to strap in the seat in a fairly timely manner. On my way home I was by myself. I asked to pre-board and that was great. The problem came when I got to the economy section of the plane. I wasn't able to push my carseat down the row. I essentially left my daughter by herself strapped into the seat at the beginning of coach (ran to our seat and threw the diaper bag down). I was then able to ask a flight attendant to carry my seat for me. She reluctantly helped. After we landed she then refused to help me carry the seat up to the front of the plane as she said it was too heavy. It left me in a bad spot so I asked the pilot and he helped me carry the seat outside of the plane.
So...the moral of the story is I would not bring my carseat on the plane unless I had my husband/or a friend to help me. So therefor I wouldn't use this product unless I wasn't flying alone. The product itself is great but the airline folk are not.
Customer Review: Works with First Years True Fit
Summary: 4 Stars
We're taking a trip where we will need our son's car seat. He uses the True Fit by First Years. We love his car seat but it is pretty huge and would have been a pain to try and carry around the airport. I saw this online, then again at BabiesRUs. I noticed that our car seat wasn't listed, but figured that I could always return it if I couldn't get it to work. After lots of work I found that this does work with First Years' True Fit.
I'm not sure what model I have, but it has the snap off wheels. The holes for the screws were difficult for me to screw in, and my husband ultimately had to do it. The quick directions were pretty much worthless, so I had to just go with trial and error. And the screws do take some time to screw in and out, so I spent a good 20 mintues doing that alone. But I did discover how to attach it to our car seat, and once attached properly, it works magnificently!
First, I had to make sure that the flip bar underneath the seat was moved towards the back so that I could put the supports underneath it. Next, after various attempts I discovered that if I thread the belt through the very bottom of the car seat it worked, but not if I thread it through the slots on the back. (See photo.) Finally, I had to make sure that the strap was as tight as I could get it.
Our baby was a little worried when we first put him in to test it out, but really seemed to enjoy it. Although it was a pain to put on, and a pain to take off, we plan to leave it attached and just check it and the seat at the gate - in a bag of course. I gave it 4 stars because it looks like a great device. Our car seat will NEVER fit through the x-ray, so I don't think they will be asking us to take anything apart. I just hope the whole contraption fits into a travel bag.
Customer Review: Makes it feasible to bring a carseat on the plane
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a great gadget if you want to bring your child's carseat on the plane but think it would be too much hassle to have a carseat and a stroller. My almost-2-year-old daughter LOVED being wheeled through the airport in her seat -- she thought it was an amusement park ride. It's lightweight and very maneuverable, even when you're pulling a suitcase with your other hand and have various carry-on bags draped across your body!
The only problems we had were:
1 - Most airplane aisles are not wide enough to allow the child to ride down the aisle in the seat. That leaves you with a carseat, carry-on bags, and a small child to wrangle onto the plane. Not a problem if you have more than one adult per child, but a hassle for a parent traveling solo. Other passengers (or in one case the flight attendant) had to help me. (Of course, this would be a problem if you had a stroller too, since you'd need to gate-check it.)
2 - The instructions say you can use the seat on the plane with the wheels still attached, but while this is technically possible, I preferred to take them off. As the other reviewer said, the wheels tip the seat so far forward that the child doesn't recline at all, which seems uncomfortable. It's also more cumbersome to install the seat with the wheels on it than to carry them separately.
3 - It won't fit through most baggage scanners with the wheels attached, so be prepared to take them off at security and reattach them afterwards. If your child is a bolter, you may want to have a safety harness for this phase.
The wheels are pretty quick to attach and remove, though it helps a lot to practice several times at home.
We've only used this once so far, but even for that, it was worth the purchase price.