Oxford Unisex Little Explorer Top Tube Mounted Child Seat, Black, Ideal for ages 3-6 years 22Kg weight limit UK

I didn't expect a lot after having seen some other reviews but I have to admit this works quite well.To start with, this product requires some basic skills with nuts, bolts and zip ties. You don't need to be an expert bicycle mechanic but just follow the instructions (pictures) correctly. I started with a "yeah, I know how this fits" attitude but then had to refer to the instructions to get it installed correctly.The best part is that my son and I now enjoy the view together while cycling and can have great conversations about birds, cats, cars, planes...Here are the answers to some of the questions I had before buying; hope this helps.a. Riding Comfort: Nothing gets in the way while cycling; I don't have to keep my knees wide.b. Seat Comfort: Little seat is comfortable; just enough padding. I may consider buying a padded seatcover for longer rides but not a concern for now.c. Safety: There are no straps or any harness that stops the little one from falling. He sits in between my arms but I still have to be careful. I have noticed that he has quickly learned how to be cautiously seated with his hands always on the handle bars. He occasionally screams, 'careful daddy!!' when I go over a bump or take a sharp bend. I do only leisure rides with him in the parks and bicycle trails and almost completely avoid traffic roads, at least for now.d. Sleep: If you are planning longer rides, I recommend a rear mounted child seat if the little one needs to take a nap. It doesn't make sense to compare both.e. Quality: Quality is excellent, I have no concerns.f. Fit: I have a Carrera Vengeance and it fits perfectly well. Although it wouldn’t fit on all bikes. i) You need to have a top tube at a reasonable height; some ladies bikes don’t ii) If the angle between the top-tube and the down-tube is too wide or if they are far apart, this wouldn’t fit.Other notes:The straps around the footrest are useless. It’s not long enough for my son's shoes to go through. He just puts his feet over the straps.

Suitable for ages 3 to 6 years - ❌Weight limit - 22kgs - ❌Simple to install - ❌Is a great product but the upper age and weight recommendations are not realistic. My daughter is a small 5yo at 17.5kg and this was far too small. Knees bent double just to fit in the stirrups (which were set at the longest length). It's also not an easy setup, once it's on, it's on.Don't get me wrong, it would be a great product for smaller children but probably not 5y olds and certainly not 6y olds.

It is a bit fiddly to install but once on it's great. Our 3yo loves it. It's a much nicer ride now that his weight is in front instead of bouncing around on a rear seat.We also now have our 3yo on this seat, and our 1yo in a rear seat and it works well even on my medium frame bike.The seat has scratched my bike a little which is annoying but not the end of the world. It isn't a seat you can easily remove or swap bikes, however, it doesn't get in the way when cycling solo, and both my b partner and I have one each on our bikes.

I bought two different cross bar seats for our 2 year old twins based on an article rounding up the best of them; the Oxford Little Explorer, and a NZ designed Shotgun at 3 times the price for a carbon Yeti.The Oxford unfortunately has been packed up to return and another Shotgun seat ordered.I wanted to like the Oxford.Assembly got off to a bad start. I’m pretty handy (having been a quad bike mechanic amongst other things) but putting this thing together is fiddly. It has not been designed to be put together easily and certainly not by someone with normal fingers. I had to remove the clamp from the seat rails in order to get the fixings in for the side plates, but that took some serious prying to close the rails up enough to clear the captive threads for the side fixings.Having assembled the basic unit, I scraped it onto my (fortunately old and not immaculate) Specialized Hardrock. It’s too narrow and badly scratched the paint down to bare ali. Not impressed. Glad it hadn’t gone straight onto my partner’s Trek.The foam pads are ineffective and the chromed spacer & footpeg bars are too short; the only allowance for variation in frame width is in the domed nuts, which is not a lot.Having taken the kids out for a ride, the design of the Oxford means the seat fairly closely follows the cross bar slope - there’s no adjustment in the seat itself - as it sits directly on the hard rubber wedge pad, meaning my son couldn’t stay on saddle and constantly slid off the back against the main saddle. The rubber riser pad was missing after our short ride around the playing field as well having no mechanical fixing, just an almost imperceptible lip at each end.Also, if you have cables routed along your top tube, fitting will be difficult. If they’re old school unsheathed ones like on the specialized, forget about anything they’re connected to working while the seat is fitted.The foot straps are too short and with no adjustment and finally it’s a pain to remove again.The only redeeming feature of the whole thing is the saddle which is quite nice; it arguably has a cooler shape than the Shotgun seat, although both kids preferred the Shotgun seat. (The Oxford is explicitly not suitable for carbon frames by the way)This looks like it would work on a very old school frame shape with a near horizontal top tube and slimmer profile tubes as found on CroMo frames. It just feels like it hasn’t been tested on many different bikes during the R&D phase.If you care about your paint in any way at all, I would also recommend the Shotgun; the presses side plates on the Oxford are pretty sharp and made a right mess of my bike. And it still moved around done up as tight as it would go.Very, very disappointed ☹️ And not a little p****d off to be honest...

Have had several trips to the park with my little Co pilot, however after just one trip one of the fabric footrest straps has broken off and this morning the other had the same issue.To be honest even if I sent it back and got a return I'd wager the issue would reoccur the quality isn't good enough.Have to say despite the footrests it's pretty solid and a hell of a lot of fun.It's nice and tidy and could be left on with little disruption if say your a bicycle commuter daily.Good but not great quality wise but good fun.

One of the best things I’ve ever bought my son also loved it was a bit tricky to get on at first took me maybe 20 mins. Seat is also comfy for my little one I went for a little test drive with my son and he had me out for a hour riding am around all the streets definitely recommend!

Nul