[nai]

Been looking at buying a new bike which can fit a kiddy seat on the back for trawling up and down High Peak Trail, round Ladybower etc.  I fit a 15/16" mtb, think my road bike is 51cm.
Almost committed to a mtb yesterday but we decided to try the seat on it and realised it wasn't going to work, my heels were hitting the seat and the seat itself was very low over the tyre even without the sprog in it.
Thought maybe a hybrid would be better but it seems not, same problem.
Anyone had this problem?  Any ideas of how to resolve it would be much appreciated
Cheers
Ian

[Obi-Wan is lost...]

What type of seat have you got? Some types allow the seat to shift back and forward. We've got a Hamax which is ok, it's not supposed to be used on a full sus bike but it worked fine on mine. If you have no joy trying alternative types consider a trailer, I thought they would be super expensive but you can get one off ebay for £60 new. I was amazed how quickly mini-obi was too heavy for his seat, even when he was small it changed the dynamics of the bike so much that riding off road was a a bit of a chore. You have to be super careful mounting/dismounting in case the top heavy bike topples over with your bairn in it.

[nai]

We haven't bought a seat yet, we just tried the (only) one they had in the shop which was the type that has a clamp fitted to the downtube and the seat slots in to that.

Interesting that you have a seat that fits to a fullsuss, I'd written off the option of fitting one to mine, definitely can't fit it to the downtube though so if it's that style I'm still out of luck.

What age was he too old?  My eldest is 3 1/2 now, the Mrs wants to get all this sorted asap but I'm guessing it'll only be used a few times this side of winter then won't come out again til the Dafs do.  Wouldn't want ot shell out for a seat only to find it's no use when we come to use it regularly.

I had considered a trailer but when I did the maths of kiddy1 = 14kg + kiddy2 = 12kg + a trailer (~10kg?) it sounded a lot like hard work and splitting the load between two of us seemed a better option.  Might have to man up tho it seems.

[SA Chris]

We were out at a castle in Deeside and a bloke turned up at the cafe with 2 toddlers in a trailer (est 2-4 years old?) plus a small one of about 1ish in the bike seat. He said it was fine on flats but brutal on uphills. Getting moving looked challenging. Oh and he had a medium sized dog with him as well. Had cycled circa 5 miles to get there. Impressive multitasking.

[Obi-Wan is lost...]

We haven't used ours for a while, it worked ok when he was less than a year, but last time we used it in the Lakes he was 1year10months and I biked up to Whinlatter with him on the back, it was a workout but doable, the worse thing was the way the front wheel started to lift on the steep sections, quite disconcerting to have no steering. Mind you Mini-Obi is a bit of a mutant, he's not even 3 yet and about 15.5kg and over 1m tall. One of the disadvantages of our seat is that it doesn't recline, so if he fell asleep he tended to loll forward which didn't look that comfortable, although it didn't seem to wake him up. The next model up reclines although this wouldn't suit you as this lessens the room in front of the kids legs even more. I guess Dad kicking child on every pedal rev wouldn't help with sending them off!

With our number 2 due in December, next summer we're going to experiment with something like this one. Even if it's crap it won't break the bank. A few blankets and teddies and I recon it will be zone to hang out in. Also doubles as a cheap double buggy with big wheels for festivals etc. We're not keen on the ones where one sits behind the other.