[SusanMae]

I understand you are in what sounds like quite a pickle.

Can you and your wife switch cars? Since you can't purchase a new one, switching would be the first thing I would suggest.

Ok after that---Your child may still be able to be RF. 1 and 20 are the MINIMUM to be turned FF. Children are over 5x safer when RF than FF in the second yr of life...and we don't have data to say how much safer they are beyond that. But children in Sweden RF to age 4 and they have lost 1 child to a crash in a 10 yr period, and physics are the same the world over as far as I know.

Are your seatbelts attached to the door? Or do you have a shoulder belt that is on a slider, with a separate lap belt? Or do you have a belt that it's 2 peices of webbing sewn onto the latchplate? Take a pic and post if you're unsure.

As for installing LATCH anchors---that is not approved, and you will be making your child a crash test dummy. If it were to fail in a crash, you would be liable--not the car maker, not the carseat maker, you---and would you be able to live with that? Especially if the worst happened? The only part of the lower anchors that you see are what you clip on to...those metal loops are linked together in the seat bight by a metal rod. I don't care how good you are---my brother is an ASE cert Master Mechanic...and I wouldn't have him do it. If it's approved in your car, you MAY be able to get a top tether anchor kit to install...but top tethers are different than lower anchors.

Also you canNOT attach the latch strap to itself around the back of the seat. The strap is not designed to take that kind of force. This would be another case of making your child, a crash test dummy.
Since you'll need to transport your child in the front seat, with the airbag off----I really think you should keep her RF. A rear seat is 40% safer just from the get go---so since you have to put her in a non-optimal place, you should put her in the safest position--RF.

Are your seats very bucketed---major slope? A pic of the seat may help us as well. If we can see the shape of the seat, we may know that some seats fit best in those kinds of seats--make sense?

Susan

	Forward Facing Car Seats A forward-facing car seat is one in which the child sits facing the front of the car. The seat should be installed in the back seat of your vehicle. Most forward-facing only seats are for children above 20 pounds.

	Rear Facing Car Seats A rear-facing seat is one in which the infant faces the back of the car. Always install a rear-facing seat in the back seat of your car. This is the safest position for an infant. NEVER place a rear-facing seat in the front seat of a vehicle with passenger airbags.

	LATCH LATCH stands for Lower Anchors and Tethers for CHildren. It is a system mandated by the Federal government in an effort to standardize and simplify the installation of child restraints without using the vehicle's seat belt system. New vehicles and child safety seats manufactured on and after September 1, 2002 will be equipped with the LATCH system. Cars, minivans, and light trucks will be required to have anchor points between the vehicle's seat cushion and the seat back in at least two rear seating positions, and a top tether anchor (with the exception of convertibles). Child safety seats will have a lower set of attachments that fasten to the vehicle anchors. Most forward-facing child safety seats will also have a top strap (tether) that attaches to the top anchor in the vehicle.

	Top-Tether A top tether (or top strap) is the supplemental attachment now standard on almost every new carseat in the USA. Top tethers can be used with either the seat belt or with the lower anchors (as part of the LATCH system). In other countries, their use may be required by law. A top-tether is simply a strap that connects the top of the carseat to an anchor mounted in the vehicle at a location behind the carseat, usually the parcel shelf or a point on the floor of the cargo area. It is designed to prevent the forward movement of the top of a forward-facing carseat in a frontal crash. This reduces the head excursion of the child, and can reduce the chances of injury. Almost all current carseats can only meet the tougher new federal safety standards when the tether is used, even though they must still meet the minimum safety standards without a tether.