[qjohn]

I'm adding a seat belt (from napa) to the back of my '95 that I plan to use to buckle through my dog's harness. (Dog will grow to about 80 lbs.) Right now, I have each end of the seat belt attached to one of the rear most tether locations using 10.8 grade 8 mm bolts.

I'm wondering if anyone knows whether they'd be strong enough to restrain the dog in an accident (so he does not become a projectile). Since they share the load, I figure they have 40 lbs each to contend... certainly less than a large child, but not exactly the same. Of course, this all assumes the harness stays together. Any comments would be appreciated.

Also, I'd like to combine the belts to share the same tether location if the load could safely be doubled. In that case, the whole load would be on one location.

Thanks,
John

 

[CPSDarren]

I have no certain answer for you, but I would suspect that it is better than nothing. Even if the anchors fail, it will probably be after much of the deceleration in the crash is over. A dog hitting me at 15 mph is better than at 45 mpg

The risk of failure is certainly greater without sharing the load, but again I'd say it is better than nothing. A securely mounted cage is probably the only other good alternative.

In any case you certainly would not ever want to share the load with a child seat tether. I'm sure tethers are conservatively designed, but any margin over the regulations probably varies a lot from company to company.