Mountain Buggy – Duet – Review by Dad of 2

Well this is my first post and why am i posting?…. well i have bought the mountain buggy duet. Frankly i am a bit livid, and im a northerner, so by heck I got to tell it as it is.

We have been waiting on this pram because its a) a side by side and b) will fit through these little village shop doors you know the type – the size of a typical front door.

Good point. it is narrow enough and scores a big thumbs up for going through said doors.
Pushes ok. Our Nipper 360, that pushes great.

Well thats all the good things about it.

So, it arrived, skies a darkening, and i rush off with said pram 2 kids to the local shop. So first impressions. If you go and spend several hundred quid on a bit of metal with plastic wheels. and you expect for the money its right.

What you dont expect is to see the seat foam and wire poking out at the bottom corners of each seat.

Our other two prams have nice foam handles. Now im not no softy, pansy sort of guy, but this ribbed plastic handle has left my hands feeling irritated after a push. I suggest ladies you pack hand cream because you go anywhere with this, your going to have sore hands. Also come to think of it I have another item in the house with the same style grip. its a £2.99 mop handle from the corner shop. So my several hundred quid has me pushing a mop handle… cheers mountain buggy. Also where this mop handle, with its plastic rubber nastyness, has been bent to make a pram handle, its left crease marks. I expect this was a cheap way of manufacturing instead of moulding it onto the handle. It also does not quite finish on one side leaving a gap…. handle looks cheap and nasty to push and of course it feels cheap and nasty to push.

The hood….
Then there is this hole in one of the hoods. about the size of my wallet right above my little lads head. So while one of my kids was dry when it started to spot on the way home the other got wet hair. I expect it lets in rain, sun, wind, you name it. Hell i could shove in a bunch of daffs. Come on. you could have charged me another couple of quid if you needed a bit more fabric. This seat hood is nothing short of useless. Im going to name this thing the polo mint pram…as its got a hole.

The brake….
ok its a bit of plastic coated wire. The type they use to make shopping baskets out of, but a bit thicker and just as bendy. Think wire frame clothes horse or coat hanger you get the idea. its also bent up in to 2 thin long sticks. you have to either reach down under the pram and give these sticks a good pull. Or do some weird type of stranding on one leg while trying to hook your shoe round. Well… i do not do yoga, i dont have double jointed feet and i was nearly on my arse trying to get the brake on. Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!

The shopping basket….
big basket…. you lean forward and with one hand blindly attempt to push the pint of milk and a loaf of bread in a bag underneath and it won’t go… Why?? well when you get down onto your knee’s, holding up the queue of shoppers, you find not one but two straps clipped in the middle over the basket. You have to unclip both. put the bag under and reclip. then get up and dust off your trousers.

the seat…
so my little lad nodded off on the way. so i lowered the seat into recline. all well and good. On the way back i put the seat back into a sitting position and what happens is the materal from being reclined mode is now in the seating area squashed around the childs head. result one unhappy kiddy.

So, maybe im whining too much, im a bloke. I want something i feel is right. So to recap.

cons
Handle is like a cheap mop handle.
foam sticks out of sides of seat at the bottom. making it look cheap
basket is crap, due to the need to fiddle, because of being blocked by straps.
no good reason hole in one of the hoods, making it poor for purpose, as its no good for wind, rain, or sun protection. Pointless being present.
brake pedal is a weird shaped bar made from an old coat hanger, you need to be a yoga expert to actually engage.
material from the side of the seat, that is used to recline the child into a lay down position is bunched around childs head when sat up.

Pros
its narrow

Value for money. Nope. I think it looks and feel cheap, only sold on the concept of it being narrow.
Verdict: feel cheated. If i had seen this in Argos, i would not have paid a couple of hundred quid for it. We have an Elite before the Nipper, and both the Elite and the Nipper are better than this thing at far less money. The only place this wins is on width.

By: dad of 2