Head rests - so narrow and far forward

[Gasaraki]

Stop saying it's a head rest. It's not a head rest, it's a head restraint.

 

[drtjstone]

you know you can just bend the headrest if you really need/want to. it easily comes out and the two metal tubes can just be bent.

It's not just the angle of the top of the head restraint. The lower part of it protrudes and pushed the head forward of a shorter driver. If the seat is set with a greater recline so the shorter person's head isn't touching, there's no shoulder support. It's fine for taller people (I'm just under 6' but shorter people - eg 5' 5" - it's a real problem. Any suggestions for how to sort this for shorter drivers?

 

[Candleflame]

sounds like you have the seat too far forward

 

[drtjstone]

sounds like you have the seat too far forward

Just been investigating precise seat angles and you're right. It took about half an hour of adjustment, driving a short distance, adjusting again to get the arm and leg length acceptable with the seat a little more reclined and for a shorter person the head restraint is about 2" clear of the back of their head. This might save us a mint on osteopath services! Thank you!

 

[Candleflame]

Just been investigating precise seat angles and you're right. It took about half an hour of adjustment, driving a short distance, adjusting again to get the arm and leg length acceptable with the seat a little more reclined and for a shorter person the head restraint is about 2" clear of the back of their head. This might save us a mint on osteopath services! Thank you!

Its an issue because while in the 90s everyone had their seat too far back and rode like a gangster (and this also lead to a funny seat design i.e. the BMW e31) nowadays everyone has their seat straight up. I consider this a sequelae of this SUV garbage which put the seats on stelts like you are riding a truck/lorrey even though its a.... car. The presence of automatic transmissions made this issue even worse, because previously the clutch pedal meant people had to have reasonable seat dicipline. Its even influenced the design of a lot of modern cars which never made sense and leads to a position where people are slouched forward and often have their necks pushed forward so they can see over the big bonnet of the big suv...

id do this:
Put your seat all the way back and completely down, adjust the seat-back at a neutralish angle -60 degrees is a good starting point. With Tesla 70 degrees means that the head restraint is 90 degrees to the ground so you really want a gangster angle and just slightly lean against basically the bottom part coz at that point the seatback is too far away. You might have to use your abdo muscles to support you a little bit in the seat. deflate the lumbar completely. Put the steering wheel wherever, its not important atm.

Next adjust the height of the seat. Default should be so high that you can comfortably feather your fist on top of your head. For anyone above 186cm this means in practice the seat is actually almost all the way down in the Model 3. Bear in mind that the back angle changes how high your head is.
Next adjust the front rake of the seat until your thighs feel reasonably well supported. The Tesla seats are unique coz they are so short most people will probably want to feel a bit of pressure on the thighs unlike in other cars where you dont want your thighs lifted at all. Some people may say "i like sitting low". Now that may be true but ideally one should sit as high as possible in the car - also Model 3 gives everyone the illusion they sit too high due to the lack of a driver dash. If you follow what I just wrote and then tape an Ipad the size of i.e. a BMW instrument cluster to the dash youll realize that you actually dont sit as high as you think. That said, you can adjust this a bit after you set it to the optimal height. If you get your fist nicely above your head you can then lower the seat by a bit if you prefer that.

Next move the seat forward. Distance gets historically determined by being able to press the clutch comfortably. Cant use that in an EV so instead press the accelerator pedal all the way down. You may initially struggle due to sitting too far away - keep moving the seat forward until you you can apply full power with your thighs/foot to the pedal and push yourself back into the seat with the force of your right leg. then move the seat a tad back again i.e. 0.5 to 1cm. At that point it should be quite easy to swivel with your foot from the accelerator pedal to the brake. If you find the front rake is obstructing your thighs from being comfortable you may have to lower the frontrake a bit (in Teslas that will also adjust the back-angle and seat height unfortunately)

Next readjust the backrest by moving it forward. You kind of want it to gently grab your shoulders just slightly then stop. for most people this will 70 degrees. If your thighs now feel a bit wedged/compressed you can drop the front rake a bit but this may then lead to not having enough thigh support. IMHO adjusting the rake and backrest in ongoing succession leads to this mistake suv drivers make, they have a tendency to put the seat up more and more and lower the rake more and more. This leads to the knee to get progressively more bent and the seat being moved progressively closer to the pedal but its not that noticeable because unlike in a sedan where your leg just has a slight bend in an SUV it often rides more like a lorrey or van with a higher seat and a more resulting bend - sometimes up to 80 degrees or so in some cars. Sedan drivers dont have this problem because the moment they get a sharper knee angle they feel like something is wrong and then put the seat back again to open up the knee angle again.

Now that you sit comfortable and can easily press the accelerator pedal, swivel to the brake, your shoulders feel nicely supported by your backrest adjust the lumbar. I personally like pressing the front button until i feel the tiniest pressure and then press the bottom button until i get a taadd more pressure than leave it. Feels like your lower back is just very gently filled out by the seat.

Next adjust the steering wheel. Pull it out until you can comfortably rest your wrist ontop of the wheel. In practice Model 3 has a very short steering wheel protrusion so most people want it all the way out unless you got short legs and huge arms.. Then adjust the height so that theres a nice gap between your legs and the wheel - try running your hands around it and make sure you can comfortably do a close to 180 degree turn with your hands not touching your thighs.

done. after that you can finetune it slightly to preference.

edit:

i timestamped the relative section good video where you can see the obtruse huge gangster E31 angle. Also note the angle of his knees which is relatively big but appropriate for a sedan.

Compare that to the suv here

again, timestamped the section.
he sits much more up, the angle of the left knee is in that case straight down 90 degrees exacerbated by the fact that its an automatic. In a sedan you cant even get such obtuse angles because the seat just isnt high enough. Half of the time he looks like hes gonna fall forward out of the seat haha.

 

[Rooster123]

I tried reversing the headrest in my Model 3, but it felt super unsafe because of how far back it was. I tried all sorts of pillows and cushions and eventually found a solution that works for me. I took a 12x12 inch piece of 1/2 inch thick memory foam and added it inside the seat. Picture is below.

This does two things, it makes the upper back portion of the seat slightly less concave, and it pushes your upper back slightly forward away from the headrest.

I'm still not crazy about the comfort of the seat, but it's comfortable enough. This is the only solution I've found that allows me to drive without thinking about seat comfort.