Does anyone know if it's possible to modify the driver seat to move it further away from the gas pedal? Btw, this is for a 2006 Prius.
I'd go for that; I'd love to have two more notches of rearward motion because my legs are long. I won't hold my breath, however. I suspect there are too many safety-related reasons that it can't be done.
Some have replaced the OEM seats with Recaro seats for more comfort. You have to add a resistor to trick the car into thinking there's still seat airbags.
My dealer explicitly told me it could be done. I'll ask today 'cause I'd like it myself (I'm 6'4"). My Prius is going in for its first service (15k KMs)
There is a thread on here about moving the front seats back. I can't seem to locate it though. It dealt w/ getting longer rails (obviously) and moving the seat sensor forward or backward(?) Has to do with airbag deployment and letting it know how far away from the steering wheel you really are. Sounded like an expensive proposition. I would say the thread was about 6+ months old.
Okay, I read through the last 9 months of threads and came up with this one. Looks like a lot of trouble but worth it for someone who is really uncomfortable. http://priuschat.com/forums/plan-for-reloc...ght=seat+sensor
In January, I called a few custom vehicle shops in the Bay Area that specialize in handicapped- / disabled-person modifications. They would not touch extending the Prius seat. One of the biggest hindrances seemed to be the location of the seatbelt -- in the side wall instead of in the seat.
Moving the seats back is easy. Well it was easy after I looked into it for a while. I took the car to New England Wheels in Billerica, MA. They regularly move seats back in many different cars, often for Boston Celtics players. They did both front seats for under $300 and did an excellent job. The work involved drilling out the rivets that hold the two pedestals to each of the four front seat rails. Then they welded about 4 inches of heavy steel (much thicker than the seat rails) to the underside front of the seat rails. Then the welded the pedestals back on three inches forward from the original position. Then they painted it all black so it looks good. I have a 2005 BC, #6 package. The mod doesn't affect the nav system at all. some of the air bags come out of the side of the seat, so these aren't affected by the mod. The airbags from the roof molding probably have some extra length to accomodate varying accidents. I suspect they'll work fine too. Even if they worked less well, it's a trade off I'd make to be comfortable in the car. The seats slide back an extra three inches. It feels way more luxurious. Even with the seats all the way back, there is still enough room in the back seat for a tall person. And my 5'3" girlfriend can easily reach the pedals when the seat is all the way up. The thing I'm still trying to figure out is how to lower the seat. I just discussed this in another post called "Seat lowering".
It actually isn't as easy as the dealer told me before. It involves extending the rails and it would take some time to do, but they said they'd do it as a service (but mine is a company car, so I don't know whether anyone will get that same level of service...)
CH: Thanks for the up-date. Will you have it done? And please post the name and location of your dealer and what the service person said so I may print it out in one piece and take it to my dealer. It would be greatly appreciated.
In the post above, I gave specifics on how the mod was done as well as the name of the place that did it in Massachusetts. I first asked my dealer to do it. They said they wouldn't do the mod since it would impact the warranty. Dealers aren't supposed to make those kinds of mods. I then went to a handicap retrofitter who had never done this type of mod before. They intalled four pieces of metal and bolted the rails to them. This moved the seat back, but also raised it and changed the angle. I had them return it to normal. Then I found a place that has done this type of mod many times before. They knew exactly what to do and did an excellent job for less money, as noted above. I would hesitate to let someone experiment on your car if they've never done this work before. Good luck!
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Can you start a thread with details? I'd like to see how you did this, how you dealt with the airbag issues, etc. It sometimes takes Danny a while to get back to people on stuff like this, but keep trying.
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