If you think about it, the person who designs seats in automobiles has a difficult job as people come in so many shapes and sizes.
So the question is: What is the most uncomfortable vehicle you have ever driven? As a bonus, did you own it or did it belong to somebody else?
Having recently purged myself of a back pain inducing Ford Escape at work, in favor of an extended cab Chevrolet Silverado, this question shot through my mind. My most uncomfortable?
GM vans through the 1995 model year. Fighting a wheel well is not comfortable; thankfully, I did not own it. What about you?
Worst fit: mid-’90’s rental Chevrolet Corsica. The steering wheel faced one direction, the left foot brace made you face the other, and the lack of lumbar support made you slouch. I’m not certain I could even recreate that position without the help of my physical therapist. Worst ride: my ’81 Toyota Truck. Little suspension travel, poorly padded seat that had you right above the floor. Louisiana roads didn’t help, either. It did ride much better with about a half ton in the bed, which may have been the main design idea. We traded it too early-100,000 miles-more because of the ride than the lack of air conditioning.
And then, there was my uncles’ Army surplus Jeep with a turned over 5 gallon bucket for a passenger seat. Road along about once to bring the cows home from pasture as a child, never again. In my memory there was a passenger handle on the dash, but I may have just remembered that to lessen the trauma.
I actually remember the International Model H as a sweet ride. But that Model M had a clutch spring made for the gym. One hour driving that on the hay fork rope and you had jackhammer knee for the rest of the day.
I never liked the driver’s seat in my 2004 Odyssey. Always felt that I couldn’t get an erect enough position on the backrest. Got rid of the bitch for a Subaru and am much happier.
My grandfather had a 1990 Silverado and I hated those “ribbed for her pleasure” seats.
Of course it was roomy but those seats were just terrible.
Lancia Beta that I test drove once. It was years ago and I wasn’t in it for long so specifics are hard to recall, but it sticks in my memory as being the most uncomfortable car I have ever been in – by a wide margin.
In my (now sold) 1993 Lexus LS400 was a very nice place to be, although the seats were not great for long distance driving.
My favourite is my current G1 Honda Insight. It’s low (but not difficult) to get into, but has seats that suit me very well and has a simple well laid out driving position. Just sweet.
I’ve ridden in a ’12 Jetta with leather seats and thought it was atrocious. My rear end fell asleep. It was as if they took those hard, narrow seats from the MD-80 plane and stuck them in a car. Yes, my ass fell asleep on an MD-80 too. Made the change in MSP real interesting.
My grandfather’s Gran Marquis hurts but I think the lumbar just needs an adjustment. I don’t mess with that because he freaks out.
Also hated cheap-o vinyl seats. We had something…either the Lynx or the Bug…when I was growing up that had black seats with a raised grid pattern on them. On a hot day it looked and felt like you were sitting on a waffle iron.
My 92 Taurus was very comfortable. My 95 Regal is passable.
Cheap vinyl seats! *shudders* that brought back a near-repressed childhood memory of getting into my Mum’s old ’76 FIAT 127 on hot sunny days in shorts and having my legs seared by the black vinyl seats…
I never drove that car (I was maybe 6 when she traded it for something else) but it certainly ranks amongst the most uncomfortable I’ve ridden in when shorts+sunshine+black vinyl is factored in.
The worst one? That I drove?
A borrowed 1993 Ford F-150 with a bench seat…and column-shift automatic. There was NO PLACE for my legs! I had to drive it sixty miles…I was about ready to park it and call a cab.
Close second: An 81-inch wheelbase Kaiser-era Jeep CJ-5. Drove one for a test, thirty years ago…I love those old jeeps, but there just wasn’t the room. And the floor-hinged clutch and brake pedals…bad, bad.
My vote is for the 2009 Dodge Avenger. It was a rental car (of course it was, nobody bought these on purpose).
I was in Jacksonville, NC (near Camp LeJune) for work, and my flight to Philadelphia (by way of Charlotte, NC) was cancelled, with the next available flight a day away. I decided to rent a car and drive home to PA. Unfortunately, the GMC Acadia that I just turned back in at the airport was already spoken for. Being that beggars can’t be choosy, I took whatever they would let me drive home. It was a 2009 Dodge Avenger with 50,000 miles on it in light blue, plastic hubcaps, and no options. Think of a cheaper version of a Chrysler Sebring (as if there was a need for something cheaper than a Sebring).
It had the absolute worst seats that I have ever felt. There simply was no good position and the lumbar support was digging into my back. It became apparent after the first half hour that it was going to be a long drive. My back was hurting before I even made it to I-95. It was aggravated by a wheel that was out of balance, which caused the steering wheel to shake at speeds above 60.
I was going to drive straight through, but it was late and I couldn’t handle more than a couple hours in the car. So I spent the night in Rocky Mount, NC, hoping it would feel better in the morning; but It didn’t. By the time I reached Virginia, I had decided that this was the worst Chrysler product ever made. By the time I reached Richmond, I was pretty sure it was the worst car ever made. By the time I made it to DC, I was wondering if any Dodge Avengers were sold to the public, or if they were all rentals. By the time I made it to Baltimore, I was an hour from home, and I was sure that there were probably better vehicles built in Soviet Russia.
I survived the trip (barely), but was much more cautious about my rental selections from that point on. Malibu:yes. Imapala:yes. Altima:yes. Avenger/Sebring:NO!
In late ‘67 I was hitchhiking in the rain and two guys in a Bug-eye Sprite stopped for me. The top was up so it was dry but snug inside. There was an eight track tape deck in the dash but only one tape, “The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators,” endlessly repeating, “I’m not coming home,” over and over. But that wasn’t so bad. Ten years later I saw a Triumph TR-3 parked about two feet from the curb looking like it needed a new home. I tracked down the owner, he wanted to sell. The starter didn’t work, it was out of gas, the spare wheel was the driver seat. When we finally got it started I ran it through the gears and around a few corners and down a little hill and the bonnet popped open, tore the hinges out, broke the windscreen, and flipped over my head. My friend, following in his sensible Volvo 122S wagon picked up the pieces and said, “It looks like you bought it.” That, Curbside Classicists, is the epitome of uncomfortable. By the way, I patched it up and drove it for four years.
Any of a number of Mercury Grand Marquis (de Sade) LS models I got as rentals. Which showed me that the Panther cars are easily the most overrated, overblown automobiles that ever existed.
Wow, Syke, I am not the only person who holds this opinions of the Panther. Never liked those cars a bit.
Amazingly, I’ve never driven a Panther.
I’m not an aficionado of full-size broughams; and the Panthers, especially in their later melted-plastic phase, just screamed OLD LADY and COP CAR. Or, worse: HEY, TAXI!! A phase of my life I’d love to forget forever.
Good to know I’m not missing much.
Having driven many of them, the Panther always screamed, “bad steering, bad engine, bad transmission.”
While behind a 2005 Grand Marquis(the only year with a rear mounted antenna) I noticed some of the letters on the Marquis part of the rear name plate were missing so it read Grand Ma. This pretty much explained this type of car and the demographic it appealed to
A 1975 Datsun 4 door sedán with its wheelwell protruding in the rear seat. And a 2002 Chevrolet Astra (Opel), with a stiff suspensión that makes your kidneys cry for help.
My most uncomfortable vehicle I have ever driven is a 1990 Volvo 240 Wagon. I am only 6ft 1 in tall and I found the driver seat never went back far enough to not feel like I was holding the steering wheel with my legs. Even after adjusting the 2 hidden adjustment levers. At first I thought it was my seat that was broken but I sat in a few Volvo 240’s from the local junk yard and they were all the same except for one 1987 that looked like it suffered from the sagging seat cushion issue(I should have bought that seat). All the other 240’s were 90-93 models so I wonder if it was because of the added airbag and the under dash knee bolster that is causing it all
I know there is a lot of Panther love around these parts but now that I’m doing more consulting around the country and frequently riding in Lincoln Town cars in livery service, I’m amazed at how uncomfortable the back seat is. It’s very low and difficult to get in and out of (I’m 6 1+ and fairly agile) and the seat is very unsupportive. If you’re not buckled in tightly you’re going to get thrown around even on small turns and curves in the road. These cars also have rather poor, jiggly suspensions and the streets of NYC really take their toll. Granted some of these cars have 200-300K or more on them but I’ve noticed even end of the line models with well under 100K and aren’t any more comfortable.
In 2009 My folks were at the Ford dealer looking for a car to replace the dying 1993 Taurus. My father’s first choice was a 2009 Grand Marquis but after looking at it he bought a 2009 Taurus(full sized based off the 500) because despite the Taurus being a slight smaller then the GM, the Taurus had more room in the rear seat area then the GM
Those 500s/Tauruses, as well as the related Freestyle/Taurus X, are incredibly comfortable cars. Seriously underrated.
I guess the seats fit my 5’11” frame a little better. I’ve always found Town Cars more than comfortable, and considerably more comfortable than an ’80s RWD Cadillac (the post-93 Caddys had a little more leg room, so they might have been better). The Crown Vic (and not-so-Grand Marquis) on the other hand is a little cramped in the back. That 3″ stretch makes a big difference; I was in a cab once and couldn’t figure out why it was so comfortable, but then I noticed something funny about the rear doors. The thing was actually a stretched Crown Vic that was mainly sold for livery use, so it was a Crown Vic body spliced onto a Town Car frame.
I have driven one, but just last week I got to sit in a new Ford Explorer. Mind you, I am all of 5’5″ and a half, so I tend to like things up close and high. Well for one, the seat felt too small. The dash seemed way to high, and by the time I got the seat and steering wheel positioned where it felt reasonably comfortable, I discovered that I could not get out of the car, as the steering column was blocking my leg!
Everyone I have seen driving one of these looks like they are too small for the car.
Who did Ford design these for?
I’ve driven a lot of cars, and generally have good comments about them.
A few personal highlights: some of the best, 1987 Cutlass Supreme Brougham, 1997 and 2000 Ford Contour. 2006 Chevrolet HHR 2LT-super easy for me to get in and out of when my knee was messed up. Olds Alero, the seat tilts so that I can get the pressure off my legs and the wheel tilts to a comfortable position.
I find a lot of new cars uncomfortable for two reasons:
1- oftentimes the headrests are tilted way too far forward, forcing my head to be out of whack with my spine. Equals instant hatred.
2 – so many seats are too hard from side-to-side across the top but are concave below that, forcing my shoulders forward. My ’05 Mazda 6 was like that, I loved the car but it was so hard to get comfy in. My ’08 6 was better but not great (needed adjustable lumbar support)
My C35 Nissan Laurel has nice soft seats, but zero side bolstering on the seat or back, so spirited driving is definitely not encouraged!
A workmate’s got a 2012 Ford Territory, and the seats in that are wonderful – plushly soft yet supportive; in fact, hard plastic dash aside, the entire Territory is a superb vehicle, I can’t wait until the 2.7 V6 twin-turbo diesel model starts hitting the used market at a reasonable price.
I’ve been blessed with a spare company car (2010 Mazda 6 wagon) for a few weeks too, and its seats are great – a little hard, but the concave shape of my ’05 6 seats has gone and I get no aches after a couple hours driving. They look the same as the seats in my old ’08 6, but they feel way better – with superb side bolstering that feels like it was designed for my shape! Still need adjustable lumbar support though…
Funny you say that about the headrests- I rented a Town Car a couple of years ago when visiting the Oregon coast. Although much of it was comfy, they must have designed it for people with osteoporosis, as the headrest actually pushed your head forward at a bent angle. Maybe they just knew their target market well. Shame- were it not for that headrest, I would have really liked the car.
I tend to use seat comfort as one of my factors in deciding to buy a car- hence, the best I’ve owned in this order:
Saab 900 (classic) the best seats ever made. period. Wonder why people put up with all of the ‘character’ that a 900 has? Its them seats. The only sports car that is comfortable.
Mercedes w126- hard, not comfy, but therapeutic, and no pain after long road trips.
Citroen CX- so good I can’t even explain it- very soft, but not pain inducing- like memory foam almost.
Volvo 240- Very comfy for me, but I’m 5’7, and it seems the car was designed for people my size.
And a surprise: Yugo 45 (GV in US speak). I thought this car would be horrid to drive, but the seats fit me really well. They were firm yet comfy and angled right for me. Legroom wasn’t bad- in RHD there was somewhere for my left foot, and what’s more, the cotton cloth upholstery gave it a cozy feel.
The worst though is tough-
Austin Allegro- bottom cushion too short and a bar on the seat frame poked me in the tailbone. I had to sit on a throw pillow just to prevent the agony of that bar. What’s more, the seats are so poorly made that the foam cushion split at the top of the seat back, and thus your upper back rubs right on the seat frame. Leyland quality at its best.
Lada Samara- Stupidly designed seat. From a picture, they look almost contoured, but the contours are in the wrong places- no thigh support so my thigh cramped up. Worse, that bar again- but here it hit right in the small of my back. I was tempted to buy a brand new Lada Niva 4×4 until I remembered those seats- they are putting me off.
Lada 1600 estate (round headlamp model) The seats in this one were fine, it was the pedals that I found flummoxing. They were mounted so high up that you had to nearly bring your foot to touch the top of the cushion to push the clutch in. After a few decades, Lada managed to fix this, and the Riva I owned was actually quite comfy to drive for long trips.
Dodge B150 passenger van- I drove this from Chicago to New York City as part of a lefty group. If you think the Chevy is poorly designed, you haven’t driven a Dodge. There was about 8″ between the hump and the door. That hump would fit a 440- and this one only had the piddly six cylinder. Driving any domestic van would put anyone off having a large family.
Yesterday I test drove a Land Cruiser BJ40. Incredibly noisy, not helped by a blown exhaust gasket, murderous on speed bumps, and with seats out of a ’70s Japanese compact. Still, I loved it and am thinking about buying it and fitting loads of sound proofing and Saab 900 seats….
Interesting that you mention the Samara. My late Uncle bought one new here in New Zealand back whenever they were new. He was well over six feet tall, and I believe he found seat comfort was lacking in the Samara, so it was traded on a new Hyundai Excel within 3 months. He liked the Excel,but still drove his Mk II Triumph 2500 most of the time as he found that super-comfy.
Ah the Allegro. My older brother’s first car was one of these and I vividly remember the way the back seat used to attempt to swallow passengers whole. I remember that tailbone bruising bar in the front too, it made getting eaten alive by the foam-monster in the back actually preferable.
+1 on Saab seats too – my old 9000’s cabin was one of the most comfortable places I’ve ever been.
Ah yes the rear seat on Aggros is fun. Early ones were coil sprung and quite nice. However, in order to improve rear headroom, they swapped to ‘zigzag’ springs, which meant the cushion would sag so low that a heavy passenger would actually make the seat foul the handbrake cables. I remember trying to figure out why my rear brakes dragged whenever someone was in the back. What fun.
I have to laugh! I had not seen this post when I posted about my Yugo. I was pleasantly surprised when my Yugo’s seats were not torture racks compared to some of the other small inexpensive cars that I’d run across in my travels.
Glad to see I was not the only one.
I’d have to say a 26′ U-haul rental truck. The wife and I moved from one city to another that were about 80 miles apart. It was all highway, in light snow, on hilly roads.
The problem wasn’t so much the seat, it was the fact that I had to keep the accelerator pedal down to the floor for most of the trip. By the end of it, my leg was in bad shape.
Mine would definitely be a 1994 Citroen AX diesel which a former flatmate’s mother foisted on her as an attempted hand-me-down while her (beloved) FIAT was in for repairs. We both drove FIAT Pandas at the time and were on each other’s insurance policies for car-sharing to work etc. so I got to experience the horrors of that little french biscuit tin a few times.
My Panda was a little older than hers (an ’89 to her ’92) but mine had been well cared for & regularly serviced it’s whole life, and even then in 2000 it remained sweet and trouble free. Hers had a lingering engine issue from being run (essentially) without any water in its coolant system one summer, it was “girl-serviced” (i.e. only taken to the garage when something actually broke) and was also catalysed (unlike mine) any/all which may have accounted for it’s more sickly nature. Whatever the reason it occasionally had to go in for fairly major engine work. On its third such hospitalisation her Mum loaned her the Citroen AX she’d just replaced as her own car. The AX was marginally newer and my friend’s Mum was very enthusiastic about my friend replacing her Panda with it.
The Pandas (hardly less biscuit-box-ish than the AX themselves after all!) had excellent and very comfortable driving positions for both me and my friend (we’re very different shapes) while the wee Citroen tortured each of us in different and inventive ways. In my friend’s case, the main gripe was that when she moved the seat close enough to reach the controls, the non-adjustable steering wheel near enough bit into her legs, in my case I developed a crick in my back from sitting twisted in order to use the pedals properly. I remember it as a surprisingly claustrophobic cabin too…
We drove my car as much as possible while the Citroen visited and were both profoundly glad when the garage reported back to my friend that her lame Panda didn’t have to be put down after all. The unloved AX was sent back to her parents and (presumably) sold on to torture someone else.
I drove a three year old limousine I already owned to Sarasota, Florida from Tulsa, Oklahoma.
It was a 1978 Cadillac 9 passenger sedan without the glass partition. I took someone else with me to share driving, as I knew it would take about three days of leisurely travel.
The first night out on the road I discovered the driver’s four-way seat had exacted a horrible toll on my back. I had been fairly comfortable driving, but suddenly I couldn’t straighten out my back when I got out of the car. I walked stooped over to the motel room and had to lay down on the bed, only then I could roll over and straighten my back. The angle of the seat back to the seat had done this to me, and the angle was not adjustable, as this car had only a 4-way power bench seat, being a typical factory limo that was not really intended for the owner to drive himself.
The next day, my friend drove. He ended up in the same condition as I had the day before. On the second day of the trip, I lay across, or sat in the back seat of the car, and I was OK.
Third day, neither one of us wanted to drive. We took turns of about an hour, each of us with better results than the previous days.
I am still amazed that a factory Cadillac 9 passenger sedan could be so uncomfortable for the driver.
I had figured such a heavy car with all the options would have been the perfect cross-country vehicle. Boy was I wrong. My hat goes off to all the chauffeurs who had to drive these cars.
400 mile trip in the backseat of a 1997 Camry XLS. Every tiny bump in the road is embedded in my spine.
1987 Ford Escort pony………………the base model of base models. Some sort of bad combination of plastic and vinyl seats, in a painful unmovable position that would make waterboarding a pleasure. To add insult to injury just a 4 spd tranny with no gauges, and no air. But it did have the dealer added pinstripe for sportiness.
1979 Fairmont with a cloth flight bench seat. My parents owned it before I got it handed down. I remember on trips that dad had to make frequent stops because the seats had zero back and side support and little in the way of a cushion. I could barely tolerate an hour’s drive in the thing. My replacement car, a 1981 Olds Cutlass LS sedan with split bench was worlds better.
AMC products in the the 60’s and 70’s also had piss poor seats in certain models. The 63 Classic my friend owns has a springy solid bench with zero support and my back is screaming after an hour driving it and his Eagle wagon has a driver’s seat that is canted to the right a little and twists my back when driving it.
Honorable mention goes to my parents friends who own a 2010 Corolla, a 1969 Camaro convertible with seats akin to misshapen boulders, dads 1989 Tempo that had a metal bar in the upper portion of the seat that dug into my back and last but not least mom’s long time friend that owned an AMC Pacer with very oddly shaped and uncomfortable seats.
For me the worst was the VW Touareg/Porsche Cayenne. Thick door panels, WIDE center tunnel, and low dashboard knee-bar conspire to press your thighs together and put your nuts in a vice. I’d rather drive cross country in a Smart.
Most uncomfortable…???
Well, there was my old early 50’s Willy’s. That was uncomfortable.
In terms of “Normal Cars”, it’s gotta be my Alfasud, that I had in 82′.
I’m so much not shaped like the average standard-Italian-Alfa-Type-Driver.
I’m only 175cm, but with a leg-length of 84cm, I have twice as long legs as any Italian 🙂
That ment I had to have the seat pushed all the way back, desperatly needing support for my left foot and unable to reach the stearing wheel.
Had to modify the seat and the stearing wheel, and support for my left foot.
Then it was ok. Aside that the seats had no leg or lumbersupport.
But the little Sud drowe and sounded like a dream.
I miss it !!!
1984 Mercury Topaz with those horrible ’70s/80s/early ’90s Ford seats that had negative lumbar support -the bolster was built up behind the shoulder blades, forcing you to slouch whether you wanted to or not.
And that was before the backrest’s support bracket broke on one side…
The Corolla having been mentioned, when I got a ride in a current but pre-facelift one I was surprised at *how much* less space there is in front than in a (last generation hatchback) Yaris.
Number 1 for me is a 1998 Nissan Navara V6 dual cab pickup, that had been in 2 crashes and had bent seat mounts – I’m not sure why that wasn’t repaired or returned to be done. The seat had bent because the former driver of the car was huge – his brother was nicknamed “The Hulk” because he actually resembled the tv character. I had to use a couple of folded-up t-shirts to be able to sit square-on, before I got that right it caused bad back pain after 1/2 at the wheel.
1981 Chevette. No redeeming value. Period. Anyone notice the trend of GM vehicles here? They definitely went through their cardboard bucket seat design phase in the late 80s and early 90s. Perhaps this was a reaction to GM’s emergence from the Great Brougham Epoch.
My 1990 Mercury Topaz had bad front seats, with no side bolstering or lumbar support of any kind. Even back then, I couldn’t fit in the back seats… The seat cushion was too high (apparently) for the car, and the mad mouse automatic shoulder belt attachment point, which forced me to bend over at an odd angle to enter the car, endowed me with instant pain upon entry. How I lived with that car for six years is beyond me.
Mid 90’s GM N-body rental cars all had the cheapest, crappiest seats I can remember.
Last year some friends and I rented a Grand Marquis for a long, long distance trip. The front seats were fine, but the back seat was HORRIBLE. And all of were different heights and sizes, it wasn’t just a case of similar sized people with the same issue. Everyone hated to be in the back of that car. I think it really was designed by the Marquis de Sade.
My 2009 Pontiac G6 has a driver’s side bucket seat that has lumbar adjustment. When properly situated for me, I can drive all day. The passenger seat does not, however, and that thing is a torture rack! They appear to be the same seat, but the lumbar adjustment makes all the difference.
Some of the best seats in cars I’ve owned have been the Japanese sourced sport buckets in in my 1987 Dodge Lancer Turbo ES and my Yugo! The ones in the Lancer were very much like Recaro copies, only it did not have an adjustable under-knee bolster.
The Yugo seats were chair height, fairly well bolstered and lumbar supported for a non sport seat. That in combination with the general good design (mid 70’s VW Golf/Rabbit idiom) made it a rather good commuter car. If you can believe that. Most folks can’t.
Any modern Honda Accord
Do you enjoy the feeling of being stabbed in the back?
If so, then the Accord is just for you!
Mid to late 70s vintage Checker cab. The front seat and driving position was position was bolt upright,looked like the letter “L” from the side. The only way to get comfortable was to remove the lower seat cushion, put something under it to raise the front and drive. I tried to sit in a Hyundai Elantra, a `04, but the bottle holder on the left door dug into my left foot right below the knee. Other than these two,nothing else. I`m 6ft.1 inch and as long as I can put the seat all the way back, I`m OK.I [prefer a seat with a folding armrest or an armrest on the console if it has bucket seats, but I don`t like buckets without a console or empty space between the seats because I need somewhere to put my lower right arm.
Believe it or not the most uncomfortable seats that I ever sat in was in a 2012 Ford Taurus that was a company car that I hated. No wonder Ford can’t sell those awful Taurus’. I used to own a 1989 Mustang GT, a fun car but it was plagued with Ford’s pseudo Recaro seats that were pretty awful. Ford was too cheap to resume offering real Recaro’s in Mustangs, Ford offered Recaro’s in ’79-82, as an option, in the Mustang, and were great seats. I sat in some new 2015 ford products at the SF auto show last year and found none of them comfortable. What’s with Ford anyway? Og US makes GM seats seem to be most comfortable, but still to hard for my tastes. The best seats today are in many made german cars and some of the higher end japanese models. Another car I owned was an ’87 VW Quantum that had just about perfect feeling seats. Too bad the Quantum had so many issues; it had to go, but it was a lovely driving car when it worked.
purchased a used 1997 ford van conversion. the seats are CRAP
almost impossible to modify the damn thing[the driver seat elc etctric and mounting base are an LSD design.totally lame! plastic bushings cheap nuts n bolts etc
will not ever buy a ford again
While they were not necessarily uncomfortable, any vinyl so-called
bucket seat from 1962-65 was certainly not the most supportive.
They were avail. in just about 2-door GM anything(Corvair, Starfire,
Skylark, Impala, GTO, etc.).
I’m probably the only one to notice, but those era seats were also
the most quickly deformed upon sitting in – even by someone of modest
weight or stature! I remember the driver
seat in my grand dad’s ’64 Buick Skylark before and after he sank
into it, and occupied, the cushion was almost unrecognizable.
My impression was of next to zero lateral support, and turns
be taken accordingly lest one be flung about the cabin(who in their
right mind wore seatbelts in those daze? LOL)
It’s as if those buckets were manufactured intentionally under-
stuffed and/or under-sprung, so as to share some of the duty
passed onto them by the relatively inferior suspensions of that
time. That said, I actually prefer them for long highway cruises
over the church pews installed in most modern mid-line sedans.
Agreed, 2005 Corolla S is by far the worst car I’ve ever driven in terms of causing excruciating back pain within 1 hour of driving, no matter what adjustments are attempted.
My experience about most uncomfortable car i ever have is VW POLO 1.4 MPI DSG, its a horrible car i ever drive in my whole life, it makes me dont want to buy any european cars anymore, the DSG Transmission is jerking at low speed and its also very hard when you have to start on the hill because its rollback s far, maybe it could hit the car behind, and the seats and audio is sucks, no ipod connectors, no hill start assist, nothing etc. i never ever buy any volkswagen cars again, i’m very dissapointed.
My wife used to own a 2010 Mercedes E550 that had terribly unfortable seats. The front seats had a kazillion adjustments on them, yet there was no way I could get comfortable in that car. My wife drives a Lexus now, a 2015 LS450, which is significantly more comfortable and reliable than the Benz.
2016 GMC Acadia. My left foot doesn’t fit anywhere while driving. Terrible front seats. Controls to far away, can’t rest arm on door, steering wheel cutouts in wrong place…basically this car is a torture chamber on wheels. Interior designer must have been the Marquis DeSade!
My 2016 Nissan Maxima LS has the most uncomfortable seats I have ever encountered and I have driven dozens of cars.
Had a 2013 Merc. E550, beautiful looking car, unbelievable power, awful, awful hard seats (sand bags), and worse the car was an electrical nightmare. Left me stranded 5 times. Had to go at a big loss.
My 2016 Toyota avalon, touring model is the most uncomfortable car by far than any other car I have owned. The dealer, Jim Hudson in Columbia, S.C. has no solutions or knowledge of my problem. Their only suggestion is to trade it in on another car at their dealership. Since I have had this car for only about 5 months with only 5300 miles on it and that would be I am sure a very expensive answer for me. I need help
I noticed a number of complaints on 1977-85 RWD Olds ’88s and 98s, and my ’77 98 came to mind as well, despite its very comfortable rear accommodations. The problem with that car, and maybe some of the others mentioned here, was that the driver’s seat was only supported on the left, so it sagged on the right and twisted the driver’s back. I tried jamming newspaper under the cushion on the right, but no matter what I did it always felt a little off. That problem was common in the 1970s and ’80s, I’ve seen a number of pre-’78 Monti Carlos and Volvo 144-244 series with seats so twisted you could see it driving behind them. The GM B and C bodies also had an ultra-cramped passenger seat, because half the floor was raised to make room for the converter. I don’t know what the passenger seat of of ’90s Camaro, with the notorious converter bulge, is like, but if there is room to stretch your legs around it, GM could have, and has done worse. There were also plenty of complaints on Chevettes, for obvious reasons, but I suspect the one bright spot in that dismal picture was the rear seat of the post-1978 stretched 4-door models (US-only, I believe); still crappy seats, but at least there was more room in front of them than in most small cars.