The Tall Street Journal

Tall Office Chair - The Search - UPDATE with Solution

Search for the best tall office chair

So I stop looking like this guy everyday


So I'm looking around at buying a good office chair for my home office, but find that most "tall" designations are for people 6'1 and taller. Nothing against 6'1 people, but I'm a bit taller than that at 6'11".


That extra 10 inches of height and 300+ pounds of support needed means that this will probably be yet another long exhaustive search for the perfect tall persons office chair.


The Tall Chair Mission

Crawl the internet, ask our community and help everyone.


As I look around and find potential options I'll paste the links and information in this post. I figure it's something I would do anyway, trying to keep track of my options, so why not share that experience with everyone else.


Links, Thoughts, Community Help

Does anyone have good experience with a particular chair or a brand?


I'll be using this section to update everyone on my search and grab useful comments left on this blog post to also include up in here. By doing this, then down the road, we will all have a useful resource for fellow tall people trying to save their cramped back by finding a proper fitting tall office chair.


Ergonomics

Tall Chair Seat Height

The height of your seat should be high enough that your thighs are at least parallel to the floor, or preferably have your hips slightly higher than your hips.

For me that means I'm looking for a chair that will rise up to 23 or 24 inches high

Annoyance is that many people list the overall height of the chair and not just the seat. My legs, could care less how high the back of the chair goes up.


Tall Chair Seat Depth

The depth of the seat is something to consider as well. The deeper the seat depth the more of your body weight can be supported by the chair (this is something to consider when purchasing couches as well.)

My initial guess is that I probably am looking for 20inches deep of a seat.


Tall Chair Seat Width

Obviously if you can not fit into the seat width-wise this is a problem. This is really the airplane dilemma where people think fat people should pay for two tickets if they want to be comfortable. Truth of the matter is that the bones of my hips do not fit into many airplane seats. I find it so comfortable bruising the points of my hips or sitting awkwardly with hips vertical in one direction or another for a flight to get somewhere. No need to repeat that in looking for my perfect tall office chair.

I'm not sure what width I need at this point, but looking for a chair with adjustable arms or no arms at all may make for a good choice.



UPDATE - Solution Found! - November 3, 2015

So.. it's been a long time coming for me to find a viable and affordable tall person office chair solution. I'm sure some of the $1000+ chairs are great, but for $60 extra this method has worked out amazingly great for the ROI.

As it turns out you can buy taller cylinders and actually replace the cylinder in an old office chair or even buy one from a chain store that you find comfortable and just replace the cylinder.  

I wound up buying this 8" cylinder and at 6'11 this chair goes way higher than I need, in fact at it's lowest its probably perfect for me. The 5" cylinder might be better for anyone shorter, and perhaps even fine for myself.

There is probably a safety risk for chairs going up this high especially for normal people which is probably why we don't see them often, but I feel completely safe in my chair, though the 5" may be more stable.

Here are the two different height products for you to check out on Amazon.  Note those are affiliate links but certainly feel free to search around for more. I had great luck with this vendor and the part was delivered quickly and worked perfectly once I got the old cylinder out of my short office chair.


Heavy Duty 5" Stroke Replacement Office Chair Gas Lift Cylinder Pne...


Heavy Duty 8" Stroke Replacement Drafting Stool Gas Lift Cylinder P...



Finally, for replacing the cylinder, there are tons of videos, but this one was a good start. My chair was really stuck and took some serious WD-40, time and the pipewrench technique, but it was pretty old and jammed in there after years of use. A new chair would probably be even easier.

[Note: Check the comments. The video wasn't embedding here for some reason.]

Views: 4223

Comment by Truejabber on February 8, 2010 at 4:35pm
I found this one a while ago (though my company ended up buying me a smaller one which isn't very comfortable)... http://www.seatingzone.com/product/SEA-9669GH
Comment by Peggy Ross on March 3, 2010 at 1:05pm
Hi - I am Peggy Ross and I am Senior Ergonomic Marketing Consultant for Ergogenesis, LLC. We are the only manufacturer of the BodyBilt ergonomic chair. Our chairs are custom built for the individual. I have worked with indivdual's as tall as 7'4". I would love to work with you on getting a chair that is custom built for your height and/or weight. My direct telephone number is 936-870-2699 and my email address is [email protected] If you go on the website and build a chair, please be sure put my name behind your name but it would be best if you just called me so that we can talk about your specific needs. Again, my direct number is 936-870-2699.
Comment by Cheyenne Throckmorton on March 3, 2010 at 1:29pm
Peggy has been extraordinarily helpful in providing lots of information about ergonomics and tall chairs. I encourage anyone looking to try some of these other sites, but also to contact Peggy. I'll keep reporting on my search as I go along, been a busy busy month.
Comment by Pamela B. Maltzman on March 30, 2010 at 3:36am
I'm 6'1" and I do medical transcription for a living in my home office.

I've got a Steelcase Leap Chair. Got one off eBay, without arms, at a decent price; it is good for people who weigh up to 300 pounds, and I am pretty near that now. It has a lot of adjustments available. The seat pan isn't all that big, but again, there are a lot of possible adjustments. I still have to pad up my chair, as I have old back injuries.

Steelcase also makes a "Criterion" chair (I think that's the name--you could check with your local Steelcase dealer), which is for heavier people.

I've heard other people recommend other kinds of chairs. Also depends on how much you are willing to spend; I had a limit of about $250, but there are many other ergonomic chairs out there.
Comment by Josephine Anderson on October 3, 2010 at 4:21am
I have a great chair at work so good I bought the exact same one to have at home too. Bye bye backache!

It is a Vitra office chair. I'm 6'6 with long legs, but have had backproblems with earlier bad chairs,
this one I can sit in for hours without big problems.

http://www.vitra.com/en-lp/office/products/axess-plus/overview/

Test it!
Comment by Cheyenne Throckmorton on November 3, 2015 at 10:28pm

Finally, for replacing the cylinder, there are tons of videos, but this one was a good start. My chair was really stuck and took some serious WD-40, time and the pipewrench technique, but it was pretty old and jammed in there after years of use. A new chair would probably be even easier.

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