Most office chairs cost an unusual fortune; the least they can do as the payback is offer comfort. Yet, like many other things, chairs are built for the average person. Office chairs have a standard height range between tall and short people. Unfortunately, their lowest settings remain too high for the shortest people, and their highest settings are too low for even the tallest people.
However, no matter someone’s height, the person doesn’t deserve discomfort and musculoskeletal problems. Is your office chair sitting lower than supposed? Then it would help if you had a lesson on how to make office chair taller.
Some practical ways to increase the height of an office chair include the following.
- Replace the existing casters
- Add extra seat cushion
- Replace the Cylinder Lift
- Get a Height Extension Kit
- Add a Layer to your office Chair Seat Pan
- Put some Paper Towels into the Gas Cylinder Column
- Replace Chair Wheels with Wooden Blocks
This article outlines seven practical ways of making your low-sitting office chair taller. It will save you some postural faults and the cost of opting for a new one when you could have easily added a few more lifts on your office chair.
Seven Ways of Making Your Office Chair Taller
Aside from the discomfort that comes from squeaky office chairs, an office chair can also be discomforting if it is not tall enough. A typical office chair differs from others due to its design, purpose, and performance. The design of an office chair is such that your elbows are level with the desk when you sit in it. However, a shorter chair can’t guarantee that requirement.
If your office chair is not tall enough, you will need to get a new one or make it taller. You will encounter musculoskeletal challenges that you might not easily treat. Regardless, you can make the chair sit higher instead of spending another huge sum of money to buy a new office chair.
Below are some of the easiest ways to increase your low-sitting chairs’ height.
1. Replace the Existing Casters
Mostoffice chairs come standard with casters of small sizes ranging from 2 to 2.5 inches. Generally, office chair wheels are quite small, which makes them perfect for hard surfaces. However, office chair casters do not roll very well with a low-pile carpet; they need a chair mat to help them roll better.
The regular office chair casters are simple, small, do not cost the manufacturers much, and are easily shipped. Unfortunately, due to the wheels’ simple form in construction, most chairs do not come with robust and high-quality casters.
Replacing your existing chair casters with larger ones is simple and will cost you less. You can replace the casters with larger chair wheels or tall chair glides. In addition, you can go for the three or 4-inch larger casters, which will offer your seat a lift or two.
They also refer to larger wheels as rollerblade wheels. Unlike an axle with plastic wheels on both sides, larger casters have bearings and a bigger rubber wheel in the center of a hub.
The design enhances better rolling, and it’s smooth, has fewer damages, and reduces the number of hair sticking in the wheels to the barest minimum.
Miracle Caster sells extra large chair casters, which offer the services you need. They sell casters as large as size 4 in diameter. More so, casters do not only add to the height of your chair.
Due to the large diameter of larger casters, they can easily distribute the burden placed on them. On the other hand, larger casters may not roll as fast as small-sized ones due to the heavier rotational mass. Nonetheless, they move more freely and may cover larger areas within a given time.
Chair glides have a flat base for balance and are mostly useful for hard floors. They differ from wheels because they do not roll. However, when you put chair glides on your office chair, the chair will become stationary, and you’ll have to raise it if you want to change its position.
Nevertheless, replacing your chair casters with tall glides adds more lift to your office chair. Bringing in large casters and chair glides is the first and simplest step you can take to increase the height of your low-sitting office chair.
Follow the steps below to learn how to replace your existing chair caster or glides.
- Use a pry bar or screwdriver to pull one wheel gently
- Measure the diameter of the center post of one wheel
- Measure the height of the existing wheels so that you can buy taller wheels
- Buy the replacement wheels
- Remove the wheels you left
- Put the new wheels in place of the existing ones
- Oil them if necessary need be
If you follow these steps, there’s no denying that you will replace the chair caster without any difficulties.
2. Add Extra Cushion
Adding an extra cushion to your office chair is another available option. It is the simplest way of making any chair or surface more comfortable. Still, short people will appreciate the creative way of increasing the seat’s height and experience more comfort.
Some shorter people use a pillow in the driver’s seat to have a clear sight. Similarly, adding extra padding to your seat cushion increases your height in the chair. If you’re adding the cushion, you should consider a soft, nice, and thick cushion. The height of your office chair will depend on the thickness and density of the cushion.
ComfiLife Seat Cushion is an excellent example of what cushion to use. The top-rated cushion is around 2.8 inches thick. Therefore, ComfiLife will likely add more height to your chair. Still, if you need a cushion that is thicker and more than ComfiLife Seat Cushion, it must be the likes of the FOMI extra Seat Cushion, which is about 3.5 inches thick. Unlike ComfiLife, the FOMIs will take the chair about three steps higher.
You may also like to put a solid material like a wood block or small box between your new cushion and the existing chair cushion.
Putting a small box between both cushions prevents you from sinking too much, maintaining the surface to provide comfort. If you do not place the box in between, you will soon compress the cushions and need more cushions.
The added box not only maintains the surface of your extra cushion but also adds more inches to the seat’s height.
In case you want to know what cushion to use, know that there never seems to be a shortage of specially designed cushions to use; there are a bunch of cushions you can use. In addition, you can buy a height-added cushion on Amazon.
Notwithstanding, your pillow can still help unless you have overused it over time. If you use a pillow overused for extra cushioning, you will encounter discomfort.
3. Replace the Gas Cylinder Lift
A Gas Cylinder Lift is the mechanism that regulates the upward and downward movement of your office chair. They also refer to the gas cylinder lift as a pneumatic cylinder. Another way you add more steps to an office chair is by replacing the gas cylinder lift on your office chair that is not tall enough.
Office chairs come with a standard gas cylinder that is 5 inches tall. Yet, there are gas cylinders on the market with lengths ranging from 4 – 10 inches. Therefore, you can buy a good gas cylinder taller in the market and replace it with the existing gas cylinder to raise your office chair.
Heavy Duty Gas Lift Cylinder offers a user an 8-inch adjustment range. Although replacing a gas cylinder is not that easy, you will find it simple with these steps.
- Place the office chair on a high surface. Placing it on an elevated surface gives you a better posture while working on the chair.
- Place an underlayment on the surface you intend to place the chair, so you don’t end up staining the whole place.
- Make the chair lie horizontally on its side, or flip over the chair so that you can have a better view of what you’re doing.
- Remove the cylinder from the seat either by using specially designed removal tools.
You can use a pipe wrench to attach to the metal part of the cylinder. Then, twist it in a counterclockwise direction to remove it from the mechanism.
- Remove the gas cylinder from the base of the chair. The easiest way to detach is to hit a hammer or mallet at the center of the base.
- Carefully insert the new taller gas cylinder into the space.
Following these steps should be done within 30 minutes—the replacement is not that bad.
4. Get a Height Extension Kit
Altering the buildup of our vehicle to give it another look seems to be another way. However, two notable methods deal with the alteration, and these are: using a kit and a DIY
The kit method depends on a height extension kit, which is initially designed for use on drafting stools and perhaps very tall chairs. Yet, they are still applicable to an office chair. The height extension kit is a height-adding tube found in your chair’s central column.
The height extension kit sometimes comes with a foot-rest ring, where you can place your feet when sitting on a tall chair—tall people may not need the ring.
Noteworthy is the fact that the perfect height extension kit for your office chair may be difficult to find on the market. However, there are a thousand office chair designs, so find an extension kit compatible with your office chair.
Aside from the difficulty in locating a suitable height extender for your office chair, the extender may also cause your chair to become unstable. And If the gas spring is burdened, it also makes your chair not adjust effectively as at the initial days of purchase.
5. Add a Layer to your office Chair Seat Pan
Unlike the kit method, this method appears to be more complex because it will require you to disassemble your chair and remove the base from the seat pan. However, if you look closer at the makeup of your chair’s seat pan, you will realize it’s either wood or plastic. So this method borders on adding the thickness of your office chair seat pan.
Here’s how you can go about it:
- Measure the height you want your office chair to reach
- Buy thick wood(s) that will fit your need
- Glue all the layers of wood together; that’s if you didn’t buy just a layer
- Drill holes in the wood that will match the existing holes in the seat base and mechanism
- Buy longer bolts to replace existing ones so you can penetrate all the layers.
- Put everything back and tighten the bolts, nuts, and screws.
If you follow these steps, you’ll have your seat risen to a higher level. However, there might be a problem if you temper with some chair mechanisms. The risk of damaging your chair is high because you’ll be doing everything manually. Also, by modifying your office chair, you may lose the warranty, making the chair less durable.
6. Put some Paper Towels into the Gas Cylinder Column
As strange as it might seem, if you stuff some paper towels down the gas cylinder column, your office height adds up a little. Here’s how to do it:
- Disassemble the office chair, and separate the cylinder’s column from the spring section.
- Stuff the column with enough paper towels
- Put back the spring section you removed from the column
- Reassemble your office chair, and observe the impressive height reached
It will amaze you that if you follow these steps, you can be sure to have a taller office chair before you sit. Nevertheless, if you stuff some paper towels into the column of your office chair’s gas cylinder, your chair’s safety cannot be guaranteed. And sadly, you will also lose your warranty based on the offense of chair modification.
7. Replace Chair Wheels with Wooden Blocks
Just like the creativity behind chair glides, you can carefully carve wood blocks to elevate the height of your office chair. The cost for carved wood will be less than casters or specially designed chair glides. More to the cost-benefit is the impressive height your chair will rise to.
To replace the casters with wooden blocks, you will need to provide wooden blocks of the same size and height as it pleases you and fasten them to the manually made chair blocks.
Conclusion
An office chair sitting too low deprives the owner of comfort, inflicting physical and emotional pain. Maintaining the proper sitting posture takes many factors—setting the correct height for your office chair is a factor to consider.
Well, I hope this article was helpful enough for you and that you can now make your office chair taller. Always remember that following the tips above will help you know how to make an office chair sit taller.
