Carved up the seat bottom foam on my 2006 Prius seat

The short story -

I spent the entire day last Saturday carving and shaping the seat bottom foam on my used 2006 Prius driver's seat (my original seat resides untouched in the house). It has improved the feel of the seat for me. This is certainly a do it yourself project. I can't imagine any sane upholsterer wanting to do this as it's very time consuming.

I wonder if anyone else around here has done this .. hmmmm

The long story -

A week and two days ago I decided I must do something to improve the 2006 driver's seat in my 2009 Prius. It's in good shape and can slide 2.5" further back than stock (Look closely in avatar

I heard an electric 'turkey' carving knife can slice foam well (ever tried to slice foam with your sharpest kitchen knife? Don't bother, doesn't work). I bought a $50 electric knife.

After pulling the seat out of the car and disassembling the seat bottom (in a few days after work), I did a few shallow slices on those pesky raised sides. Oh how I hated (past tense!) them



I was hot to shave about 1/4" off the flat bottom portion (anything to sit this 6'2" bod lower in the car). I didn't see a way to cut the flat portion with the knife, so I stopped by a large upholsterer in Hayward. He showed how the foam could be bent due to the recessed area (the one that runs across in photo above, fabric attaches in those grooves). Bending foam makes it possible to cut flat portion, but not easy. Now why didn't I figure that out myself? Argh.

Saturday morning, I took my best shot at shaving the flat portion by hand. I've no idea how it turned out as good as it did. Kidding aside, I went for it and held the knife steady as possible going through this $200 to replace foam cushion. There is a very slight depressed area, but not bad. But, better to build a rig to hold knife at correct angle when cutting through that section.

Like I said, I spent the whole day cutting with knife, dremel with cutter and grinding bit. The dremel makes lots of foam dust so did that outside.

So I came out with this basic shape (can see slight depressed area where my left butt cheek lands) -



The sides stick up quite a bit so I cut them down more on Sunday.

It's a Cuisinart



The fabric is a little baggy, not bad. I widened the flat portion 3/4" on both sides. The raised sides (bolsters?) are still there, but don't press my hips/thighs anymore.



I don't want to get too much into evaluations at this point after only 2 days on it, but I do know this.

Sitting on the bare seat with an decent velour seat cover is better than stock but still not great, even in my most comfortable sweats.

Luckily I pulled another trick by adding a very thin seat (1/4") cushion (I'm tall and have no use for some thick seat cushion) I had the foam made for $10 at a great local foam factory.

Shown below, it also has a triangle of foam under front edge to give some more thigh support (better for long legs in this petite car).



I toss the seat cover over the cushion so I'm not always fidgeting with the cushion while getting in the car.



I'm going to hold off proclaiming a smashing success, but so far the seat is feeling pretty good. Now I'll have more 'room' to try a sheepskin seat cover later on.

 

Hello Tom. I saw photos of your sheepskin covers just the other day and wow do they look comfortable! I'll have to try a pair on mine.

Thanks for posting up

 

First a big thanks to Boo for good suggestions on both my seat mods. And to Patsparks for your helpful suggestions. And to everyone else who read along and helped out too.

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I never considered thick seat covers before shaving down the seat bottom foam (on my used 2006 Prius seat) last weekend, so tonight was the night.

I went to a local mega auto parts store, Pep Boys and bought one of each 'one size fits all' seat covers in genuine sheepskin ($70), neoprene ($25) and leather ($60). I bought them to try the material, see which I like best.

The leather had some padded backing and fit ok. It felt immediately cold when sitting on it. The bottom was littered with seams. I didn't like it.

The neoprene fit over the seatback without headrest, so I drove around a mile with no headrest. The seat bottom was not bad at all. The padded seatback pushed me farther forward in the seat, so that was a minus.

I actually tried the sheepskin first, but wanted to save the best results for last. The cover is a 2 piece. I put the bottom on, then the seatback. The thick seatback pushes me forward, but I've no qualms about using just the sheepskin seat bottom cover with my thin velour seatback cover, so that's what I did....



And like you guys said all along, sheepskin is very comfortable. No cold, no seams, just comfortable right away.

note - I cut out the side of velour cover for seat airbag.