I’m looking for technical help or recommendations on: Seats
Hi All,
I have bought nice MK1 for me, however I am not able to enjoy driving it as I get lower back pain when I drive. I had back pain issues since long. I don’t have this problem with my other cars.
Is there anything I can change in my MX5 like seats or suspensions so improve driving experience.
any advice on this will be much appreciated. I like my car and I want to enjoy driving.
You have my sympathy! I know how much of a pain (literally) the lower back can be.
There are a few things which are different in an MX5 - it’s more bumpy and your legs are a little higher (relative to your ■■■) than in most other cars. Getting out can also be more of a strain !
Everyone is different, but a lumbar support can work wonders - cheap and easy and maybe worth a try?
Probably not what you want to hear… but the mk1 might not be for you.
I have bad lower back pain and sold my mk1 that i had for 8 years. I did however swap it for a mk4 and it’s much better for the back!
You can change to any seat from 1991 to 2005 late mk2 cars. The mk1 came in both one piece and two piece backs. Mk2 even had the larger surf board type seats which are definitely firmer.
What type do you have at the moment?
I had lower back issues a couple of years ago, was advised to use a lumbar roll in the car and on my work chair. I ordered a couple from Amazon and found them to be really beneficial. Definitely helps to support the back and I no longer get any aches, even on long distances. Worth a try, could be a cheap and easy fix.
I’ve had a poor spine since 1998 having been written off by a drunk.
Oddly, my Mk1 (auto to begin with but manual modded now) seat for me is far more comfortable.
Did 2000 miles in it in a week one time, stepped out fresh as a daisy.
If I’d tried that in SWMBO’s 2002 Sport manual, I’d have needed stretcher!
It’s mostly down to the seats I think, but perhaps not all.
In addition, 2 years back I got a good sports injury chap onto my spine, who happens to be the Police Intake trainer & injury fixer with Police Scotland. He did a great job. Which for him is just as well as he is my “kid”! Now I can drive the Sport fine. You might want to find out if something can be done with you as well?
Back people can be expensive but from personal experience i can say that they are worth every penny.
I went to one and at the end of my treatment i was almost half an inch taller!!
No joke.
My spine was more s shaped than it should have been and locked solid, he unlocked it all and straightened it out a little which is why i got taller.
What exactly should I look for when looking for a sports injury chap? I’ve been going to a Chiropractor which help shiet term, but doesn’t seem to be helping for the long haul.
Cheers
Talk to your GP for recommendations.
See if your local NHS websites etc have any contacts.
Chiropractors range from Good, to Not so Good at all.
Good ones are excellent, but the business is laced with charlatans…bit like dentistry and much else. But be very careful, A bad session can put you back a lot.
I should know.
Some interesting comments. I suffer occasionally from back problems, but can get out of my 2.5 after a long drive feeling as fresh as Mr. Scottishfiver’s daisies
Sorry to hear your NA is giving your back some ‘jip’
It was the same for me when I had my 1992 Eunos Roaster, but on mine you could access behind the backrest padding from either side and add a ‘material’ (I used foam water pipe insulation) to provide a lower back bolster that was totally invisible as well as extremely effective - well for me it was !
12 years later, when I sold the car, it was still providing the support I needed.
Have a dig round in the area suggested and try it out.
Best of luck
The fabric seats in my 1998 Mk2 exacerbated my lower back problem (back injury from my teenage years) so I bought a pair of used leather, high back seats from an NBFL. Fairly easy to swap over, they work very well, being far more supportive and make the car smell nice!
Assuming you have cloth seats then you should have these ‘pockets’ behind the backrest padding to insert/add ‘material’ to provide support to the lower back. Worth a try for little or no cost and significantly less expensive than a chiropractor !!!
I tore a muscle badly over 20 years ago, had sciatica pain down my left leg for several years after that. The fix for me was Pilates. If you find a practioner that focus on mobility and tell them about your lower back pain they’ll have exercises that will help. I’d almost bet it’ll have something to do with the psoas muscle.
Hi @mr-parag-shinde ,
Sorry to hear about your back pain.
As one of the taller club members (6’5") I understand all too well the crippling effect of back pain.
Having lived with it for too long, I’ve spent time understanding how to avoid it and the control measures I needed to prevent it from occurring.
When I bought my Mk4 I noticed the lower back support wasn’t amazing. Maybe it works fine for a slightly shorter person, but for me “the taller driver” it wasn’t good. Having investigated aftermarket seats and then discovered Mazda had architected the Mk4 in such a way I couldn’t fit sport seats due to a lack of width in critical areas. (The one piece sport seats are too narrow for me to sit in with my 35" waist)
I decided to buy a MK4 seat from a car breaker, strip it down and discover why my BMW i3 seats were super comfortable on longer journeys and my MX-5 seats were not.
My conclusion were…
in my BMW i3 I was sat more like a dining room chair. i.e. hips and upper leg / knees and lower leg almost at right angles
my i3 had more support in the lower back region of the seat
my i3 had more support/was firmer in the rear half of the seat bottom
For me, lower back pain is caused when I don’t support the seat base enough, particularly the rear half of the seat bottom. And if I don’t provide enough support in the back rest, particularly in the lower half of the seat back. Or if the seat back is too short - which in this case isn’t a factor as the MX-5 seats are tall enough.
So I undertook more research, talked to upholstery experts on online forums and discovered a method to enhance the seats in my MX-5 using proper seat parts, rather than cobbling together something which wasn’t made for the job.
It’s too complex, to explain more here but I made a YouTube video which you can find on my blog explaining what I did and showing a complete stripdown of the seats.
Having watched the classic “foamectomy” or MK1 seat restoration videos on YouTube, I appreciate a MK1 seat isn’t like a MK4 seat, but hope my insights might help give ideas on how to resolve your issues.
Good luck with resolving your issues, and here’s to lots of “top-down” motoring over the coming year!
Steve
For the back pain problem I have added a wedge and back support shown in the photos. and it is working well for me. Before driving even a mile was painful but with these modification I can drive without pain. I haven’t tried long distance however I am now able to enjoy with roof down driving locally.
