How to Raise Office Chair without Lever

Comfort comes first! Yes, you read it right. Though many of you might agree to disagree when it comes to working but this is what it is. Workplace seating is more than just a place to sit; it is also a place to be welcomed and comfortable, while also being made of a material that will be sturdy and survive the test of time.

One may not give it much thought, but a chair is one of the most visible signs of productivity in the workplace. How is someone likely to work harder and stay focused when they aren’t at ease?

Imagine working for ten hours and constantly glancing down, only to return home with a neck ache! You can’t be more concerned with that uneven coordination between your eye and height. You will probably lose yourself in a task and will be counting down the hours until it’s time to pack up. This is not something you want yourself or your employees to be doing at a job.

Thus, we all should be aware of the art of raising an office chair without a lever. Because obviously, spending hours and an hour sitting idly on a seat is not fun at all.

Regardless of how expensive your multifunctional office chair is but if it won’t stay up, stay down or recline then it’s a big “No” for the person who owns it. Adjusting the height of an office chair correctly will literally take a strain off your back. Sitting in an odd chair can cause you to slump, crouch forward, and type at an unnatural angle. If left untreated, any of these problems might cause pain or possibly disability in the long term.

Fortunately, these issues are frequently avoidable by simply altering the height of your office chair. You can avoid sitting oddly by adjusting the chair’s controls but for that, an individual must be fully acquainted with the kinds of chairs available in the market.

Contents

Know your Type of Chair

Pneumatic Chairs

Pneumatic chairs are regulated via a lever located right below the seat. This lever smoothly raises and lowers the seat. But how exactly does this operate? A pneumatic chair contains a large number of components! They are as follows:

The chair base (often with three, four, or five wheels); a gas cylinder that contains the compressed air; and a seat covered with a plate that holds the adjustable lever, along with a cushioned backrest.

Step 1: Adjust the lever

To raise the seat, jerk the lever up and elevate your body off of the chair.
Be seated and pull the lever up to bring down the seat.
To enable the backstop, recline to the optimal stopping position and press down on the lever.
And if you want to release the backstop, straighten up the knob.

Step 2: Replace the lever

Most office chairs have a predefined height and adjustment range for the knobs. Replace fatigued or obsolete gas lift cylinders on chairs irrespective of their fine, sturdy shape and size. When removing gas lift cylinders, never overheat or fracture them.

Non-Pneumatic Chairs

There is no need to use a lever to modify the height of a hydraulic office chair. All you have to do is locate and depress the release button on the side of the chair. Depending on how much pressure you apply, the chair will rise or fall. When you’ve discovered the perfect height, press the button to lock the chair in place.

Yet, in case you can’t find the height adjustment lever on your office chair, the following are the best two methods that one must apply for ideal results.

Doubleback Method

This method requires the movement of the chair in reverse direction; either clockwise or anticlockwise.

If your chair does not come with a lever, the first thing you should do is stand up and move your chair to a sturdy surface. Try to keep it in a location with no surface inclination.
To manually adjust your chair, try rotating it clockwise and anti-clockwise. Examine for height variations in each direction, and you may then make a rapid transition. You must keep track of which side is for going up and which half is for going down.
Raise the chair slightly when adjusting it. Every chair has limited hydraulics that resists pressure as you try to sit.
Repeat these steps until you reach the desired height. Sit in the chair to test the new position. Make sure to keep executing the technique until you reach the desired height.

Under-Chair Bolt Method

Certain office chairs are altered by rotating big bolts at the chair’s base. Kindly refer to the step-by-step instructions on how to raise an office chair without a lever below to do this.

Step 1:

Adjust the seat height by standing in front of the chair. Similarly, the traditional office chair cannot be replaced while seated. You must be capable of turning the bolt under the seat manually.

Watch the chair move up and down as you operate the latch under the chair. Decide the adjustment setting and cease the movement of the huge bolt.

Step 2:

Lay on the stretched height of the office chair to make sure the elevation is comfortable for you.

Step 3:

If the height of the extended height office chair does not suit you, please stand in front of the chair and turn the large bolt under the office chair seat once again. Continue doing so until you’ve found the perfect fit for your seat.

This process can be repeated as many times as necessary until you discover the height that best meets your style. After determining the proper height, secure the bolts to keep the seat in place.

Non-Adjustable Chair

Now that you have gone through multiple techniques to raise your seat higher and none of them were of good use to you then we guess, it’s time to bring your creative powers into action!

We’re going to show you a handful of DIY ways that may lend you some aid in adjusting your office chair without using a lever.

DIY Adjustment Methods

Tip 1: Determine your caster and upgrade it with a larger one

The usual diameter of office chair casters varies from 2″ to 2.5″. If your desk is slightly taller, replacing your existing casters with larger ones is an easy and inexpensive option to lift your chair. You can choose between 3″ and 4″ casters for an extra 1″ to 2″ raise.

Larger casters not only provide better height, but due to their wider diameter, they can more readily distribute the weight placed on them, causing the chair to glide more smoothly.

Tip 2: Grab a height extension kit

The height extension kit mainly used for office chairs adds a fair amount of elevation to your chair while allowing for height customization. This easy-to-use and inexpensive kit frequently incorporate a foot ring that allows the feet to rest at the new level.

Tip 3: A cushion or pillow can do the job!

A pillow or cushion is one of the easiest ways to relax on an uncomfortable chair while adding extra height to it.

The only concern here is that it will cause your body to be misaligned with the chair, particularly the lumbar support and headrest. Therefore to avoid back issues, make sure the cushion isn’t too big or discomfited or you may use a medicated cushion for improved performance.

Tip 4: Build a base beneath the chair

Another effortless way to raise an office chair without affecting its mechanics is to place a platform underneath it. This could be either a flat piece of wood or any other flat and solid object.

For this one, you may need to lock the wheels to keep the chair from moving over, and also do take into account that the item must be strong enough to bear the individual’s weight.

Tip 5: Embed sufficient paper towel into the gas cylinder

This technique might seem a bit strange to you, but believe us it works! All you have to do is;

Remove the cylinder’s spring part from the column.
Put paper towels in the column firmly so that the gas spring doesn’t collapse when you reassemble the chair back.
Now, replace the spring and you’ll see a change in the size.

Lumbar Chair

If you have got a chair with a lumbar support cushion in the backrest, you can alter the contour of the lumbar cushioning to be more or less noticeable. This provides for a better match between the low back curvature and the low back support of the chair, minimizing lower back strain.

Synchro-Tilt Chair

You can lock or unlock the backrest recline if your chair has a synchro mechanism. Make sure you increase the tension knob (which is often located beneath the seat) to avoid the sensation of the backrest succumbing and leaning back.

Why is there a Need to Raise a Chair Higher?

Too high or too low, level of a chair can lead to multiple musculoskeletal disorders. You can vary the angle of your hip joint while seated by adjusting your workplace chair. The angle of your hip joint is one technique to alter the degree of your lower back curve. For the same reason, Chiropractors emphasize the significance of adjusting your workplace chair to the proper height. The benefits include;

Prevention of back pain
Reduce muscle tiredness and numbness
Fend off circulation problems
Hinders the development of edema

Decide the Height

To begin, you must measure the following:

Height in inches or centimeters
Measure your height again but this time with various footwears
Height of the backrest
Seat width
Armrest length
Seating width

Then, examine the height of your desk or your workstation too. Moreover, you must also keep into consideration the type of chair you are going to be seated, whether; it is pneumatic or non-pneumatic.

Wrap-Up

The moment you realize that you are facing a headache, blurred vision, or discomfort; you pull out the instruction handbook for your chair or hunt for an adjustment diagram online as your first step. Once you’ve got that, the above techniques will fine-tune everything for optimum ergonomics.

Even if you spend a lot of money on ergonomic goods, if you don’t set up your chair accurately, you could still have problems at work. However, we understand that everyone has a different body type, and therefore no chair can be perfect for all of us. You can still modify a chair to better fit your body, which will automatically lead to significant productivity and job satisfaction.