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So a friend came to me with an idea. He wanted to turn the chair game upside down. That is exactly what we at Next Level Technoligies Motorsports (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Next-L...63334083696993) aimed to do.
He has had this lawn chair for a very long time:
It has been through the thick and thin and has been held together with zip ties, duct tape, and random bolts for the past year and a half. It simply does not want to die
We had a mission to do the impossible. To lower a lawn chair. I loved the idea. I had been brain storming all week to come up with a method on how to do what has never been done. We at Next Level Technoligies Motorsports had been looking forward to the weekend to do one of our first true no expense spared builds. With that said, we got to work.
First was to remove all the old duct tape and zipties that were holding it together:
We had the notch the frame of the chair to give the seat support rod something to sit in. We didn’t remove the inner material to try to maintain structural integrity, so we simply bent it in and ziptied the poles into place. We put one of our shop employees in to test the strength:
While it did flex a bit, it was strong enough for daily sitting duties.
Next, we had to remove an old bolt that held in one of the sides of the seat and drill it out to fit a bigger bolt into it. BMW rear axle bolt anyone?
We didn’t have the right sized nut so I tried to rethread some bolts or cross thread an existing one on with an impact gun running 40psi over the recommended pressure, but it didn’t work. We ended up going to Lowe’s to get a fancy wing nut for quick release application:
With the seat fastened in place and nice and sturdy, we could now focus on sitting a little lower to the ground. We busted out the grinder and got to work:
We first cut the front poles to see what we were working with. We started by removing 6 inches from each side, but then we decided to remove a little bit more. Test fit 1 2 3:
We then used a dremel with stupid cut off wheels that broke every 10 seconds to cut slits in the poles so we could slide one into the other:
There was another picture of the dremeling, but it is all stupid and big.
Once we had all the slits cut, we flared out one pole and slid the other into it. Then we drilled some holes:
Then we got some channel locks and a riveter and got to work:
Then we realized that it was easier to just cut the slits because the metal was so cheap you could do that:
Time to set her down and see how she sits:
A bit of dragster rake as the rear was not modified yet, but not too bad. Not quite as low as we had hoped, but we had to get her to a show the next morning and didn’t have time to redo it.
Time to get the rear situated. We went about it the same way. Grinders, rivets, and snippers.
Had some issued with one of the rivets and had to grind it out. Whatever:
Next Level Technoligies Motorsports swag:
With everything complete and the chair back on the ground, it was time for a shoot. So here it is, in all its glory. I present the stance chair:
Everything went surprisingly well and I would say that as of now, it is one of the lowest
static chairs in the land. Looking forward to the unveil tomorrow at a local show. It isn't quite as low as we had hoped, but we aim to get it sitting lower in the future. I think for being the first NLTM build, it really doesn't get much better than this.
At the end of the day, the garage was a mess:
One last rolling shot of the stance chair with Jeremy driving:
Make sure to check out our facebook page and like us at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Next-L...63334083696993.
Currently developing high strength balsa wood barrels and carbon fiber wrapped Ronal Turbo faces for lightweight.
He has had this lawn chair for a very long time:
It has been through the thick and thin and has been held together with zip ties, duct tape, and random bolts for the past year and a half. It simply does not want to die
We had a mission to do the impossible. To lower a lawn chair. I loved the idea. I had been brain storming all week to come up with a method on how to do what has never been done. We at Next Level Technoligies Motorsports had been looking forward to the weekend to do one of our first true no expense spared builds. With that said, we got to work.
First was to remove all the old duct tape and zipties that were holding it together:
We had the notch the frame of the chair to give the seat support rod something to sit in. We didn’t remove the inner material to try to maintain structural integrity, so we simply bent it in and ziptied the poles into place. We put one of our shop employees in to test the strength:
While it did flex a bit, it was strong enough for daily sitting duties.
Next, we had to remove an old bolt that held in one of the sides of the seat and drill it out to fit a bigger bolt into it. BMW rear axle bolt anyone?
We didn’t have the right sized nut so I tried to rethread some bolts or cross thread an existing one on with an impact gun running 40psi over the recommended pressure, but it didn’t work. We ended up going to Lowe’s to get a fancy wing nut for quick release application:
With the seat fastened in place and nice and sturdy, we could now focus on sitting a little lower to the ground. We busted out the grinder and got to work:
We first cut the front poles to see what we were working with. We started by removing 6 inches from each side, but then we decided to remove a little bit more. Test fit 1 2 3:
We then used a dremel with stupid cut off wheels that broke every 10 seconds to cut slits in the poles so we could slide one into the other:
There was another picture of the dremeling, but it is all stupid and big.
Once we had all the slits cut, we flared out one pole and slid the other into it. Then we drilled some holes:
Then we got some channel locks and a riveter and got to work:
Then we realized that it was easier to just cut the slits because the metal was so cheap you could do that:
Time to set her down and see how she sits:
A bit of dragster rake as the rear was not modified yet, but not too bad. Not quite as low as we had hoped, but we had to get her to a show the next morning and didn’t have time to redo it.
Time to get the rear situated. We went about it the same way. Grinders, rivets, and snippers.
Had some issued with one of the rivets and had to grind it out. Whatever:
Next Level Technoligies Motorsports swag:
With everything complete and the chair back on the ground, it was time for a shoot. So here it is, in all its glory. I present the stance chair:
Everything went surprisingly well and I would say that as of now, it is one of the lowest
static chairs in the land. Looking forward to the unveil tomorrow at a local show. It isn't quite as low as we had hoped, but we aim to get it sitting lower in the future. I think for being the first NLTM build, it really doesn't get much better than this.
At the end of the day, the garage was a mess:
One last rolling shot of the stance chair with Jeremy driving:
Make sure to check out our facebook page and like us at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Next-L...63334083696993.
Currently developing high strength balsa wood barrels and carbon fiber wrapped Ronal Turbo faces for lightweight.
Photo:Konky Photography
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