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Fitting, Safety, and Continuous Innovation

23:39
38:52
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At 23:39 in

Randy LaJoie's Former NASCAR Shop Turned Racing Seat Factory! (How Its Made: The Joie of Seating)

What happens here

Randy emphasizes that proper seat fitting is not about personal comfort alone, but about safety. He critiques generic seats that leave too much room, explaining that hips should be snug in the seat belt holes, and shoulders firmly within the shoulder wrap. For optimal safety, the eye-port of the helmet should be centered. He shows how different drivers (like female racers) require custom 'hourglass' shapes, differing significantly from the 'square seats' often offered by competitors. He also explains how safety devices like the HANS device impacted seat design, necessitating headrests to be moved further back. He underscores the danger of head rotation during impacts, aiming to minimize it with proper head and neck support. Randy reflects on the evolution of seat safety, highlighting how his personal experiences and those of his son, Corey (who now test-drives), continuously drive improvements. He proudly states that their race car seats incorporate advanced safety features that weren't common in the past, constantly pushing boundaries in racing safety, even when it’s not the easiest or cheapest option.

Goal: Understand the critical role of proper seat fitting, safety features, and the continuous innovation driving seat design.

Tools and materials

  • HANS Device — Head and Neck Support device that influences seatback design
  • Standard Race Seats — Demonstrating various sizes and fitting principles

What they say

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press the eject button. Yes, I'm stuck. very nice. This is fun. How do you fit into this ? She was into it. In the smallest one. Yes. Is it the right size or too big? Well, see how low your shoulders are? Yes. So I have to take the top down. So, their eyes, number one, it's above their eyes now. So, I have to lower the top part. The hips are perfectly fine. Side, side , their hips are not coming out of the side pockets. Hmm. Because girls are already , you know , hourglass shaped. So, my competitors are very difficult to fit because they are square shaped. Hmm. And most women are hourglass shaped. So, we have to give them an hourglass shape so they fit girls. Oh. You actually make them differently ? Absolutely, yes. For women. Yes. I didn't think so. You have to, because they are a little different from us. Yes. Excellent. So, I love when we do things that have both an art and a science to them, that the average person doesn't think about. They just buy anything , but yeah. And I think that's fine, but I do n't trust readymade stuff. My ready-made products are very close to custom, because we put a half-inch pad here and there, raise or lower them, or make them wider or shorter. I mean, we try to fix them. I've been to 185 race tracks since I quit driving. And my biggest thing is that people don't fit into cars. They don't fit in the seats. The seats do n't fit them. I asked, " What are you doing ?" They asked, " What do you mean ?" I said, "The seats don't fit you. " They asked, " What do you mean ?" I said, " Move your hips." And they're like, "What, how?" So, I used to help them. I mean, I used to put ratchet straps around them and tighten them, and at first I sold kits to put on other people's seats for shoulder and head support , because they did n't have that feature. Hmm. So I said, " Look, here's a kit." Then, other seat manufacturers started doing the same thing. They were like, "Oh, that's a great idea." " So, you started by improving existing seats before selling your own whole line ? Let's say I 'm here, but nobody wanted to buy the expensive seats. I mean, there were $600 seats on the market , and mine were twice that price. I'm not twice that price anymore, but I'm still the most expensive because of our process. You know, all the stamping, the guard rails we put in. I mean, all that is n't cheap. All that, I mean, not cheap at all, that's an added expense. You know, some people put tubing around it. We use a lot of tubing underneath , but…

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