You come into work, settle into your nice comfy office chair, turn on the computer and the day starts. Or maybe you’re at your work or lab bench; you step onto the footrest and sit down on your chair. All set for the usual daily routine.
That sinking feeling.
All is going well, but as the day goes by, your desk / bench seems to be getting higher. Well of course that can’t be happening, unless it’s one that’s height adjustable. A more likely scenario is that your chair is dropping down.
What’s the problem?
Of all the components that make up a chair, pretty much the only thing that can go wrong is the failure of the gas strut – that’s’ the bit that goes between the seat and the base of the chair.
Typically this would be due to old age, but can also be caused by making constant adjustments to the height of the chair.
What are the options?
The most common thing to do is to go and buy a new chair.
But why spend all that money when you possibly don’t have to?
It is in fact a very simple, quick, and easy task to replace the gas strut on a chair
How?
Once you have the new gas strut, you will require either, a rubber / plastic mallet or a hammer and a block of wood. Yes that really is all you need, and about 5 minutes of your time.
- Turn the chair onto its side.
- Using the hammer or mallet hit the steel plate on the underside of the seat of the chair until the seat comes away from the gas strut.
- Then, whilst holding onto the gas strut, use the hammer or mallet to hit the star base of the chair – making sure that you rotate it so that each “leg “ of the star gets equal force applied, Continue until it comes away from the gas strut.
- Remember to use the piece of wood when using the hammer, so that you are not striking the actual chair and to offer protection against possible damage.
- Insert the new gas strut to the seat of the chair.
- Then pick up the chair and position the gas strut into the hole in the star base.
- Sit on the chair, and have a quick bounce on it.
- Job done
So there you go, at a fraction of the cost of a new chair, the old one is back in use and probably as good as new.
