4 Ways To Fly Pain-Free and Safer
	WHY are Oregon Aero Seats So Comfortable?: Overview
	Photos and X-Rays: Oregon Aero Painless Seating Vs. Conventional Painful Seats
	Portable Cushions
	Production Aircraft Upgrades
	Custom Seat Cushions: Civilian Helicopters, Homebuilts, Military Helicopters, Fixed Wing Military, Additional Aircraft

"If It Were Simple, It Would Have Been Done Long Ago"

HOW We Do It: Solving Multiple Problems Simultaneously

Mike Dennis sits in an RAF E-3, Waddington, England, during development of custom seat cushion systems for the Royal Air Force E-3 fleet. It took 27,000 research hours and seven years of experimentation to fully understand and solve the many problems that prevent comfortable seating. The challenge was that all solutions to the many problems must function simultaneously.

Solving the problem of painful seating provided Oregon Aero with a set of difficult challenges, all of which had to be solved simultaneously to create pain-free seat cushion systems. The bottom line: what Oregon Aero has achieved is much more complicated than it appears on the surface. Mike Dennis during sled crash testing of Oregon Aero’s experimental seat frame at MGA Research Laboratory. Oregon Aero has gone beyond designing seat cushion systems to designing the complete seat system—again, by solving multiple problems simultaneously.    "It sounds simple — to make a comfortable seat — but if it were, it would have been done long ago," says Mike Dennis, founder and president of Oregon Aero. "We spent 27,000 research hours and seven years of experimentation to fully understand and solve the many problems that prevent comfortable seating."    Often a seat is regarded only as an object to keep a person from hitting the floor when they bend their knees. But anyone who’s ever sat in an uncomfortable seat (and that’s all of us) knows it’s more than that. It’s not just a matter of sitting down—we instinctively shift and move our bodies, trying to find a comfortable position.    Oregon Aero realizes finding that comfortable position involves the following: the proper hip and pelvic alignment, lumbar curvature, and upper body position; and unrestricted blood flow where the body comes in contact with the seat. If the body is not positioned correctly or blood flow is blocked (which creates ischemia, commonly called "hot spots,") then we are in pain.    "These problems have continued to hang on year after year because conventional seating usually attacks a single problem, not all the problems. Consequently, these single-problem solutions don’t work," says Mike Dennis.    "Each problem that prevents comfortable seating may be a small problem, but they all add up to create a big problem — pain — and they all need to be solved at the same time." Identifying the source of seat discomfort in a major airline’s narrow body aircraft first class seats, in 1995. Oregon Aero’s suggested new design won a design contest sponsored by the airline.      "For example," he continues, "one product may push on the lumbar area of the spine  to try to create a comfortable lumbar curve. But instead, the nerves are compressed and a secondary problem is created. Or another product uses seat material that should prevent the blockage of blood flow but it doesn’t shift the pelvis into the proper position. Or another product relieves pressure on the nerves but doesn’t eliminate hot spots."    "In other words, engineering goals can be mutually exclusive. When one problem is solved, another is created or amplified; this is the way the engineering process works. But add to this the sensitivity of the human body to being in contact with manufactured hardware, and the engineering challenge becomes even greater."    "There’s an extremely delicate balance that must be created and maintained through the seat design and materials," concludes Mike.    What Oregon Aero has learned is how to get all the solutions to all the problems working successfully at the same time.

Thickness Doesn’t Affect Comfort, Impact Protection

Variations in Oregon Aero cushion thickness — whether custom, upgrade or portable cushions — provide the same level of comfort and impact protection because materials are pressure and temperature sensitive and because the design shifts the person into the correct sitting position.

 

Whatever the thickness of an Oregon Aero cushion, whether custom, upgrade or portable (shown here), the cushion provides the same benefits: painless seating and improved impact protection. Variations in thickness are used only to accommodate a person’s physical characteristics and the cockpit environment.    The properties of cushion materials and the cushion design ensure painless seating each time, for each user, regardless of thickness. The visco-elastic foam is temperature and pressure sensitive and the cushion design shifts the hips and pelvis into the proper sitting position.    (See Portable Seat Cushions for a complete explanation of how to select a portable cushion thickness.)

 

Military Testing Aids Light Aircraft Designs

Oregon Aero often has access to military equipment such as this Oregon Air National Guard simulator the company used when designing the APECS® I ejection seat cushioning system.

Oregon Aero’s ability to use military simulators and test seats in mission aircraft is a valuable design aid that provides data directly applicable to light aircraft seats. If Oregon Aero can’t find a Mil-Spec, we design the cushions to exceed the higher FAA specifications.

Oregon Aero Seat Cushion Systems Meet FAA Specs

Most Oregon Aero seat cushion systems have been tested and meet or exceed the 19G/1500 pound lumbar load survivability specification of 14 CFR (FAR) 23.562. All materials used in our seat cushion systems meet or exceed 14 CFR (FAR) 25.853(a) for fire resistance. Flotation capability which exceeds FAA and Coast Guard standards is available. See Testing for more information.

 

These photos show a successful 19G lumbar load survivability test of an Oregon Aero ULTRA II™ Custom Seat Cushion System, conducted at the National Institute for Aviation Research, Wichita State University.

Many currently available Oregon Aero seat cushion systems have been tested and meet or exceed the 19G/50 millisecond lumbar load survivability specification of Federal Aviation Regulation 14 CFR (FAR) 23.562 (now required for new aircraft seats). A modified seat with Oregon Aero cushions passed the above NASA full scale, real time test of a 70 mph, 30 degree nose down impact, which creates a 19G vertical acceleration of the spine in 50 milliseconds.

A customer sent us these photos of her Maule, burned in a hangar fire which destroyed 11 airplanes. She told us, "the windscreen is melted onto the instrument panel, but the (Oregon Aero) seat cushions look untouched!" Materials used in Oregon Areo seat cushion systems meet or exceed 14 CFR (FAR) 25.853(a) for fire resistance.