Jan. 12, 2015—Faurecia introduced Monday a lighter-weight, roomier car seat that uses advanced materials and processes and is ready for production for midmarket vehicles.
Faurecia's "Lightweight and Roomy" seat, debuting this week at the North American International Auto Show (NAIAS 2015) in Detroit, weighs 5.07 pounds less than Faurecia's lightest current production seat in the C-car segment. Weight savings are compared to a reference seat being produced in North America by Faurecia: A six-way manual seat, which is already the best-in-class lightweight seat in its segment. Faurecia has worked on all fronts with materials to improve not only cushion and backrest structures but also trimming components.
This seat also expands the roominess of the vehicle cabin, offering 1.2 inches of additional space for rear seat legroom or for reducing the overall vehicle length.
"We are proud to unveil this portfolio of lightweight technologies that are ready for mass production," Tony Kmeid, vice president of engineering for Faurecia Automotive Seating North America, said in a release. "Faurecia is on track toward approaching the weight reduction of 8.8 pounds per seat proposed in the Renault EOLAB concept car during the 2014 Paris Motor Show. We continue to work persistently to further reduce the weight of our seats. We put a strong emphasis on proposing solutions that are easy to implement and that offer the expected cost-weight performance."
