Lincoln Continental's 30-way power seats treat your cheeks individually
Lincoln's forthcoming Continental will feature innovative seats designed with health and wellness in mind.
Over the years, car industry ergonomists have developed seating innovations like variable-density foams and dynamically inflating lumbar supports that expand to hug you in corners. But up until these Lincoln Continental thrones, we've never seen seats that allow the cushion under each leg to be manipulated independently, let alone for both length and height.
While these seats are technically those of a concept car, CNET has been assured that they are extremely close to the production model's units, with the brand going so far as to hold a New York press event this week just to let journalists inspect them more closely. The forthcoming production sedan from Ford's luxury brand will boast 30-way power, which sounds like more adjustability than one of those indulgent $4,000 massage recliners from Brookstone (only these seats are a lot better-looking).
Dan Ferretti, Lincoln's global seat technical leader, tells CNET the reason the Continental's seats allow for individual leg articulation is because drivers use their legs differently: "There was a recognition early on that each of your legs is doing something different. One is, for the most part, continuously connected to the accelerator or brake pedal. The other leg is free to move about, sometimes you tuck it up under you, or stretch it out... you want to have different functionality and different support."
On long drives, I've found that it doesn't take a Costanza wallet in one's back pocket to create spinal and posterior discomfort, so I'm looking forward to seeing how the Continental's high-tech chairs may be able to alleviate side-to-side variances that can trigger pain.
What's more, it's likely that it won't be just the driver and passenger who will enjoy all that adjustability. The Continental concept features four individually articulating seats, and when the vehicle was revealed at the New York Auto Show in April, company officials insisted that the show car's interior was nearly production ready. CNET expects the bucket seat and center console setup to be a cost option, with a traditional three-across bench as standard.
This oddly hypnotic video shows many of the various ways these seats can be adjusted: