My buddy just bought a 2007 Camry SE. Only complaint he has concerns the headrest angle of the passenger seat. He states he can't get his shoulders backk into the without his head tilting forward. He turned them around and then the angle is off too far the other way. Has anyone else noticed this issue and is their a fix ? The angle is the same in the drivers seat but when driving most of us sit more upright and its not as bothersome

 

He should not sit in a HCH either. The headrest is so bad on the HCH, that one thing caused us to go immediately to the Toyota dealer and look at the TCH (and I am glad we did anyways).

 

That's the one complaint I have about the car and I think you're wrong about the angle not affecting the driver, it is affecting me, especially on long drives it becomes bothersome. At least passenger can recline the seat or find some other way to be comfortable, but driver has less options and yes, reversing the headrest moves it too far away and becomes even dangerous in case of rear end collision, there is no support and that could injure your neck. I want to make a trip to the junkyard to find another headrest and bend the rods to my liking. I don't want to do it to the original headrest because I'm afraid it will crack and I'll be left without the headrest. If you're short, you could lift it up above your head a little (I'm tall so it won't work for me), another way would be to reverse it and attach some pillow on top of it. I have some long, 10 - 15 hours non stop trips planned in the future and there is no way I'll survive them without fixing that headrest somehow. if I can't fix the headrest, I will try some heavy padded seat cover, to move my whole body away from the back seat, but that opens another can of worms , since there is air bag in the side of the seat.

 

It's not an issue, and there is no fix. What I mean to say is, they're doing that intentionally to meet certain safety standards. It stinks, and I hate it - but I have gotten used to it. It does seem worse in the passenger seat, just because passengers tend to lean back in the seat, whereas drivers tend to sit up away from the seat.

 

I did some more research and here what I found out.
The poles are 6 inches apart (center to center) and have diameter of about 7/16 inch (can't find my calipers so this is just rough estimate, could be metric). There are universal headrests that can be adjusted to fit most of the cars , I'm assuming Camry included, but they usually come with build in LCD screen, in pairs, so the price is kind of steep at close to $300 at minimum , but if I could find a blank one (no LCD installed) it should be much cheaper and angle of those headrests is much more reasonable. I found one at E-bay for $30 plus shipping but it is nonadjustable one with wrong pole distance so my search continues. But there are solutions and it's just the matter of finding it for right price, so maybe others will have better luck than me. I also will take apart original headrest to see what can be done with it, but I wish I had a spare one just in case I mess this one up.

 

Pete4, for Hondas, the headrests for the Civic and the Accord are/were the same hole width, and were interchangable. People were putting Accord headrests in Civics because they do not like the Civic ones.

Maybe this is true for Toyotas too, and you could put in a Corolla or something headrest??

 

I don't find the headrest uncomfortable, but to my understanding, yes the head restraint geometry is designed close to the head to afford better rear impact crash protection. Though despite this, recent IIHS crash test results showed the Camry received "good" ratings in frontal and side impact tests while receiving a "marginal" in rear-end crash/head restraint testing. If you think Camry headrests are uncomfortable, have you ever tried Volvo? Those are very upright, large headrests--safe though.

 

I too have noticed some back/shoulder issues with this Camry.. I never had any problems with my 1997 Camry. I haven't even gone on a long trip yet (the longest drive so far is probably 50 minutes).

 

The problem is, not everybody is build the same and not everybody likes to drive in the same sitting position. I absolutely hate SUV style, high off the floor, 90 degree angle sitting position, makes me very tired on the longer trips, I love sports car type, sit on the floor reclined back position and on longer trips I can't imagine driving any other way. It would be nice to know what was the problem for such low rating for headrest, I can't imagine why it would not give proper protection , unless it broke off or the seat collapsed on impact. Well, if the headrest had higher angle than current, I would either had to take it out altogether or buy another car. In the meantime I still didn't fix mine, it seems trip to the junkyard will be required.

 

I think the headrest issue is a conflict between comfort and safety. For safety, the head should be in contact with the headrest upon rear impact. But, this is uncomfortable for normal driving. Active headrests avoid the conflict and achieve better protection by moving the headrest up against the head upon rear impact. Recently Toyota announced an active headrest design to be used in all future models (somebody posted it somewhere on this site).

By the way, being a short person, I almost always find airplane headrests terribly uncomfortable. They push my head forwards so much that I am constantly having to use my neck muscles just to hold my head up. And airplane trips can be long! Taller people's heads are higher, and they don't suffer in the same way. People like me on the tails of the statistical distribution just aren't catered for!

Stan