Triumph stuck with rumbling seats long after they were cool – Jalopnik

Many drivers on the road today probably won’t even know what a rumble seat is. If they saw one being used, they would probably – and rightly – think, “How the heck is that even legal?” Well, for the uninformed among us, a rumble seat is essentially a small bench seat that folds out of the rear deck of a classic car. The back of the chair folds up and your legs fold into the space that would otherwise be occupied by the back of the chair.

Typically, rumble chairs are quite small and ideal for younger children. Sometimes they come with a small fold-out front screen to keep the bugs out of your eyes and teeth, but unnecessary additions such as seat belts and airbags are obviously not present, which is why junk seats went out of fashion about 100 years ago.

One British car manufacturer, however, didn’t get the memo and continued producing sports and touring cars with junk seats – or ‘dickey’ seats as they are known there – into the post-war era. The car manufacturer in question is Triumph. Nowadays, Triumph is best known for producing quintessential small sports cars, such as the famous TR series – the TR4 is actually one of your favorite British cars of the past 70 years. But before its success in the 1950s and 1960s, Triumph was a bit stuck in the past.

While most other car manufacturers had firmly abandoned junk seats in the past, Triumph continued to offer both the 1800 and 2000 Roadster models with the unusual seat design until 1949.

Rumble seats were initially inspired by the jump seats fitted to the very first cars. These seats were mainly intended for butlers and the like, who could not possibly travel in the same space as the landed gentry who provided the car in the first place. Cars became more affordable as the years went by, but that extra seat still came in handy in coupes and roadsters.

While sedans may be extinct now, buying one was certainly a viable option back then. But then you lost the sleek lines of a sports touring car; with a rumble seat it was a win-win. Unless you actually sat in the rumble seat, of course. Essentially, those occupants simply became a crumple zone; you wouldn’t want to hit a bump if you had your friends in the back.

Some were more comfortable than others, with side curtains, roll-out covers and even folding windscreens – as in the case of the Triumph Roadsters – but the folding seat was always far from an ideal way to travel. As such, the style was largely phased out in the 1930s, but Triumph – keen to stick with its more traditional approach – decided the ‘Dickey’ was worth persevering with.

By the time the Triumph 1800 and 2000 Roadsters met their demise, the Rumble Seat experience had at least reached its peak in terms of comfort, even if safety was still overlooked. Rear passengers in the Triumph had individual seats, soft carpeting under their feet and a folding windscreen with a wooden frame – basically everything except a seat belt, if we’re being honest. Although some new cars no longer have a spare tire, back in the day there was a spare tire conveniently located just behind the rumbled seats.

Triumph retired the stylish Roadsters in 1949 and began to concentrate on the wonderfully popular TR range, with the TR2 representing a huge leap forward in style and modernity. Despite the fact that the junk chair had clearly enjoyed its day in the sun, well into dusk, it seems, another automaker toyed with reintroducing it.

Nearly twenty more years had passed when the patently strange AMC teased a concept called the Vignale AMX, which featured a ‘Rambleseat’ with a folding windshield. AMC has put out a lot of quirky and underrated cars, but potential rear seat passengers are probably thanking their lucky stars that this concept never made it to production. The rattling seat was sleeker than previous attempts, although safety was still not taken into account. Shortly afterwards, the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act came into effect and the fun police in power took umbrage with the death wish design, so any dreams of reunions were quickly dashed.