Boulies Master

Hello from Canada. I ordered the chair on a Friday, received it on the next Tuesday. All was in order, no broken parts. I did not use the included instructions, but found a wonderful video on Youtube, which perfectly explained how to assemble it. Took me about 2 hours with the help of a friend. No extra tools needed, just the items included.
Love the chair, very comfortable. I am 5ft 3 inches tall, the lowest setting is good for me. Very well made, well worth the money.

Super comfy and well worth the money. I have had secret labs and I say Boulies chairs are superior!!

VERY GOOD PRODUCT AND FAST SHIPPING. THIS CHAIR ARE VERY CONFORTABLE.

Very good product and extremely confortable!!We highly recommended this chair and low price!!

TL;DR With some modifications to eliminate noises, the chair will be a well needed upgrade. It's worth the purchase and maintained, I expect it to last me for many years. Purchased in Canada.

I previously used an IKEA Millberget chair ($89 at the time) for nearly 10 years. With the chair only having a tilt mechanism, the only part that ever made noise was the bearing within the bottom of the piston over time. Other than that, after nearly 10 years the material was quite worn out.

I didn't want a bucket seat chair. These seats are made for track cars. They're meant to be safe, not comfortable. I don't know why this trend started but it's now just something you have to deal with to get the features these seats have. An office chair just doesn't have a decent recline and headrest for relaxing; nor are quality chairs generally affordable or under $600 CAD.

I wanted a seat that had adjustable arms rests, a tilt mechanism, seat adjustment, lumbar and, preferably a fabric material. Boulies and SecretLab were recommended. With both having virtually the same features and Boulies being around $300 less all in, Boulies was the choice. After some modifications, the chair is the upgrade I needed.

Aside from noises, the only oddity with the chair is with the tilt mechanism. When initiating the tilt, at about 5-10 degrees, which happens to be the earliest lock point for the mechanism, there's an odd "hump"; like a speed hump on the road. I don't imagine there's any modification that can be done to correct this as I feel it's inherent to the mechanism but, I thought I'd mention it so others may be aware of this possibility if you're sensitive to the very minor jostling that occurs rocking back and forth.

Regarding noises, on the first day chair was silent. However, through the week after settling and use, there were many noises.
It started with a metal on metal screech within the arm rests when rocked front to back. I fixed this by disassembling the arm rests and adding Gorilla tape to the bottom edge of the height adjustment cutouts. It's a lever design and the metal lever rubs on the edges of the metal cutouts. This could be corrected within the design by adding some plastic shims as they did with the sides of the metal arm tubes (between metal tube and plastic outer). There has been no noise from that since. There is still a noise from the two metal plates that allow side to side adjustment contacting each other due to a gap. I may modify with some adhesive felt to silence this without binding where lubrication was factory applied.
The next noise was the seat recline mechanism. I had to open that up and tighten the fasteners to eliminate creaking when leaning to the right side. The many locking points of adjustment on the unit is outstanding.
Thirdly, it's as if the foam core is so tight against the metal frame inside that there is a creaky/squeaky noise that comes from any movement against the seat back and side bolsters. While I wish this noise wasn't there, it's not the worst and I can't do anything to fix this in a non-destructive manner. Once positioned, this becomes a non-issue.
So far, the last and most annoying noise to present itself, is from the gas piston. Any rotation with weight applied to the chair (sitting) causes a rubbing/friction noise. Imagine an old door creaking open. This noise is quieter when the seat is at it's lowest position, and loudest at it's highest position. Take your hand and place it on a bare desktop, apply downwards force then push forwards. You hand should skip between points of grip. Now, imagine that noise housed inside metal that amplifies the noise with minor vibrations. I have solved this issue for the moment by moving some lubricant from the piston frame to between 3 components inside the bottom of the piston body: a plastic spacer, a metal washer and a rubber bump stop/spacer. I believe this rubber piece may have been the culprit as it would do the same as your hand when not lubricated. Should more lubricant be needed, a general purpose grease should suffice.

For a brand new chair, I really didn't expect all these noises. Will I send the chair back? No. It's not worth any costs or logistics involved and it's superior to my previous chair. Further, I strongly believe in the right to repair. If I buy something, I will take it apart and fix it as needed. If you're looking for a chair with these features, this chair has them all at a price that's not too hard to stomach. Overall, I'm satisfied with my purchase despite the aforementioned flaws and hey, I could be that 1 in a million that had issues.

I'd like to thank Jeff from support for reaching out to me to offer replacement parts. He caused an impromptu disassembly of the piston while I had a moment to spare leading to my findings of point 4. This review has been edited to update these findings.