My Seat is Nice and Firm!

Well 2 huge boxes arrived yesterday and I helped the lady unload them from the FedEx truck while I did my best not to jump up and down and scare the poor lady half to death. The boxes were not in too bad of shape compared to what I hear from a lot of the club members. Once I opened the boxes 2 new seats confronted me, they were so clean and bright red it brought tears to my eyes (it could of been dirt as it was very windy). I put all the nuts, bolts and other assorted implements of destruction to the side and immediately set one of the seats up in the driveway to see how it felt. As I sat there in the sun in my new seat I couldn't resist the urge to act like I was driving and make Jeep noises as I bounced up and down. People driving by started honking and waving and of coarse Annette drives up and just shakes her head, as someone on our forum said "every neighborhood should have at least one crazy person". I'm guessing many of my neighbors think its me. As I was alone no pictures were taken (I hid the camera from Annette) but here's Bethany imitating her Father.

I now started to dive into the installation. Opening all the packages of nuts and bolts I decided that the best way to go about this was to remove the passenger side seat first so I could see what needed to be done to mount these beautiful works of art. After fighting the 4 bolts (3 - 13 mm and one torx - no idea why Jeep did this) loose the seat proceeded to slide forward and smoosh my fingers. After throwing the tool closest to me I finally got the seat out and after searching for 10 minutes for the tool I threw, I was ready to remove the mounting hardware from the old seat.

The 4 mounting nuts that hold the bracket to the old seat are under the frame and after years of dust, dirt, water, spilled *coffee* and who knows what else they were kind of rusted and hard to get off.
The 13mm ratcheting wrench that I threw earlier was needed to remove these and I have to say I'm so very happy that I had purchased the wrenches last year. They made the job of removing the nuts a lot easier than using a standard wrench.


When I finally got the mounting frame off the old seat I sat down, nursed my smooshed fingers and drank a well deserved cup of *coffee* (OK I mean a beer).... I took a little bit of time to finish the *coffee* and examine the old seat and the new seat and the mounting frame. I immediately noticed that the old seat mounting holes are nowhere near the same dimensions as the new seat. Pondering this predicament I decided that I would have to go get some flat metal to create plates to compensate for the off-set holes. At this point I congratulated myself for starting on the passenger seat as I had to drive the Jeep to get the metal! After moving the seat from behind the Jeep (yes I did get in it one more time and make Jeep noises) I jumped in the Jeep and made for the store.

When I returned from the store with a piece of flat metal 1/4 thick, 1 1/2 wide and 48 inches long I started with what I thought was the best plan of attack. I drilled a hole in the end of my metal bar and then measured over the correct distance for the off-set and drilled another hole. I then cut the metal bar and low and behold I had my first custom fabbed mounting bracket. I did this process 3 more times and then sat down in the new seat, drank another cup of *coffee* and made more Jeep sounds.

After bolting the new brackets to the seat and the mounting frame I was extremely pleased with myself and what I had accomplished. The seat slid backward and forward easily (I took some time to clean and lube the old seat rails before mounting) and still folded forward like the old seat did. At this point in time it was in my best interest to test fit the new seat into the Jeep. I managed to get the new seat into the Jeep without getting it dirty or smashing my fingers anymore and I noticed that something was wrong. While I was congratulating myself on how ingenious I was for figuring out how to mount the old slider bracket I didn't notice that old seat is mounted off to one side and I had mounted the new seat in the center....

The new seat was hitting the roll bar and would not slide all the way back! After taking a look at the bottom of the old seat I now noticed that the old seat was off-set. After de-congratulating myself, I wrestled the new seat out of the Jeep. I undid the mounting nuts and bolts and set my newly fabbed mounting plates off to the side. Once more into the breach I yelled (well not really but it sounds kinda cool in a Shakespeareian kind of way) and took a closer look at what I was going to do to get the darned seats mounted (no longer a work of art but now more of a pain in the.....well whatever).

I figured out that I would have to drill out the existing rails on the inside, side of the seat to get the mounting bracket as close to the edge of the new seat as possible.

Front of Seat - Click image to enlarge
After I measured twice (yes I'm learning) I started to drill the new holes. With the new holes drilled I mounted the new seat back up and found that I would only need to make one mounting plate for the front outside bolt. This was much easier to do than making the 4 prior plates!

Back of Seat - Click image to enlarge
With the seat mounted once again I figured I better sit down and have another cup of *coffee* before testing the fit.

Back to wrestling the seat back into the Jeep and yes it did smoosh my hand one more time (probably because of all the *coffee* I drank). The fit was a lot closer to what I was looking for but the outside adjuster knob still rubs against the roll bar. I decided at this point that I could live with it for now until I could get to a welder to move the seat bracket over another inch or so. After 5 hours of fighting the stupid seats (we are way past works of art now) this was an easy choice. If you ram the seat back hard it will go past the roll bar so its all good for now. The seat looked really nice in the Jeep and sat at the same height as the old seat other than the sides which are higher. Very nice fit to the tooshie and good support for the back and shoulders, not as soft as the old seats but not to firm either.

After relaxing in the seat for a while I picked Calvin up from school and had him remove the last old seat from the drivers side (It was his turn to be the worker while I supervised). This seat went much smoother due to my prior experience and didn't take that long to do. We managed to get the seats in without getting them too dirty (wash your hands often before handling the new seats). I have to say even though the seats don't go all the way back without rubbing the roll bar they are very comfortable and look really nice.
They still "tumble" forward if you reach under and push the lever but they do not tilt.

I have driven around 100 miles and they provide much better support than the old seats. It's harder to get in and out of the Jeep because the sides of the seats are higher but not to bad. I'm pleased with the seats and the install but sometime in the future I need to get to a welder and see about welding brackets about 1 inch farther to the inside of the seats so they don't rub the roll bar.

A short slide show of the Seats installed