more junkyard engineering... (reclining stock Mach 1 seats)

[DarkBuddha]

Please forgive if this is a bit long...

Well, pops has been at it again. When I went back last March, we discussed plans for the interior. At the time I had already gotten a pair of very decent Fiero seats (with speakers in the headrests) and was planning on having them recovered to match the style of the original Mach 1 seats. I thought that was that...

Well, in late August, pops mentioned he didn't like Fiero seats, no matter that I wanted seats that reclined and had decent bolster and support. His concerns were that the Fiero seats have a lower back than the original highbdacks, and he didn't feel the seat bottom was substantial enough (especially for me... 6' 350lbs.). They also would've lowered the seating position an inch or two, which isn't good for him or my wife (both of which are under 5'6"). The solution? Pops figured he'd modify the original seats to recline and add a bit of bolster and lumbar support.

Well, after pulling the seats apart and scouring the junkyards for the last 3 months, he finally found a mechanism that basically bolts on. Looks pretty good so far, but the seats don't flip forward as much as they used to, which will hamper rear seat access. And we've still got to figure out the extra bolstering and adding the adjustable inflatable lumbar too. Anyway, here's a couple pics of the seat in recline and flipped forward...

 

[DarkBuddha]

oops... pics...

 

[oboebrian]

NIce, i've gotta give your pop a big thumbs up for his junkyard engineering skills (i always laugh somewhat when i see these posts and wondering why i didn't think of that). What car was the hinges from?

 

[DarkBuddha]

Yeah, pops has been doing this kind of thing his entire life (since his first '50 Ford in '61). Hell, most of the cars he's bought over the years were either from the junkyard, or on their way there.

Anyway, the hinges are from a 70s Dodge Colt. I should correct my previous post... pops says he had to cut the original frame extention from the upper part of the seat, as well as the hinge pin from the bottom. Here's a pic of the part to be removed...

 

[Pakrat]

Hunh, cool for Pops. There is nothing like the junkyard mcguyver. My dad is the same way. He finally sold his house and I have inherited everything of his basically, tools he got from his dad even. In fact, I'm using his 1955 Sno Bird Snowblower on my driveway this year. Went out of business 45 years ago and he has been fabricating parts for more than 25 years now. Damn thing still starts right up though, simply amazing. Still has a glass fuel filter too.

So the big question is, what are you doing with the Fiero's now? I may be interested if you get rid of them. I need all the speaker help I can get with the vert, and headrest speakers may be the deal.

 

[66 BLAKE 96]

Thats too cool!

(though I looked long and hard for Fiero seats before getting my racing seats)

 

[DarkBuddha]

So the big question is, what are you doing with the Fiero's now? I may be interested if you get rid of them. I need all the speaker help I can get with the vert, and headrest speakers may be the deal.

I'm not sure what we're gonna do with the Fiero seats... I hadn't even thought about it. I'll ask pops next time I talk to him, but I gotta tell ya, he and my brother get dibs. I'll let you know though.

BTW, I'm still considering doing the speaker in the headrest idea. These old cars are not well designed for stereo systems, and based on what I know about spatialization and sound dispersion (from my experience in studio engineering and sound design), not much can really be done to improve the sense of stereo (or surround). I'm still trying to figure out all my options. We'll see...

 

[jackmach1]

thanks for the memories..

I just had to comment that one of the first mods I did to my non-Ford car was make the front seats fully recline. I did this by enlarging the hole the original bolt pivot went in and put in a sleeve and then slotted the hole and welded an extension onto it. To recline, you pulled the sleeve out, slid the upper seat up, and then it would fall back to flat.
I must also add that I made the four-speed shifter shaft pull out of the shifter, so it was removed, this made it easy to move about from seat to seat.
I was 17 years old. My girlfriend and I enjoyed those seats tremendously!!

Pops mods using an existing fold down hinge is good work. Such hinges didn't exist back in late 70's.

 

[DarkBuddha]

Wow! This thread is 2 and half years old now! Talk about a blast from the past... whoa...

This is still one of my favorite things my father has done, and with the new release of the new "sports" foam and upholstery from TMI, these reclinable seats would be extra killer. Ultimately, we've decided to do a different seat for the time being since it was cheaper to find a nice set of late model leather highbacks than spend $400 to reupholster my originals.

BTW, I noticed the pics are MIA, so you can see the reclinable seat mod here:http://groups.msn.com/DBsMustang/seatmod.msnw


And here is a pic of the TMI sport seat demo from SEMA 2005:

 

[bnickel]

ya know, i've been considering doing Pop's mods and getting the TNI sport seat conversion ever since TMI came out with them. for now i'll be keeping my 86 GT buckets and having them recovered. however, if end up having to sell the stang after i get it finished and get another 70 cougar like i've been talking about then i probably will do it but i may just get the foam kit and have custome seat covers made to match the cougar interior.

ultimately, if i get a cougar, i would like to do the sport seat conversion but have the seats covered in black leather and black & white or black & blue houndstooth material for the inserts. i think that would be extremely cool. i wiould use the black/white houndstooh if paint the coug black or white and use the black/blue if i paint it blue.

 

[DarkBuddha]

Sounds good Bryan... I'd read somewhere you were considering getting rid of the Mustang, but I have to admit I'm surprised. Still, I think your choice of a Cougar is a very excellent one. I admit that if I didn't have the Mach, I don't think I'd buy a coupe or Grande. I'd probably have a Cougar, Comet, Torino, etc., or maybe that '70 Marauder I've been dreaming about.

 

[bnickel]

yeah the reason i've been considering selling it is that since i can't work because of fobromayalgia and really bad arthritis selling the stang is about the only way we can up with enough money to put a down payment on a house. the plan is that if i do sell it half the money will go to a house down payment and the other half will go to get me another toy. since cougars are still very reasonable price wise and i really did love my old 70 that seemed like a logical choice. i had even considered getting a ranchero but they are almost as much as a mustang and more than a comparably equipped cougar.

the plan is to find the nicest cougar i can that will fit the budget with enough left that i can ad a few goddies to it and possibly enough to do a paint job, even if i have to do it myself.

 

[Pakrat]

Yeah Yeah, let's get to the important stuff though.


WHAT EVER HAPPENED WITH THE FIERO SEATS?