homemade seat brackets?

[brownz]

Looking to see who has made their own seat brackets and how it worked out in the end. Was it worth the fab time? Any pics?



I'm looking at some seats for a budget build and might try to make my own brackets to save about 200 bucks.

[cornfedbill]

I built a custom bucket seat in college for use in a small offroad (SAE Mini-Baja) offroad car. It worked well. But I am not sure I would trust myself in a car that is fast enough to create safety issues.

We used 5/8' tubing to make a frame. We used thin stainless strips for the seating and back support - like a lawn chair. Then we covered the seating surfaces with vinyl wrapped foam. The side bolsters were just insulation wrapped tubes.

It was comfortable and cheap if nothing else.

[BBC71Nova]

I'm planning on making mine here soon. Should be interesting...

[rustomatic]

My low-tech approach consisted of 1-inch square tubing, cut, ground, and clear coated (raw metal); there are two long tubes for each seat (they make a square with the sliding adjusters). Obviously, this was massively expensive and super-exotic, costing nearly 15 bucks, with bolts from my local OSH hardware store. After a few measurements, I managed to drill the "brackets" to fit directly into the sliding adjusters that came with my seats, and into the original holes in my floor pan. The height is pretty much the same as stock (low).

I've crash-tested (literally, I did a 180 into a ditch) the driver's side, and they (the mounts) did not move--the upper backrest of the seat was bent, however, which I fixed by twisting and cranking on a section of round tubing through the upper seat belt holes...

I could only find one installed picture (construction was too boring and lame to capture digitally, although I was happy with the overall results):

Attachment 76067

[Bryce]

I made seat brackets for my falcon. They are solid mount, no slider or recline. I will find pictures tonight.

[DarkoNova]

Rustomatic, you should have taken a few pics of the build, no matter how boring!

I need to make some for my seats. I forget the company, but someone makes brackets for them. But I don't feel like paying $80 a piece for what's basically some pieces of square tubing welded together...

[BBC71Nova]

Wedge Engineering makes a lot of brackets for seats. They even make the brackets that some of the popular seat manufacturers sell. I was gonna go that route but I'm first gonna try it myself.

[brownz]

I made seat brackets for my falcon. They are solid mount, no slider or recline. I will find pictures tonight.

did you find any pics?

[Anthony k]

Wedge Engineering makes a lot of brackets for seats. They even make the brackets that some of the popular seat manufacturers sell. I was gonna go that route but I'm first gonna try it myself.

Don't even bother with wedge, it's a huge waste of time and a run around, then he suggests to just buy the brackets that recaro sells and modfy

[astroracer]

I designed and built seat mounts for the van. Don't think the design will be applicable to a car but it may give you some food for thought. The frames were designed in UG then laser cut by a friend at AM General (when I worked there... )

Here is the seat frame all clamped up and ready for welding.
Side view.

Front view'

Everything went together great!
We decided to tack the frames up while they were bolted into the seat... I had an issue with that but Mel assured me he would keep the seats safe from spatter...

He did..

All tacked up.

Sitting in thr van. They are very sturdy just tacked. I sat in this and jimmied around a bit. No movement at all.


Both seat frames tack welded. We were pretty well wiped out by this time. Called it a day. I needed a shower.


If you have any questions just ask...
Mark

[Nitroexpress]

I fabbed up a set for my second gen Camaro out of 1/4" CRS I used the mesurements off the stock seat brackets to make a set to mount Pro-car racing style seats in my car.