How i lowered my seat :D

Hey guys, little thread for you to have a look at this is how i lowered my seating position and made it possible to fit my bucket seats on Corbeaus own runners as opposed to thoes made for GW. I also added a great deal of strength to the car along the way



This is what we started with, 1 small and 1 large pice of box section which was a good couple of inches off the floor of the car. This is what robs the F/TF of that Lotus Elise and true sports car style driving position.

For those of you who don't know (and aren't mad enough to keep taking your car it bits!) this box section is covered in carpet and is what the runners sit on, the runners then have the seats bolted on top of them. The standard runners and those from GW are quite thick and are mounded over the box section so are pretty high. The runners i bought are Corbeaus own and are very thin.


So we don't like this box section... yes it ads some stiffness to the chasis (but less than you'd think as we shall soon discover) but its a silly way of mounting the seats and personally i felt like i was driving a 4x4 not a sports car! soooooooo............



out comes a little angle grinder and....



bye bye box section.... as you can see the big pice of box section isnt actually as structural as it looks, its tac welded, but under it is a strengthening pice of box section



out comes that too.... now your thinking nooooooooooo! Adam-MGTF you fool! your cars structural rigidity has gone! well no



cue a large pice of high tensile steel plate... this stuff is used to build lifting rigs for oil companys and according to my engineer uncle has more than replaced the lost strength



here is the plates in situ. These are the correct with for the bolts to fix the Corbeau runners to.



for some added strength we put in a brace bar behind the seats of square steel... this added more rigidity to the chassis and is a good point to bolt my harnesses to... some more brace was added to the foot wells for good measure (my uncle said neither were needed but with 350bhp going in Bucephalus i figure the more the better!)



And there we go, you can see the hight difference by looking at the bolsters on the two seats... in "real life" and actually sat in the seat its an evan more pronounced differance and really makes you feel like your sat in the car not on it.

Step away from the grinder, Adam!:OMG::hehe:

David Aiketgate;14742 wrote: Step away from the grinder, Adam!:OMG::hehe:

muwahahahahhhhh

still have to do the other side........ and i have an F exhaust to play with now "let he sparks fly!"

TBH, I really need to have my seats lowered, but I don't see me being this 'drastic'.:shake:
I'll just have to keep ducking my head to see through the windscreen.:whistle:

David Aiketgate;14821 wrote: TBH, I really need to have my seats lowered, but I don't see me being this 'drastic'.:shake:
I'll just have to keep ducking my head to see through the windscreen.:whistle:

i may have a set of TF runners going spare soon david, will let you know

Adam-MGTF;14891 wrote: i may have a set of TF runners going spare soon david, will let you know

Thanks Adam, but I think they'll be the same as my Mk2 F ones.

David Aiketgate;14910 wrote: Thanks Adam, but I think they'll be the same as my Mk2 F ones.

really? i thought they lowered them in the TF?

Adam-MGTF;14923 wrote: really? i thought they lowered them in the TF?

I'm pretty sure the TF and Mk2 F seats are the same.

David Aiketgate;14925 wrote: I'm pretty sure the TF and Mk2 F seats are the same.

cool mate added to the old knowledge bank

Yeah, the reason I mentioned seat lowering is because I have a long back, and although I'm only 6ft, my eyeline is the top of the windscreen surround!.
In fact, when I had the seats out, I found sitting on the floor gave me the ideal height!:lol:

In my Nissan, I threw the runners away and bolted the seat direct to the floor.:dunno:

edit - Just looking back at your photos, the brace bar across behind the seats duplicates what you would have with hoops.
In fact, the bar you fit for the hoops is actually even more substantial than yours! Probably 45 or 50mm square.

David Aiketgate;14974 wrote: Yeah, the reason I mentioned seat lowering is because I have a long back, and although I'm only 6ft, my eyeline is the top of the windscreen surround!.
In fact, when I had the seats out, I found sitting on the floor gave me the ideal height!:lol:

In my Nissan, I threw the runners away and bolted the seat direct to the floor.:dunno:

edit - Just looking back at your photos, the brace bar across behind the seats duplicates what you would have with hoops.
In fact, the bar you fit for the hoops is actually even more substantial than yours! Probably 45 or 50mm square.

whats the hoop bar made of mate? ive never seen one fitter

Adam-MGTF;15064 wrote: whats the hoop bar made of mate? ive never seen one fitter

It's a hollow square bar like you've fitted, but about twice the size.