Installing 996 seats in an SC?

[William Miller]

I bought some 996 seats to put in my SC.
They seem like they will work with a little work although they to sit too high. Help!

These are stock seats from a 2000 996 they have manual sliders and an unusual gizmo that makes the whole seat raise up and down (not just the bottom) the backs tilt with a little motor.

I'll probably keep my old seat belt attachment points on the floor.



Any help would be greatly appreciated.
How high is the 996 mounts from the floor?

[William Miller]

bump

I found more info that the 996 has the seat mounts sorta built into the floor pan/ tunnel and inner rockers. The guy I bought them from said the mounting "rails" are about 1" above the floor.
I guess I'll have to remove the SC seat mount supports and find or make something to replicate the 996 mounts.

Anyone done this yet?

[cali74]

run a search of old posts before you end up doing it - there have been a few people that have lowered the rails for helmet clearance issues and the like. Biggest thing I got out of reading their posts was to be careful welding the tunnel side for fear of explosion, fire, and fun stuff like that.

[William Miller]

What do you think the search criteria should be?

[cali74]

This should do the trick...
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/search.php?action=showresults&searchid=978202&sortby=&sortorder=

[William Miller]

Thanks, your the search master!

[cali74]

it helps to lurk for a couple years while doing a build-up!

[William Miller]

I know most topics have been covered to some extent, but when I try and do searches I end up with nothing or 1000 responses.
I'm just not good at it.

After reading these threads I found a few ideas, but mostly that there is no bolt in type kits. What has been done is just common sence and I'll just have to tear into it.

[bitmit]

Whatever you do, post pics!!

[William Miller]

OK, I've got a lot of things done and now I'm back to this project.

The seats are in, but still too high for my taste. It was fairly simple to drill a few holes and bolt them to the stock seat supports.

This is what they look like.



I'm going to take them out soon to dye them black and I've bought some 1-1/4" square steel tubing to use for mounts.
I don't think it's going to be a killer job , but will move cautiously, especially if I weld something to the tunnel.

Before jumping into this I wanted to check one last time to see if anyone has done this before? Anyone make / sell an existing bracket that should work?
Thanks!

[Rick Lee]

Are those Chronos' old seats? Didn't he have to cut out of the last fun run because his son puked in the car after a few twisties? Do search on Rennlist's 993 and 996 board. A lot of guys swap seats there.

[William Miller]

Rick, Good eyes, I was wondering about that funky smell!
I did get a bargan!

Heres what I found out last night. My original thought was to mount the bars parallell to the car. That won't work for 2 reasons.
1st the are too many different shapes in the floor especially at the ends where these bars would match up with the seat rails.
Second the seat adjustment mechanism (front - back) sticks down below the rails. I'm thinking the 996 bracket probably has a depressed area for this.

Next Idea wich I think is going to work well. Going across the car these bars will rest on the lip of the floor pan where it meets the tunnel and the inner rocker. The outside end meeting the rocker will have to be ground or cut to fit that shape.



The front cross bar will take just a little more work. The existing brackets are lower in the back so I'm going to try and match the angle or maybe make it a little steeper.

The overall drop will be about 1-3/4" - 2".
I'm going to test fit it that way. If I need to go lower, I'll have to do it with angle instead of the box section. One clearance issue is that if I go much lower the seats will have to be shifted farther to the outside of the car. The inner side of the seat is very close to the tunnel. If I moved them over about 1/2" I could probably bolt them thru the floor with some spacers to level things out.



Rick, I'm going to rennlist to see what I find there.
So far thhis seems to be a relativly simple project.

[William Miller]

Rick, I think the incident was on Jim's new seats. What a relief!
This is a picture of the brackets I ended up making.
The square tubes were too thick and it would have been much more difficult to weld the nuts on the inside. These are srtong as hell. They are about 2" lower than the bracket. The back bracket cannot go all the way across because of the mechanism that raises and lowers the seat.

Can't wait to finish the other side. BTW I had to remove the harness from the tunnel to make these welds. Other side should be OK.

[sc]

Bill,

how did the final installation turn out. I have a pair of 996 seats for my 911sc, but it looks like if I lower the mounting brackets the seats will rub on the tunnel and door sill.

Thanks
sc

[William Miller]

The seats worked perfectly at that height.
The sliders were below the edge of the tunnel, but the seat sides were just above it. No rubbing at all.
Good luck!

[sc]

Thanks for the info!