Removal of 1987 911 Driver Seat

Digman · Digman's Garage

I am having difficulties removing the drivers seat from my 1987 911 Cab. It is a 4-way seat. I am able to remove the front two bolts, but I can not access the back 4. The seat is in the bottom most position, and the seat will not lift via the switch. Are there any tricks to either getting the seat to move further forward or lifting the seat to get access to the screws.

BTW: The manual passenger seat was no problem at all.

kidrock · 08-23-2010, 07:33 AM

you should have a manual adjustment handle on the front left portion of the seat? Gently pull the handle upwards and move the seat forward manually...this should give you the access you need to get to the rear bolts.

flatsixjunky · flatsixjunky's Garage

Quote:

Originally Posted by kidrock

you should have a manual adjustment handle on the front left portion of the seat? Gently pull the handle upwards and move the seat forward manually...this should give you the access you need to get to the rear bolts.

+1, I have 4 way seats too. Never had any problems taking them out.

dw1 · 08-23-2010, 08:22 AM

See if you can get power to the lift motors somehow. The driver's seat is a major PITA to remove if the seat is not raised as far as it will go.

Not long after I got my '87, I took the right size allen wrench and ground it down to have as short a vertical distance as possible and still fit fit into the bolt heads. This was before I fixed the seat switch. In retrospect, I really should have fixed the switch first.

Digman · Digman's Garage

Guys, Thanks for the help.

I have gotten all but the forward most bolt on the inside rail. It seems as if the top rail is not moving forward enough. It is only exposing the back most bolt. Any suggestions.

Wil Ferch · 08-23-2010, 12:06 PM

I disagree with those that say simply move the seat forward. If the 87 is anything like my 85, you need to raise the rear "butt" portion of the seat to gain acess to the forward-most location of the rear pair of bolts. Your allen wrench is "L" shaped and even the short portion of the "ell" is too tall for the seat in the bottom-most position. Maybe you CAN cut off the short length of the "ell" but you better be careful, if you strip the insides of the hex, there is a big problem as you can't get vise grips or such on the outside edges of the recessed hex cap screw, it's burried inside the "U-shape" of the seat rails.

If you ever do this again...start with the rear pair.

If your seat up/down power switch is not working at all ... I can't help you, but if only one direction works, reverse the wire leads to get the proper "lift".....then when you are done, reverse the power leads again back to where they were originally.

shnewberry · 08-23-2010, 12:13 PM

I am working on an '84 with an interior that looks like a barn-find. One of the problems I encountered is that coins had found their way into the tracks, making it nearly impossible to move the seats to the point you can reach the bolts. I had to get really medieval on the seat and remove the seat bottom cushion in order to drop straight down onto the bolt through the springs. Since I am re-doing the upholstery, it was not a really big deal.
Hopefully you will find a less drastic solution.

Digman · Digman's Garage

Thanks for the tip Shnewberry. After unbolting the seat from the rails I was able to lift the seat enough to get some light down the rail and see my 25 cent problem. After a game of Operation I was finally able to extract the problem coin.
Thanks for all the help everyone.

MH911 · MH911's Garage

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