Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

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ClarkTheShark

Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by ClarkTheShark »

Well, finally decided on what seats I wanted and made an investment. I ended up going with Corbeau Sport Seats in black vinyl.

'Azruss' had done a good post several years ago on how to modify the seats and have them ride a little lower. Turns out, Corbeau completely changed how they make the bottom of these seats - which means I couldn't completely rip off his idea. :P Corbeau sells a mounting bracket that's specifically for our cars. They are $100 a piece and are about .5 inches thick. Being thrifty, I decided to make my own brackets.

Image

Went to home depot, bought some 1.5"x.125" welding steel. after some measuring and deliberating, here is what I came up with.

After the bracket was made and test fitted to the seat, I opted to spot weld the slider rails (factory fiat) directly to my newly fabricated brackets.

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Also was able to score some new 8x1.25 mm allen head bolts to use to attach the rails to the factory mounts on the floorboards. Here is the finished product:

Image
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Ptoneill
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Your car is a: 1979 Fiat Spider 2000
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by Ptoneill »

Looks very nice, what is the part number for the seats?, do they offer leather?
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Pat
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azruss
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Your car is a: 80 Fiat 2000 FI

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by azruss »

Nice mod. It looks like it might even sit lower than my seat. The style I bought was available in cloth, vinyl, or leather. I chose cloth because it didnt want my skin melted to the seat in the Arizona furnace. they are also available with a lumbar support or seat and back heaters, but not both. I ordered the heaters. They are a high/low and low will cook you out of the car.
ClarkTheShark

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by ClarkTheShark »

Ptoneill wrote:Looks very nice, what is the part number for the seats?, do they offer leather?
http://www.amazon.com/Corbeau-Sport-Bla ... sport+seat
Daniel

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by Daniel »

nice looking seats I'm green with envy :mrgreen:
wizard124
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Joined: Mon Oct 29, 2012 9:27 pm
Your car is a: 1980 124 spider FI
Location: Sheridan, WY exSan Rafael, CA

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by wizard124 »

nice work. I have been wrestling with this same issue. More pics please.

How is the finished seating height? Any clearance issues? Are the Corbeaus a major comfort/support upgrade from the stock seats?
ClarkTheShark

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by ClarkTheShark »

The seats barely fit. If they were a half inch wider, they wouldn't work. The back is much taller (~7 inches taller overall), but still clears the convertible top just fine. From the back of the car with the top down, it makes the entire car look like... A Miata.

That being said, they did raise me up in the seat about 1 inch. But that's probably because the old foam in my factory seats were completely shot. The new seats are very firm and offer a ton of support from side to side on your rib cage. very comfortable.

I would recommend the seats, but be prepared to wrestle with them a little bit to get them to fit. I'm 6'0", and the top of my head is about 1 inch from the top of the windshield in my driving position.

Ill post more pics this weekend.
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v6spider
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Your car is a: 4.3L V6 Powered 1972 124 FIAT Spider
Location: Mount Vernon WA

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by v6spider »

Nice work Clark! Not a fan of vinyl but they do look nice.

Cheers!
Rob
http://www.v6spider.com
4.3L V6 Powered 1972 124 FIAT Spider
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toplessexpat
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Your car is a: 1976 Spider 1800
Location: Houston, TX

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by toplessexpat »

So I did a bit of looking into these having been dissuaded on the SpiderPoint seats by the ridiculous cost of purchase and getting them stateside ($1400+!)

It looks like Amazon sell them for 598$ a pair, in a whole range of appropriate colors (Black, Tan, "Spice", etc), and also in Neoprene, Leather, Vinyl and Vinyl/Cloth. The brackets are also there at $100 each.

Now I'm seriously considering them - but wouldn't mind seeing some photos of them both fully installed if anyone has them?

Cheers

Andy
---
Many classic Fiats - it's a disease!
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ClarkTheShark

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by ClarkTheShark »

toplessexpat wrote:So I did a bit of looking into these having been dissuaded on the SpiderPoint seats by the ridiculous cost of purchase and getting them stateside ($1400+!)

It looks like Amazon sell them for 598$ a pair, in a whole range of appropriate colors (Black, Tan, "Spice", etc), and also in Neoprene, Leather, Vinyl and Vinyl/Cloth. The brackets are also there at $100 each.

Now I'm seriously considering them - but wouldn't mind seeing some photos of them both fully installed if anyone has them?

Cheers

Andy
The first picture in the thread is of them fully installed, ill take a few better shots this weekend. Also, I'm actually really glad i made the brackets, they are lower profile than the Corbeau ones, and you can use your factory rails - so you don't have to buy corbeau rails.
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azruss
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Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by azruss »

Now I'm seriously considering them - but wouldn't mind seeing some photos of them both fully installed if anyone has them?
Search Corbeau Seat install on this site. The seats have been lowered 1.5" from these pictures. These seats are cloth.
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phaetn
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Your car is a: 1974 Fiat Spider 1800
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Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by phaetn »

My Corbeau Clubmans have come in to upstate NY and I'm going to drive down to pick them up this weekend.

I, too, have foregone the Corbeau bracket and will have a local welder make up a custom bracket and weld the factory slider right to it. I'm somewhat concerned that I am going to screw up the measurements and then it won't all line up... How easy is it to do?

Cheers,
phaetn
1974 CS1
32/36 DFEV; CompuTronix ign.
9.8:1 c/r; 40/80 intake cam w/ Isky springs
Vicks' SS header & adj. cam pulleys
A/R's progressive coils, Koni Yellow dampers
205/50-15s on CD-66 style rims
Momo wheel, Corbeau seats w/ 5 pt belt
pics and HD vids
ClarkTheShark

Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by ClarkTheShark »

I didnt do anything fancy. just used a tape measure and a little drawing. The mounting holes in the Fiat seat rails actually have little steel things that move around about a half an inch, that allows some forgiveness in measuring.

show your welder/fabricator my post. he will probably do it as good or better than i.
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phaetn
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Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by phaetn »

Will do, thanks.

I picked up the Clubmans yesterday and took out the original seats today since it was so sunny and warm (that is, right around the freezing level). :) There was a rear screw that was a real pain to get out on the passenger rail -- I tried dremeling the head, drilling it to use a screw and bolt extractor, nothing seemed to work. Finally I just gave up on it and went on to the driver's side. There a front one stripped a bit, but I used a bigger extractor this time and it came out relatively quickly, as did the whole seat. Emboldened, I went back with the bigger extractor to the passenger side and finally got it after some more work. Happily, none of the receiving threads on that floating loose piece you mention seem damaged so that's a good thing!!

My bracket will have to be a wee bit different than yours: The Clubmans are a bit narrower, I guess, so the bracket will have to extend slightly beyond the bottom of the seat. Hopefully it won't be too visible -- maybe I'll have to spray paint it black.

Thanks again and I'll post some pics when it's done.

Cheers,
phaetn
1974 CS1
32/36 DFEV; CompuTronix ign.
9.8:1 c/r; 40/80 intake cam w/ Isky springs
Vicks' SS header & adj. cam pulleys
A/R's progressive coils, Koni Yellow dampers
205/50-15s on CD-66 style rims
Momo wheel, Corbeau seats w/ 5 pt belt
pics and HD vids
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phaetn
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Re: Corbeau New Style Sport Seat Installation

Post by phaetn »

I saw a local (and recommended) welder today -- quite a character!

He recommended a metal supply store that specializes in small orders so I picked up some flat bar .188 hot rolled steel. It's thicker than the .125 and the same size as what's on the Corbeau seat at the mounts. Turns out it was actually cheaper than at Home Depot. $25 for the lot.

I ended up overlapping the corners to get some extra welds in there for security -- I think three or four per corner. The welder charged $20 for the two brackets.

Image

I checked and rechecked measurements today and will bring in a bracket tomorrow for him to weld on the actual rails and use his press for the holes for the seating mounts. I'll just do one seat at first, so in case I screwed up I can still always put a stock driver's seat back on. :) As far as I can tell it's a 15 1/8" centre for each parallel rail, plus there's that wiggle room with the floating receiving nuts.

Image

Like you, ClarkTheShark, I've used #8 1.25mm allen head bolts to fasten the sliders -- they are a lot easier to get rather than trying to fit a Phillips screw driver down there, especially when the seat is in the way!

It's going to be a tight fit for sure and the seat is very, very different than stock. I hope it's still comfortable on long rides!

Cheers,
phaetn
1974 CS1
32/36 DFEV; CompuTronix ign.
9.8:1 c/r; 40/80 intake cam w/ Isky springs
Vicks' SS header & adj. cam pulleys
A/R's progressive coils, Koni Yellow dampers
205/50-15s on CD-66 style rims
Momo wheel, Corbeau seats w/ 5 pt belt
pics and HD vids
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