I Got Lucky !!
 

Stopped by the local insurance company salvage yard yesterday and asked about a 60/40 bench seat with folddown armrest from a 92/98 Silverado for my 72.

I bought a set of buckets & console from a wrecked 96 Silverado ext cab last year but decided the bench with folddown armrest might work better for me seeing I cant find a set of integrated shoulder belt seats from a 99 up Silverado. The partsman said he had a 60/40 bench with folddown armrest and when we looked at them discovered someone had pilfered the folddown armrest from the seat which makes it useless. Right beside that seat was the ones pictured below. I couldn't believe my eyes. I've had my name there on a waiting list for a year for a set of these seats. The partsman said they were probably on hold for someone and when we checked they weren't. A little haggling ensued and they werre loaded into the back of my Burb.

Has anyone installed a set of these in their truck. Just curious as to how easy/hard they were to install and if any modifications were needed.

Re: I Got Lucky !!
 

Nice seats but be very carfeul in how you mount them. The floors of our trucks are not even remotely close to being able to handle the loads of a seat with integral seat belts. Reinforcement to the area where the front mounting bolts are will be required. Even for a stock bucket truck they had reinforcements in that area and that isn't with integral belts. The rear will probably be OK with minor mods. Similar strengthaning to a bucket seat trucks rear inner mounting will be required for just the seating portion of the loads and attaching to all of the other stock belt mounting will be reqired for the belt loads. Trust me on this as I do this stuff for a living.

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Nice find :cool:

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They would work good in a burb, to big for a truck though.

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[QUOTE=Deuce]They would work good in a burb, to big for a truck though.

In the August or Sept 04 Classic Trucks Magazine they did a test of most popular seats for our trucks and these according to them were ideal and a great fit.

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Hi Ray, thanks for the info. I remember you mentioning about the safety aspect for these seats on a thread. I stopped at my buddys shop yesterday to show him the seats and he says I need brackets to do it right and he will do them for me. He's an old bodyman and has his own frame shop now..

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They work just fine in our trucks :cool:

You may lose a little legroom or relocate the fuel tank, but their are plenty of 67/72 trucks running the 99+ seats :D

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Nice!

Great input, Stingray!

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I've got a rear mount gas tank from ECE that I'm going to install before I put these seats in.

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I have them in my truck and they fit great. I do intend to re-inforce the floor mounts. Stingray is right on.
Larry

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HI Stingray do you mean like a tapping plate on the outside bottom of the floor. thanks

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How about some pics of them installed in your truck??

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Check with Yukon Jack. He did a real good setup of those seats in his 69. I believe he has a link showing how he braced them up and all also.

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I got a 60/40 seat for a $100 and sold it for $600. That was a easy chunk of cash. I new they were worth lots but I did not think I would get $600.

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A reinforcement plate would be reqired at the rear inboard mounting points but the front would require some kind of tube or channel structure that ties to the rockers and/or front cab mounts as well as the z channels that run fore and aft about mid floor. I wouldn't know whether this kind of mod is at all sufficient without pull testing it and ruining a truck

Another method of making the floor survive is to make a sub structure that pushes down on the truck frame after the floor deflects about a quarter of an inch. This would stop the downward rotation of the front of the seat as it tried to submarine through the floor.

Very special consideration is given to floor strength in the vehicles that are originally supplied with integral belts. It is impossible without a computer model of the vehicle and a bazillion dollar computer or destructive testing of actual designs to know for sure what the performance would be of such a seat installed in our trucks in any manner short of attaching them to a rolll cage. I said it about a hundred times on this board that integrel belt seats just don't belong in ANY vehicle they were not originally designed for. If you're not in an engineering profession or are a race car builder and don't already know exactly what kinds of mods are likely to be sufficient then you shouldn't be installing the seats. An autobody frame guy would have a real good idea as well as to what parts of the floor would need reinforcing and how to do it.

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I have a good friend that has been in the auto body business for a long time. I am going to get him to make some suggestions as to how to best set up some under cab support for these seats. I will dig around and see if I can find my pictures.
Larry

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Silverado Seats

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I removed the rails at the bottom of the seats. Allowed more room under the steering wheel and made the fit easier.