Dodgy seat mechs :/

[Adams-Sideways]

Hey guys, i have these seats in my 1986 325 . . .



On the outside they are in good nick but the mechs are useless. If i grab the top of the seat i can rock it back and fowards about 6 inches each way, not good, and when i lock the seat in the high position and sit on it, it falls straight back down. All in all very tired mechs!

Question is, can this be fixed or does this mean new seats

Any help/remedies would be great

Ad

[Rav335uk]

Not worn, sounds like something has broken.
Only 2 nuts and 2 bolts to undo and take a look

[E30BeemerLad]

I believe the mechanisms from the comfort style seats are the same as sports seats, so the stuff can be swapped over.

Someone confirm or correct me as I have 2 comfort seats in my garage which I keep meaning to strip for the mechanisms so i can chuck them out, if they are no good I'll throw them very soon

[Adams-Sideways]

I took them apart and oiled everything but couldnt find any bolts to check etc?

[Brianmoooore]

Mechs. are the same and easy to swap over, but it sounds like the seat in question may have a broken frame (MOT test failure).
The seat backs are held onto the base by two 8mm cross head bolts. These tend to work loose, and if the resultant movement is ignored, and the bolts not tightened (five minute job) the twisting force on the seat back soon leads to a broken frame.

[Adams-Sideways]

Right im gonna check these bolts tommorow, do you just have to take the back cover off to access them?

[Brianmoooore]

Back cover has to come off.
Tilt the seat back over as far as it goes, and you'll see two small cross head screws at the bottom. Take these out then pull out the bottom and lift at the same time.
The screws that work loose are around a third of the way up, and might be partly hidden by flaps of loose fabric.
Chances are though that the horse has already bolted, and the seat frame is cracked, leaving the catches on either side out of sync. with each other.

[clipper]

Worth adding that if there is nothing broken and you do just have to tighten the crosshead screws than tighten them f.ing tight, than some more, as they will only work loose again if not.

Also I always thouth that comfort seats had only one gas spring on the backrest while sports had two, one on either side... maybe wrong though.

[Ajsingh]

Sport seats also feel as if they sit lower than comfort seat. I deffo found a differance when i changed my seats

[daimlerman]

There's more information here;

http://www.e30zone.net/e30zonewiki/inde ... orts_Seats

But the hinge mech is the same on all seats...4door/2 door/sport/comfort.

Differences between 2/4 door is that a cable/operating mech is added for backrest tilt.

Sport seat front tilt/theigh bolster are two seperate mechs added to the base frame.

The possible damage mentioned above is to the top of the hinge mech,it bends through 90 degrees and tends to snap on the bend.

[asmith88]

same happened to me i took the seats out the other day as the drivers side was sitting at a back breaking angle,

took it out there was one of the bolts missing, found something similiar not the seat is lovely and tight,

[Adams-Sideways]

thanks for all the help, will investigate today then report back

[polsta]

sounds like yours have defo broke, the little bracket that holds the bolt

comfort and sport brackets do differ due to the extra ajustments

if broke, buy some whole mechanisms (adit prob has some) and swap the whole lot over, not a hard job to do

[Adams-Sideways]

Took the worst offender (drivers seat) apart today as described above and could not see anything broken, put all back together with those screws that secure the backrest very tight! And it still wobbles bad as ever, seems to be movement coming from under the plastic hinge covers on the sides. Are there bolts to check there? Also if i stand above the seat directly with it out of the car I can see the backrest is at an angle like the hinges are out of sync kinda?

[kev76]

sounds like mine. it was the bar that runs between the back rest tilt adjusters . it runs under the seat and holds the seat cover down .mine had broke at one end.

[DaveD]

why not do the job properly...go into the wiki link that daimlerman posted open the link in there...its a step by step guide... and dismantle the seat totally and reassemble...it isn't hard

[Adams-Sideways]

That is all good and well, and is pretty much what i have done but struggled to find anything broken

[daimlerman]

Some seat problems are less obvious until the thing is in bits....

[Adams-Sideways]

Ahhhh i see, right will crack on taking them FULLY apart then how much do a decent set of sport mechs go for?

[Brianmoooore]

Usual place I find they break is around the weld that holds the short piece of thick walled tube to the relatively thin sheet metal of the side of the frame, near the top left of Daimlerman's pic. of the base.
The damage can usually be successfully welded if you're half competent with a MIG, and without stripping things down quite as far as in the pics.

[Adams-Sideways]

got a mate thats handy with mig so could be done

[DaveD]

not very much if the covers are in a poor state...its the carriage that costs. they are usually repairable

[Adams-Sideways]

right will get cracking with these asap