Fitting Saab Seats

[Cookster]

Just got a set of Saab 9-5 seats thought it was going to be fairly easy to fit them but it looks like it's going to take a bit of fiddling more than I thought anyway.

The passanger swivel seat should be OK will have to grind runners off base & bolt it through, will have to do away with swivel seat on drivers side as it will sit too high, still a little high on original runners think I will have to have some offset plates made up as centres are different.

Probably woulden't have bought them if I had known.

Anyone else fitted these seats who can give me any tips please?

[72BUG]

There's a guide in the Wiki up there ^

[peasant]

There's a guide in the Wiki up there ^

Wrong Saab though ...the Wiki guide is for Saab 9000 seats

[brickinit]

Hi

I bought some Saab 9-5 seats too as everyone seemed to say they "bolt straight in" which isn't quite true is it!

Started, as you said, with removing the passenger swivel base and grinding/ cutting off the runners (8 short welds on each), cleaning off the remenants of the welding and painted up these areas (blew 2 cutting discs as they seemed to get drawn into the gap between the runner and base so just a word of warning!)







It was then just a case of centralising the runners on the base, pop marking the position of the Saab runners, drilling and mounting the new seat with the bolt heads on the underside to make sure the seat would still swivel - easy side done in about 1 1/2 hours including brew making and head scratching but not watching paint drying





Drivers side was a bit more involved as I wanted the leg / steering wheel clearance to remain similar so I removed the seat runners by drilling out the spot welds (using a spot weld drill) and making new holes, sadly including through into the wheel arch, which I'd hoped to avoid

Made up spreader plates and waxoiled everything so, hopefully, no ill effects from rust in the future and I would use the forward of the rear two mounting bolts on the drivers door side as you'll be quite close to the expansion tank with the rearmost of the two!

Getting the nut / bolt / washers on the inside took a bit of fiddling but I would take the battery out at the beggining of the job as it gives you much better access (or start training a ferret to get in there for you!)

Took over 2 hours on this side but drilling the spot welds carefully was quite time consuming at first till I got the hang of the depth needed (I was using little 1 - 2 second bursts on the drill trigger with quite a bit of pressure on the back of the drill) and you can just make out a colour change as the drill goes through the weld in most cases as the join between the runner and body was a little rusty as you can see in the photograph











Although it was a bit of a fiddle we are really pleased with the seats as they are very comfy and the charcoal colour goes really well with the grey interior we have (and the starkley contrasting orange Sainsdury's bags), and the passenger seat is like a big armchair when swiveled to the back!

Right, just off to pop a 911 engine into our 76 Bay as, apparently, they bolt straight in too!

Hope this helps

Mr B

[Cruz]

The beauty with saab 9000 seats is you don't have to destroy the old runner track so you can put original captains seats in when they come up cheap and your leather seats have cracked and split like mine did after 5 years of my a*** sliding over them as I go in

[Cookster]

Cheers Mr B

You deserve that Stella!

Kinda had the same idea as there's no other option when it comes to fitting these seats because of centres & steering wheel clearance, wish I had got 9000 seats but hey ho! too late now.

Will be doing the same as you this saturday, I got the beige ones to match my interior they will look great once fitted & I'm sure it will be worth it in the end.

They do look really comfy my last T25 had buckets seats fitted by previous owner these will be lush compared to them.

Again thanks for your great advice the spot weld drill bit is a good tip.

Will let you know how I get on

Cookster

[brickinit]

Hi again Cookster

Just noticed your based at sunny Hunny - we stayed at Searls in the van between Christmas and New Year in 2008 but every where else seemed to be shut!

We skipped UK camping last year in favour of NZ but we plan to follow the Norfolk coast over Christmas this year starting at Burnham Deepdale - should give the seats a good test

Good luck withn yours

Mr B

[helga592]

Your thread is great realy uesfull Ive just been to the local scrapy and bought myself a set(£50). Theres some electricry wires underneath do i need to worry about them? Ive taken the seat belt wire off.
Cheers Nik

[Aidan]

brickinit your battery clamp is on upside down

[brickinit]

Hi Nik
Didn't worry about the wiring as not bothered about the heating (as yet!) and they are manual adjusters - air bags sound a bit scarey too but think mine had been activated as the roof had been cut off to donor car by the fire service!
In the other thread re "Saab seat help" started by Iceworx, he is looking at the wiring side of things and I also found this link added by Fritz a while ago which may help

http://www.saablink.net/forum/showthread.php?t=27647

Thanks for the shout re the battery clamp Aiden but I've looked at a couple of others on the site and they seem to be the same - how is yours mounted please?

Mr B

[Cookster]

Got seats fitted look & feel great, had spot welds & welds on my runners, struggled a bit with M10 bolts would have been easier with M8 I think but I managed not worried about heated seats but I see no reason why you coulden't get them to work.

50 sqid was a really good price I paid £125 for mine plus carriage! but hey ho I'm happy

Mr B hope you have a good trip this xmas lots of nice pubs round the coast & treat yourself to some brancaster mussels if you like that sort of thing, hope the weathers not too bad were off to gran canaria to find some sun hopefully, should have the kamper on the road by march can't wait planning on getting away most weekends done a 3000 mile trip round europe last year that took a month though.

bit quiet with work at the mo so been the working on interior also fitted some new sounds & prepping body for new paint also having the old graphics re-made to keep it original.

Again thanks for the advice

Cookster

[brickinit]

We paid over £100 for ours from a 1995 9-5 and they were a bit manky but cleaned up really well

It was a specialist Saab breaker in the Midlands and he said all the seasts normally go for some form of camper conversion and the prices were going up from an average £50-£80 last year to over £100 for decent leather this year!

Mr B