adjusting front seat

[EDLO]

I have a 1965 Riviera with manual adjusted front seats. My question is can the seats be made to adjust back further. I am 5'9 and the leg room puts my knees on the console. the passenger seat is the same way. I would like to know how anyone else has solved this

[Jim Cannon]

Yes.

My Dad is 6' 2" and moved the seat base back on our car 2" to have more leg room. He did it by cutting hefty strips of metal about 1 inch wide and 3 inches long (6 of them) and drilling holes 2 inches apart in them. He bolted each strip where the seat mounts in the floor and bolted the seats to the strips. He used flat head screws and countersunk the holes in the strips for a flush fit.

I have hear others say that they flipped the front seat mounting brackets around and bolted them back down to give some movement back. I guess that also requires doing something in the back where the third mounting bolt is on each side. I don't know that detail.

[Conroy]

I am 6'3" and have often thought about remounting the drivers seat in my '64 Riv. After I read a discussion about this before, a very good point was made about safety. Heaven forbid we should ever wreck our babies, but one must consider the thought of being a projectile through the windshield with a seat strapped to your tush. I have not yet seen a good and safe idea for remounting the seat. I am sure there is a solution but I have put off researching this until I replace my carpet. I would be interested in hearing other ideas.

[tim63riv]

Conroy,

I think Jim's method sounds fairly safe as long as the metal that is used is of significant thickness, like 3/8th or thicker. Besides, the seat belts are mounted to the floorpan, not the seat!

Tim

[Conroy]

Yeah, I thought of the seat belt thing later, but it was a funny visual. Never the less, I would want to make sure the seats are secure. It seems like I saw some tracks made up that would accomplish the same thing but I don't remember where I saw them.

[EDLO]

Thats the best i have been able to come up with. I did try to work with the tracks but no luck there. Does anyone know if the 4 way seat gives more leg room. Has anyone tried to install a 4 way into a manual seat car

[toomuchvinyl]

Hi Edlo, I have a 4-way power seat in my '64 and I can honestly say that the legroom with it is probably no better than what you have. My wife and I are both 6'1" neither the driver or passenger seats go back far enough to suit us. I've been watching this post since you created it to see if anyone had relocated their front seats and how they did it. It's definitely a modification I want to do. Jim's reply earlier sounds reasonable to me. The only other reference I have seen about this was a profile of a custom Riv in a past issue of the Riview. I have considered trying to contact the owner and ask how he did his. Maybe there's someone on the Forum who hasn't seen this yet that might reply with more suggestions.

[imported_buick5563]

OK, I'm only 5' 11" but I couldn't handle the grandma seating position on my 2 dr. sedan, so lemme see if I can explain how I did it on my 55. Obviously this was a bench seat conversion, but this should work on a bucket seat car, you would need to do it twice, however.

I drilled out the two spot welds that held each of the tracks to the mounting brackets ( the floor part). I then moved the actual seat track back 2" back on the floor mount then welded it back together (I bet if you took it to a Midas you could get them to weld it for nothin') . Therefore, the seat uses the same floor mounting spot (which was necessary on my 55 since the floor wasn't flat), but the seat is about 2" back. I realize this is on a bench seat, but my Wildcat had enough legroom for me. I will try to further explain if anybody needs it.

Mike