SoDiezl350

Thread updated with pics of drivers side seat installed. Notice I painted the brackets black prior to installing the seat. I think it looks a lot better. Enjoy!

I am making this thread a bit prematurely as I haven't installed both seats yet but I have managed to install a seat out of a 2008 Viper ACR into my passenger side with a functional seatbelt.

Some of you may recall me mentioning that this is something I was working on well I am very close to being complete. I originally purchased the pair of seats thinking they were going to fit in without any problems as I had seen pictures of them installed in Vettes. My plan was to simply modify the seat brackets to allow them to bolt to the C5s floorboard.

As is is usually the case the swap was more complicated than I imagined and at one point I was tempted to sell them. The seats were too wide to fit in the car and the main culprit was the 2nd seat belt reel located near the floor of the car.


When I was doing my test fitment I was pretty irked to find that the seats would fit fine if the seatbelt system on the C5 was like every other car where the bottom attachment point was simply a bracket and not another seatbelt reel.

This still left me with hope, because I knew if I was able to eliminate the bottom reel I would be able to fit these excellent seats. After a bit of research, I found out that the C6 did not use the same seatbelt mechanism and it in fact attached directly at the bottom instead of using 2 reels.

I purchased a set of C6 Z06 (oooh yea! lol) seatbelts on ebay and got to work modifying them to work in the C5. These required a decent ammount of modification but once I had them I knew that the swap would work.

I already have the brackets made for the drivers seat I just need to swap the modified C6 seatbelts so that I can fit the seat in there as well. I plan on painting the brackets black so that they don't stand out so much. The seats leave plenty of leg room and headroom as they can moved all the way back and haven't been raised above what they normally come at.


Without further boring you with the background story, I will let the pics do all the talking.

SoDiezl350

I would like to follow up the previous post with a clarification which might not be obvious just from the pics.

I did not use the Corvette seat brackets but the original brackets that came with the Viper seats. The rear mounting ears are a perfect mate to the corvette floor board studs so all that was needed was an adapter to allow me to attach them to the front.

What you see in the pics are the adapters I made and attached to the Viper brackets. The nice part about this is that nothing gets cut up or modified to where I can't go back to the previous setup without simply unbolting the seats and swapping them out. The downside is that the power seat functionality is lost on the driver's side.

Mister Peebody

Nice work!

jrose7004

Those will look great in your Vette!

ajg1915

21St CMC down in Texas use to do these installs aways back.

The seats look great.

peter pan

Wow that is going to be a great upgrade for you

VCUFAN

Yeah, just met a guy in Jacksonville a couple of weeks ago that has some Viper seats in his Z16. Not sure what model they're from but they look pretty close to these. Nice job on modifying them to work in your car.

SoDiezl350

Updated first post with pics of drivers side and painted brackets.

corvettedaddy11

ChromeC5

Very Nice Job!

WKMCD

Very nice!!!!!

You could find an upholstery shop to replace the Viper panel.

doublec4

Looks like they belong in there!

tomlink

What was the cost for the seats and mods? Thanks.

c5inphila

Your seats look very good in your car. One thing i would do is put large washers on the rear nuts, the holes on the seat bracket look big.

SoDiezl350

I paid $900 shipped for the Viper seats. They came out of an 08 ACR with 5k miles on them. The Z06 belts costs $60 and I bought those from ebay. The brackets cost about $20 in steel and hardware.

SoDiezl350

That's a good idea! I was thinking of it yesterday as well while installing them.

SoDiezl350

Haha, I know! I'm glad it's not in bright red letters but would love for it to say Corvette instead. I've found some Corvette patches that I could put over it but something tells me that would look tacky. I'll have to think of something. I can live with it for the time being. The appearance and fit of the seats is well worth the out of place logo.

Vetteman Jack

Nicely done and way to be creative in finding a solution to making the seats work.

00Corvette

They look pretty close to Corbeau A4's...are they "soft" or "firm" as far as the foam padding underneath the leather?

Thanks,

Donnie

SoDiezl350

Having owned a set of Corbeau CR1s I can make some comparisons between the two seats.

The biggest difference between the Viper seats and the Corbeaus is the weight. The Viper seats weigh a lot more. They are considerably heavier than the Corvette seats as well.

That might sound like a downside but what I've found with the seats is they are built like a tank. They dont flex or bend in any direction unlike the Vette seats or the Corbeaus for that matter.

I find the Viper seats' reclining mechanism is of much higher quality than either the OEM Vette seats or the Corbeaus. They exhibit no deflection under high loads, which gives the driver/passenger a feeling of much higher quality. This also goes for the slider mechanism. The sliders on the Corbeaus are pretty wimpy and don't lock the seats as firmly as I would like. These seats feel like they are bolted directly to the floorboard.

This solidness is very noticeable at all times. Getting in the car, accelerating, braking, or turning, the seats feel very stiff and it gives a very reasurring feeling.

To answer your question about the firmness of the cushions, the bolsters are very firm but the cushions under the alcantara is quite soft. I would rate these seats as comfortable for medium sized individuals but probably too small for larger people.

I would say the stock Corvette seats are much more leisurly and I would probably prefer them for long road trips. That being said, the feeling of control is much higher with the Viper seats. It really is as much a handling mod as much as suspension or tires.

The bolsters are also positioned such that they support your arms when you hold the steering wheel at 9 and 3. Some people might find this irritating. Once again, it's a nice feature for spirited driving but it limits the mobility of your arms.

To make an analogy, when I was selecting what shocks/springs/swaybars to replace the base suspension I was somewhat concerned that the Z06 springs, Bilstein sport shocks, and C6 Z51 sways would result in a ride that is too harsh. I read reports that people immediately removed the Bilstein shocks due to how stiff they were. What I found is that with that setup the ride was exactly where I wanted it. Firm but not too harsh for daily driving.

My concerns were similar with these seats. I liked how comfortable the OEM seats were, and I didn't want to sacrifice all comfort for performance. I think the compromise of the aformentioned suspension upgrade is very comparable to the compromise I achieved with these seats. The performance increase is much greater than the sacrifice in comfort. IMO the Z06 should have come with these type of seats from the factory.

I mentioned earlier that I didn't lose any headroom. This was based on observations in the passenger seat but having sat in the driver's seat, I would say I lost about 0.5" of head room and 1.0" of leg room. Viper owners frequently complain that the seats come positioned too high and modify the seat attachment tabs to allow the seat to sit lower. As of now I'm not planning on doing this modification, but I will see as I drive the car more whether I miss that 0.5" of headroom. Where it really comes into play is in the steering wheel position. With the Vette seats at the lowest position I kept the steering wheel 1 increment lower than what I can with the Viper seats. I had enough knee room with the Vette seats to not bump the wheel as I move my leg to apply the brakes. In these seats, my knees will touch the steering wheel when I apply the brakes.