MIGHTYM0USE

has anyone modified the factory seats in some tasteful manner to accept shoulder harness pass-thru?
thanks.

rabrooks

mine work well just going around the side of the seat. I did make a small slit in the seam in the seat bottom to bring the crotch harness thru. If I ever replace it, I can remove the cover and have it sewn back up with no evidence of it being there.

Mike.D

If you don't have a sub belt, you might as well go to the track with no seat belt or helmet. Do you want to be making insertions into a seat for a lap belt? Why not just buy a track seat to change out when needed?

MIGHTYM0USE

i want to go through the seat. i dont want my shoulders to come through the harness in a crash.
i have a solid plan, will update. yes of course sub belt too

i like the stock seats.

AzDave47

Make sure you get a sternam strap for the shoulder belts, too.

MIGHTYM0USE

i agree that strap is a good idea if your shoulder harness goes around the seat, but i dont see it being used in drag racing?

von zoom

I had two seat backs made for my Z06 which is a simple switch out with the factory seat back. The bottom was cut for the sub belt, covered with a seat cover altered with a cut for the belt.

I don't think you should attempt to use a harness with goes around the seat.

Marradind.com makes them.
vz

DaOtherOne

Nice job

Jawnathin

I thought I read about someone cutting some slits in the seat back and adding some harness bezels through them. I think the harness bezels were from a Viper. I can't find the thread for you.

skxf430

That seat looks well done and very comfortable

Some of our local event coordinators would not allow that seat since it isn't FIA certified to be used with harnesses.

HOXXOH

Check post #12 for pics. http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c6-t...in-my-car.html
Sometimes you Z06 guys should visit the C6 Tech forum. It's not just for plain Jane Vettes. We race too.

von zoom

Sorry, but I was in a hurry to post last night, and was not real clear about my set up. The seat backs were made to spec to replace the factory ones. I even had factory heaters installed. The bolsters on the back are increased in size to aid in body lateral support. No air bags on the side, so you will need a dummy sensor to replace the factory one so the computer will think the air bag is still there.

The seat bottom is still factory, except for the seat cover. The sub belt is attached behind the seat on the floor and routed between the seat support wires (they have to be spread a little to allow room for the belt to fit) and through a cut in the foam of the seat. A new seat cover replaces the factory which has a slit for the belt to run.

The shoulder harness is connected to a Shark Bar, and the lap is connected behind the seats on floor attachments. FYI, the floor room behind the seats is minimum so it becomes a thight fit, and some effort is required to get the seat adjusted over the belts.

And yes, you will need a seat belt end clip to insert into the factory belt connection so the computer will think the factory belt is connected and air bags will be armed when using the harness system. (I use the factory belt for city driving.)

A word to the wise, if you are not adapted to doing this kind of work, I recommend seeking help prior to attempting. I have two left hands when it comes to this, so I had it done, and it took some doing by the folks who did it for me. :-)
vz

MIGHTYM0USE

von zoom, very nice seats! a bit radical for my taste.
i searched, and didn't find the above links, but thank you very much guys, thats why i asked
hoxxoh did pretty similar to what i was thinking! i'm going to make a nice aluminum trim ring for the back like this:

here is what i'm working with:


and i make these myself:

von zoom

Wow nothing like Mightymouse with what you are doing. Looks great. Only concern will be the height of your cut through for the shoulder harness. They should be even with the top of your shoulder for proper support and protection. I wanted my Z06 to still resemble stock, and even be easy to return to factory, plus I could not find any race seats which were comfortable that would fit in the car.
Good luck with your project. Ready this season?
vz

Bill Dearborn

Why would you do anything but a full aluminum race seat in a set up like that. You have everything needed to do a proper seat. A solid mount for the seat, a solid place to mount the back brace and lots of room to properly run shoulder harnesses and sub belts. There are many things wrong with using the stock seat for this application. First, the back isn't strong enough to take severe impacts from your body flying back on the rebound from a head on incident, second, the seat bottom springs are vey close together and sub belts can become frayed by rubbing on them, third you really want the sub belt mounted so it pulls directly opposite of the force being applied by the shoulder belts (its purpose is to hold the lap belt on your pelvis so the lap belt prevents you from submarining), fourth the openings you can achieve for the shoulder belts are far too small. You want the shoulder belt to travel in a straight line from your shoulder to the belt mounting location. If any part of the seat pushes the belt up or down on its way from your shoulder to the mounting point that part of the seat becomes part of your safety harness. Since it isn't designed to take the thousands of pounds of force applied to the belts during an incident it will fail and probably will increase the amount of upper body travel allowed by your harness. Increased travel means increased chances of hitting something hard.

As I said in my post in the other thread this job needs to be done correctly or not at all. A lot of organizations that conduct track events will not allow modified stock seats and 5 or 6 point harnesses due to the huge safety problems experienced with those setups over the last 8 or 9 years. In most cases where 5 or 6 point harnesses have been adopted to stock seats of any car make people are far better off with the stock belts than with the race harnesses.

However, it is your butt on the line and not mine so you can do what you want to do just as long as I don't have to clean the goo up afterwards.

Bill

von zoom

Check here.
www.marradind.com

You will find them very helpful.
vz

MIGHTYM0USE

thanks for the link vz very nice work they do.

bill i don't know what to say, i appreciate your concern, and promise you won't have to deal with the goo? if you have some schematic that illustrates your geometry concern that would be helpful.

but i will be using the stock seat

Canuck

Might be worth a look here:

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/auto...r-harness.html

MIGHTYM0USE

cool fix, tho i agree with just foam supporting the bezels they could be pulled down and squish you.

in the c6 seat back there is 7/8" of composite, much like popular composite race seats (with harness slots)

Thomas F. Manalio