Can I purchase a new car seat for a Subaru car from the 80's? Are there aftermarket suppliers? I'm looking for the best quality that will fit into a Subaru DL.

keep all the hardwear for the seats you have in it and get legacy ones from the yard. as far as i know, you have to keep your mounting brackets and sliders as i do not think anyothers are interchangeable....

Legacy seats are not easy to install - it requires cutting and welding as do most seats other than the originals. It would help if you told us what you are putting them in??

 

GD

with my 86 GL i had the drivers seat was toast, so i was working at aaron's wrecking yard at the time so i picked up a set of impreza seats, used the GL brackets after unbolting them from the stock seat, the front 2 bolt wholes match up so i put a nut/bolt in there, then just redrilled the 2 rears and just tossed another set of nuts/bolts and bolted them back into the car.

 

they do sit higher then the stock seats, or was that from the stock seats having no foam left

 

legacy seats cant be THAT different.

 

im thinking about putting a set of WRX front's in for my offroader

DL wagon

Year??? There's a big difference from EA81 to EA82

1981

with my 86 GL i had the drivers seat was toast, so i was working at aaron's wrecking yard at the time so i picked up a set of impreza seats, used the GL brackets after unbolting them from the stock seat, the front 2 bolt wholes match up so i put a nut/bolt in there, then just redrilled the 2 rears and just tossed another set of nuts/bolts and bolted them back into the car.

 

they do sit higher then the stock seats, or was that from the stock seats having no foam left

 

legacy seats cant be THAT different.

 

im thinking about putting a set of WRX front's in for my offroader

 

I'm worried about the roof clearance as well. But I have "reinforced" the existing seat with knee cushions and a sacro-ease, which raises the seat back to what probably is where it's supposed to be.

Your best fit is going to be another EA81 seat, or the Isuzu Impulse seats fit rather well. I have a set in my Brat. But any other subaru seat is a *************** to fit into an EA81. I had to do quite a bit of cutting and welding on the Gen 1 Legacy seats in my 84, and they still sit too high.

 

Those of you who have put seats into EA82's.... yeah that's quite a bit easier since the EA82 has more room to work with, and uses the more modern mounting style like the legacy and impreza - where the inner rear mount is on the transmission hump. The EA81 is flat to the floor, and the plastic stuff gets in the way on the EA81's a lot more as there is very little extra room.

 

GD

Your best fit is going to be another EA81 seat, or the Isuzu Impulse seats fit rather well. I have a set in my Brat. But any other subaru seat is a *************** to fit into an EA81. I had to do quite a bit of cutting and welding on the Gen 1 Legacy seats in my 84, and they still sit too high.

 

Those of you who have put seats into EA82's.... yeah that's quite a bit easier since the EA82 has more room to work with, and uses the more modern mounting style like the legacy and impreza - where the inner rear mount is on the transmission hump. The EA81 is flat to the floor, and the plastic stuff gets in the way on the EA81's a lot more as there is very little extra room.

 

GD

 

Wow, what an interesting strategy. What year Isuzu Impulse should I be looking at, and is it a "weld free" job?

Wow, what an interesting strategy. What year Isuzu Impulse should I be looking at, and is it a "weld free" job?

 

Actually, it can be weld free, yes. Three of the 4 bolt holes line up nearly perfectly. although the rails are about 1" too narrow when bolted to the Impulse seat. You can counter that in a couple ways. I made some small "adaptors" to move the inner rail out about 1" to line up to the floor. Initially I didn't weld anything, but I later welded the inner rear bracket to the seat as it was easier than using a self-tapping screw for me at the time. It can be done either way tho.

 

I can't recall the exact year, but I think it was an 88. They are not easy to find tho.

 

GD

Easiest option: Mid 90's Saturns (the really common sedans whatever they are called)...

The front two bolt holes line up directly. The back two mount brackets dont line up but a 1" spacer and a couple bolts thru the floor and youre done. The seats are comfy, not too wide and only very slightly taller. They have more adjustments than a Stock Subaru seat as well.

Downside to them is about 50% of the cars that I have found in the yards with these seats are bolted into the Saturn itself with an Internal Torx bolt and most people dont have torx bits. You can buy a cheapie set at Advance Auto parts and alot of other tool places for under $10. If I remember correctly it was a type T45 but it might be a few off of that.

 

2nd best option...likely your drivers side is shot and passenger is mint. If thats the case go to the yard, get a passenger seat that matches your drivers seat. Then go to a farm/fleet type store and get a hog ring plier and some hog rings, take apart the passenger seat from the yard and your driver seat and swap the foam and upholstery from the yard seat onto your drivers seat.

 

3rd best: Find an auto upholstery shop and have your seats redone. Its surprisingly not that expensive especially if you remove your seats and take them to the shop and prepay for the work. As a bonus you can update to todays upholstry appearance and durability. I got a set from the junkyard that somebody had this done to and they are the most comfy I have ever had in a Subaru INCLUDING late 90's legacies, outbacks, etc. Certainly not as good as the 05 and up though. The pair (came out of a Brat) cost me 31 dollars.

Idea one and three are intriguing for my situation.

 

The biggest problem with my car seat is it no longer goes completely into the upright position. It's like it slipped a notch and now won't go upright all the way.

Mid 90's Saturn seats huh? There's a rip in the driver's seat and some of the metal edges are starting to dig into my sides. Gonna have to go find that Saturn S with that tan interior in the junkyard. (I'm sure there's plenty abound)

legacy seats were actually easy to put in.Just swap the old rails for the new ones. the only hard part is removing the legacy seat rails (they were revited in or something.) but other than that there was only a one inch width differencewhich was easily fixed.

they are extremely comfortable and look aweso!

The problem with ALL of the options listed thus far is they sit WAY too high. The whole reason many of us want to yank the old seats is they sit too high to begin with - add a Legacy seat into the mix, and watch me smack my head on everything. The reason I went with the Impulse seat is that it's VERY thin. As in 2" or more lower than the stock EA81 seats. The whole bottom of the seat is like 4" thick at most. They are quite comfortable, and I'm probably going to have them redone at some point. Take a look at the legacy seat picture above, and notice the location of the door speaker in relation to the seat bottom, then take a look at mine:

 

For me they work quite well. On the other hand my GF, and my ex GF (both 5' 3" or so) are unable to drive it without sitting on a phonebook or pillow to reach the pedals. The seat sits so far back and so low, that even all the way forward, they can barely drive it with a lot of effort. The seats are using the stock impulse locations for the rails. I love them, but short people beware.

 

The Saturn ones seem like an interesting option - I'll have to look at those and see if there's a way to make them lower.

 

 

GD

If you did want to go for the saturn seats and need the special tool but dont want to buy it, you can go to AutoZone (not sure if they have them everywhere, but they have them on the west coast anyways...) they have a free "borrow a tool" service, and i believe that they have a few sets of those guys that they will lend you for your trip to the yard.... just a "soob owner" (aka CHEAP) option....

Impreza RS seats will fit also, that is what I have in my 87 Brat. Same as WRX and the most comfortable seats I have ever sat in. Front inside tab bolts in, cut ear off inside rear and drill to bolt to seat belt mount, rest were tabbed over like Tsutomu did. Outside bolts missed by 1-inch over stock, no rail switching. Took maybe 5 hours to install counting taking the old seats out. They have been in three years now and came out of a new 2002 that had 5 point racing harness seats put in for rally racing. At 5'9" I really can't tell any difference in height over stock or it has been so long since they were installed that I have forgotten there was a difference. I can't think of any other seat I would want over them, 2002 did not have side airbags in the RS, any WRX seat should fit the same also. I believe they are thinner than the seats in the 93 Legacy we use to have but closer to thickness of the seats in 2003 Legacy my wife has.

I have a set of Legacy LT seats in my Brat. I shifted the rails over the 1in rather tat using the option tsutomou used (might be a tad unsafe). Its a little more labor intensive, but the results are nice. I dont suggest using these seats if you are over 5'7, for the reasons GD stated. They work perfect for me, I'm 5'4.

Another option no one has mentioned, are XT6 seats. These will put you lower in the car, I know someone who has them in his Brat and he is over 6ft.

I suppose if one pulls a seat from another car they should sit in it first to make sure it's comfortable. Could you imagine just seeing what looks like a decent seat and forgetting such a minor detail as actually sitting in it first before pulling it.

 

How about this idea.

 

I pull the Subaru seat out of my car. I find a wooden platform and reattach the seat to the platform by creating a seat template in which I can actually fasten the seat to the wooden platform.

 

I pull the subaru seat off and then take the wooden template with me when I go Seat hunting. If a seat fits on the wooden template, then it will fit on my subaru (this is starting to sound like Cinderella). I just don't know how complicated the wooden template would be to make nor how dimensional it would have to be depth wise.

resurrection of old thread: regarding the saturn seats, will the rear work fairly easily also?

The answer was written above:
 

... The back two mount brackets dont line up but a 1" spacer and a couple bolts thru the floor and youre done ...

 

I bet that the Spacers must be done with piece of Tubing,

 

similar than the ones used to drop the engine's crossmember on lift kits.

Kind Regards.

ok thanks. I read that line but had interpreted incorrectly I guess thinking it was refering to the front and rear mounting points of the front seats. But now after you point it and re-reading it I get it now thanks. 

You're Welcome!

 

Please share a couple of Photos with us, if you install Saturn Seats on your Subie.

 

Kind Regards.

On my 86 XT GL, someone rear-ended me, and my driver's side seat went back, and now won't go all the way up properly.  I'm assuming something just got bent bad and needs bending back into shape because the seat goes back and forth - just not all the way upright.