Passenger seat repair

[Hurco550]

Just picked up my 79 spider last week. It needs a little loving here and there but is a pretty solid driver. One of its issues is the bolts tore away from the seat frame on the passenger side seat back. Through some research, I found that that is a common problem in these seats. I decided that rather than trying to find a whole new seat, I would just fix it, and here is how I did.

Started by removing the upper seat cover.





This is what I found after removing the cover. Evidently this was broken for a while before I got it. The wholes were very wallowed out.



Instead of just welding nuts to the thin metal, I drew up a bracket in auto cad with the two bolt holes at the proper spacing. I had the piece water jet cut and I tapped the two holes m8 x 1.25, the same as the original mounting bolts. The material is .25" thick and the other hole is just for clearance of the plastic cover clip.



I welded the piece in location, being sure to quickly cool the steel with a wet rag as to not melt the cushioning foam.



The seat is now back together and rigid again. I wonder how long it will be before I have to do the same to the drivers side =)