The AUSubaru.com.au Forums

I want to get the front seats of my RX Turbo rebolstered.
18 years of butts being dragged across them has casued the foam to collapse.

The problem is that I don't simply want to add more foam in, I'd rather get metal pieces put into sides of both the base & the backrest & then add foam.
This will offer much mroe support & last a lot longer.

I did want to re-use the 97 WRX seats I've got in my current car, but the upholsterer says that the RX turbo material can't be used on that seat

Any suggestions?

The best person to ask would be Fury as he is a motor trimmer (retired)

The material in the original seat , cant be used, as it will be much weaker (being years old) than new. If you can get matching material, fine, but chances are zip ! ( you could try, but would probably fall apart within a year or less) this should get another 10 years without much drama.

Maybe what you can do is keep the centres, ( about the same load on them as now) then have the outside faces and sides re made with different material, but do the back seats as well so the whole car will match.

Unless you get the seats engineered, don't weld metal to the sides, as your insurance wont cover personal injury. Just get a very high density foam insert, much less hassels, cheaper and safer, with probably better support. This is the most common way of doing this in a performance trim shop. If you want further details, no probs

Considering the amount of mods happening to the rest of the car, engineering is going to be a must anyway.
I want to save the check material, but the vinyl on the sides is going to be replaced.
The rear seat is also going to be done because the RX sedan rear seat material is not going to fit the wagon rear seat.

Is there somewhere you can recommend to do the metal inserts? The extra foam (the amount I'm thinking of won't be enough on its own)

If you can wait till Tue / Wed Ill check out a couple of places for ya. I'm still in QLD ( work related ), flying back Tue Lunch.

Do you have spare check material? how far are you doing it up? like really good or full modded interior?

Depending on what I have going, I might have a look at it for ya and come up with a plan..

I live about 1/2 drive north of Gosford

That'd be awesome.

I'm in no hurry, there's a lot of other work to do to the car first.
The interior is going to one of th last things, though I may have to do the front seats cause of the torn vinyl material in the side of the driver's seat (not sure if it'd pass blue slip or engineer)

I don't have a licence at the moment, but get it back shortly (15/12) so I'll arrange to come up to show you after then)

My RX passed blue slip with torn vinyl.

I've got a lot of work to be done on my car & I'd rather get it engineered once, it's a lot cheaper.
Otherwise I would get it done later (plus its easier to do now while the car is still off the road)