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TJ Seat Swap

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PCO6

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Discussion starter · #1 ·
I needed to deal with the front driver's seat of my '03 TJ which was looking pretty bad. The options were to reupholster, recover or replace them. I chose to replace both seats with a set from an auto wrecker. My basic criteria was black vinyl seats from a 2 door of some sort so they would fold forward. Seat heaters would have been nice but weren't essential.

I must have looked at 150 cars at the wrecker I went to. The 3rd car I saw seemed to fit the bill (except for the heaters) but I had to look at them all ... "just in case".

I got a set out of a '03 Hyundai Tiburon and they turned out great. The hardest part was to determine what parts from each set of seats I needed. In the end I was able to keep both sets of seats in tact and build some simple brackets to make the Tiburon seats fit. The only modification I had to make to either seat was to cut away a small amount of plastic from the base of the seat on the driver's side to clear the Jeep seat belt mechanism. It made no real difference to the appearance.

Here's how they turned out ... very comfortable!
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And from the back. Even got a mesh storage net.
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Simple bracket made out of flat bar. I will remove the seats, paint the brackets and use grade 8 hardware. They can now be removed easier than the original seats.
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Nice thing about this type of head rest is that I can hang a back pack (or ?) from them. This is my old first aid kit from Scouting.
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Discussion starter · #7 ·
Neil F. said:
What did you do for the sliders?
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I used the sliders from the Tiburon seats and they work fine. I wanted to keep both sets of seats in tact vs. using bits from each.

The only thing I have to do is make a cable pull so the passenger's seat flips forward like the original did. That will be pretty straight forward.
 
Discussion starter · #8 ·
esad_b said:
That's one clean looking floorboard for a Canadian Jeep!

Your jeep must be one of the few without any leaks.. lol.

Hello from another Canadian! :wave:
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This Jeep ('03) spent its winters in Florida ... until I got my hands on it! This will be its second Canadian winter. It's a daily driver and it makes regular trips to Krown Rustproofing. :laugh:
 
#10 ·
PCO6 said:
This Jeep ('03) spent its winters in Florida ... until I got my hands on it! This will be its second Canadian winter. It's a daily driver and it makes regular trips to Krown Rustproofing. :laugh:
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I hear ya, our winters can be some hard on cars. One of the reasons I do not drive my Jeep in the winter :)

tucsonzj said:
nice! a guy in my group used wj seats in his tj. Loves his heated seats in the winter haha
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I did the same thing a couple of years ago in my TJ, I didn't opt to install the power features tho just to not have wires running everywhere.

But you can see some pics in my build thread - the seats look real nice and certainly a lot better than my old 97 seats..
 
#11 ·
tucsonzj said:
nice! a guy in my group used wj seats in his tj. Loves his heated seats in the winter haha
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Heated leather WJ seats are the most plush.:shhh:
 
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#12 ·
PCO6 said:
This Jeep ('03) spent its winters in Florida ... until I got my hands on it! This will be its second Canadian winter. It's a daily driver and it makes regular trips to Krown Rustproofing. :laugh:
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As a FL oldfag, I just want to make a quick comment about 'florida' cars. Depending on the distance from the ocean a florida car can suffer worse damage than one from "up north". The salty mist for the ocean gets into places that can't be removed no matter how much rinsing. And often the condo rinse water can be brackish as well.

I had a company ford taurus that had the heater core fail from corrosion and the car was regularly serviced. It lived outside near the beach for three years and was driven normally.

I'm not saying there aren't a lot of nice cars in sunny florida. But it's not a guarantee no salt damage.

</end Dennis miller> lol
 
Discussion starter · #13 ·
^^^ I don't know specifically where in Florida it was but I was told by the vendor that it spent 4 months there and 8 months here since new. Anyway, I'm happy to say it has virtually no rust on it.
 
#15 ·
Nice! I put leather ZJ seats in mine but will probably get something else eventually. They took care of the 2 main issues I was concerned with (needed extra lower back lumbar support and wanted leather) but came with other issues instead. Between being slick leather and having less lateral support than the factory seats I feel like I have to hold onto the steering wheel to keep from sliding out on corners lol. They also aren't as plush as I expected, actually kind of firm. I'm thinking a lot of that could be dry hardened leather though. I've been thinking about something more like you have. As for heaters, I didn't feel like trying to get mine to work so I just put some aftermarket waterproof heaters in mine. Works great, it was 27 degrees (yes, Fahrenheit, -2.7C in Canadia) on the way to work today and I was fine with no doors, a thick jacket, and gloves.

 
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Discussion starter · #16 ·
Those look great GringoLoco. :thumbsup: I know what you mean regarding the change in lateral support. I found the original seats in mine to be OK in that regard and in general they were fairly comfortable. Mine is a Rocky Mountain Edition and it had the all vinyl seats. It was hard to find originals to replace them with so I just went for a wholesale change.

It's been interesting with the new (to me) seats. They have a LOT more support and have given the Jeep a whole new feeling when driving it. The thigh support for general driving has been a bit hard to get use to. I don't need to be "hugged" when getting groceries but it's nice when speeding (ha ha) through interchanges. I had a 2 hour (each way) mostly highway drive a few days ago and they were very comfortable for that distance.

If anyone would like to post what they have done please feel free to so. There are lots of options and it's helpful to whittle them down to see what works best for you. :2thumbsup:
 
#17 ·
PCO6 said:
Those look great GringoLoco. :thumbsup: I know what you mean regarding the change in lateral support. I found the original seats in mine to be OK in that regard and in general they were fairly comfortable. Mine is a Rocky Mountain Edition and it had the all vinyl seats. It was hard to find originals to replace them with so I just went for a wholesale change.

It's been interesting with the new (to me) seats. They have a LOT more support and have given the Jeep a whole new feeling when driving it. The thigh support for general driving has been a bit hard to get use to. I don't need to be "hugged" when getting groceries but it's nice when speeding (ha ha) through interchanges. I had a 2 hour (each way) mostly highway drive a few days ago and they were very comfortable for that distance.

If anyone would like to post what they have done please feel free to so. There are lots of options and it's helpful to whittle them down to see what works best for you. :2thumbsup:
Click to expand...
Mind me asking what they charged you for the Tiburon seats?
 
#19 ·
How much lower back lumbar support is there? I need a LOT of lumbar support. I can't even use any of the aftermarket Mastercraft or anything seats because it feels like it forces me to slump. Usually the only seats I like are in full sized American trucks. I always have the power lumbar cranked all the way out. I actually screwed mine up a little when I did my aftermarket seat heaters. I ripped all the pillow top foam from the back of the leather so the heater would be up against the leather, and lost a bit of lumbar. I'm going back in later to stuff some extra foam behind the heater to push the lower back section back out. I thought about trying to overstuff the side bolsters but don't know if it'll help yet.
 
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Discussion starter · #20 ·
GringoLoco - The lower lumbar support is good (for me) and it's adjustable. The seat bottom also has a height adjustment which pivots up and down from the front of the seat. I't's been a long time since I used aftermarket seats (I used to build and race off road cars) and I'm sure they have come a long way since then but I was happier to go with OEM seats from a car I could sit in and try out.
 
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