Advice on Racing Seats
 

Hey all. I am hoping someone can give me a little direction on racing seat options. I am on a budget, but want to be safe. I have been looking online for ideas to use on a first gen RX-7 (1980), but have struck out finding anything recent.

I am 6’2” – 215lbs, so headroom is something I am looking to gain. So, I think a side mount style would be best? I see T3 has some seat brackets, but I am unsure of what seat to go with them. The market for seats is kind of intimidating if you don’t know what you are looking for.

Piggybacking off this, I am also looking to upgrade the seatbelt to something more secure – possibly a 3-point harness (if that even exists). My seatbelts don’t lock when you tug on them. I’m not sure if that is normal or if they are broken. So I don’t have confidence that it would hold me if they were asked to do so.

The budget does not allow for a cage or roll bar. The car is not going to be used on the street. It will be primarily used for autocross and occasionally the drag strip. My budget goal is to stay below $500, if possible. I just need something safe - comfort would be nice, but not a necessity since I'm not taking any long road trips in it.

Any advice is well appreciated. Thanks

A three point harness is what you have from the factory, one of those obvious things you don’t realize until some one points it out.

using three point harnesses also isn’t recommended with a bucket seat since it typically puts the lap belt over the soft part of your guts instead of your pelvis. It could do serious harm in an accident.

if you want maximum space while really sticking to a budget, but have a good quality seat, some of the aluminum road race seats like kirkey might be the best shot. You can get fabric covers and supplement them with foam from a fabric store as needed.

definitely hard to get something that fits, looks good, is safe, and comfortable.

buy a genuine name brand seat, Recaro, Sparco, Bride, etc, the chinese knockoffs do not have to go through the crash testing and other certifications, so they are sketchy at best

Aluminum. Kirkey or UltraShield. Bolted directly to the floor. For autocross and drag racing only, you should be good with something like UltraShield Spec Miata seat. If you are road racing, I recommend at a minimum one with shoulder support. Full halo is even better, although the halo only comes into play in a crash. The Kirkey 71 is what is currently in my ITA RX7. Previously I had the equivalent of a "Spec Miata" seat. All those options should come in under $500, except the halo 71, which is about $550. I think a racing buddy might still have a 16 or 17" Kirkey economy road racing seat that came out of his Panoz. If you are interested I could see if he still has it and how much he wants for it. The seat (if he still has it) is in San Diego, but I will be coming up to Thunderhill just before Thanksgiving for a race and could bring it.

Carl

Thank you all for the advice. I’ll do some more research on what was shared.

I probably could have explained more about the seatbelt situation. I understand the factory seatbelt is 3-point. What I am looking for is something that holds me better. Because the seatbelt doesn’t lock when tugged (like late model vehicles with ALR), I guess I don’t trust it to hold me if need be.

In my mind I was thinking of something that used the factory mounting points but could be manually cinched down like a racing harness rather than the auto retractor from the factory.

I see there are some devices Available that lock in the lap belt section of the factory seat belt. But it doesn’t look like it would do much for the shoulder belt.

Thanks

If you're looking for a harness-style restraint system, you're going to need a cross bar for the rear mounts of the harness to ensure proper angle to your back - so in the event of an accident you don't wind up paralyzed due to the straps being mounted to the floor or at too severe of an angle. You can accomplish this with a harness bar or a roll bar behind the seat, which will eat into your budget heavily.

On another point, I'm running Corbeau seats in my car on their double-locking slider brackets. I'm 5'8" and just under 200lb (short and thicc!), and the way that the brackets mount the seats in my car makes it almost impossible for me to fit in the car without a helmet on. No way could I fit with a helmet. Granted, I'm using fixed-back seats which don't allow for reclining whatsoever. I'm planning on either cutting out the floor pan mounts for the seats and modifying the sliders to push the seats down at least an inch, or going with a side-mounting system so that I can angle the seat backwards a bit and fix the seat to the floor. The seats also contact the center console & shifter surround, as well as the e-brake which is super annoying. Either way, the Corbeau system definitely leaves some room for improvement to say the least.

I'd be very careful with "budget" options, especially for road course HPDE style driving. The factory belt and seat and chassis is a complete system. Fixed back seats and full roll cages and 4/5 point harnesses are a complete system. You don't want a harness and a fixed back seat without the roll cage. In a rollover, your body cannot move aside if the roof of the vehicle collapses. In a side impact, your body cannot flop over as the door pushes inward. Both of these scenarios aren't an issue when you run a full cage.

That's not to say you can't upgrade the seat. Just stick with 3 point belt and a seat that reclines...as it will snap backward before snapping your spine and still allow your body to move to the side if necessary.

Harness bars (not full cages) are acceptable for Autocross but should not be used on the street or HPDE road course events. People use them...but that doesn't make them safe. The one that T3 sells is basically a tent pole. I'm not counting on that to save my life.

In the end, a 3 point belt is fine for the g forces a mostly stock 1st gen will see. You'd have to run some pretty hefty brake upgrades to feel like you were getting pulled out of the seat under braking.

I don't like seeing people use a racing harness in a car with out a roll bar. In a roll over the harness will hold you upright in the seat and without the protection of a roll bar you are prime candidate for a neck injury or worse. And in 30+ years of autox I have seen a few cars roll on their tops at autox events.

Aluminum racing seats from Kirkey, Ultrashield, etc. are intended to be mounted to the floor and to have the seat back bolted to a roll bar. Otherwise they are pretty bendy. FIA approved racing composite racing seats don't need to be mounted to a cage. Frankly I always found OE FB seats to be pretty good so not sure I would replace them.

For your belts....
The cheap solution is a CG Lock. It is a clamp that allows you to tighten the lap portion of the factory 3 point seat belt so that it holds you in your seat. I use one in my 2017 Mustang GT when I autox in CAM C. On Federal 595 rs-rr racing tires my car generates 1.09 lateral Gs and the CG Lock keeps me planted in the seat nicely.

The other solution would be to install the lap belt from a racing harness in your car. I did this in the 85 Mustang I also autox. Just unbolt the factory seat belt from the floor, slip the lap belt under the factory belts and bolt every thing back together. On the street, use the factory belts. At the autox/HPDE use both. Find a road racer that has an aged out racing harness, they will probably give them to you.

Then there is the free method. Before latching your factory seat belt, twist it 5-6 times and then connect it. It won't retract anymore and will hold you in pretty good. I do this when I am instructing someone in an autox from the passenger seat. Works pretty damn good and doesn't cost anything. Usually you have to play around with the belt to figure out the optimum number of twists to make it tight.

I don't have any seat knowledge, but just to easy your mind a little the SA seat belts (79-80) do not lock when pulled and they are designed that way. HOWEVER, they do (or at least are supposed to - mine do) lock when the car decelerates quickly. So while they won't catch like new cars do, they will still hold you if there is some hard braking. I know you probably won't use them with whatever you're new setup is, but at least for now it might be some reassurance. And just to note, FB's lock both ways (pulling and decel). You can always swap to an FB belt if you end up staying with relatively 'factory' style seats.

I 100% agree with mustanghammer.

That being said corbeau Forza fits perfectly. It's also comfortable and one of the few seats that isn't too wide to fit.
I'm 5'9 210Lbs.

I can share pics of fitment if your interested.
Their bracket and sliders worked fine for me but Im now using bracket's I made.

A lot of good information you all shared with me.

My biggest reason for wanting to change my seat is for headroom. With a helmet on, my head is pretty much touching the roof. I’d be happy to use the stock seat if I can somehow gain a couple of inches by removing the sliding mechanisms and fixing it to a locked position that works.

Benjamin4456, thanks for the reassurance on the factory belt. I’ll consider using them with the CG locks mustanghammer recommended.

I will look some more for seats or ideas and maybe check back with you all for some feedback.

Thanks!

Would the Corbeau Forza work for me using the factory belts and no roll bar? I like the price.

https://corbeau.com/forza.html

Stick with a reclining seat like the A4 or Evolution if you aren't installing a roll cage.

So I think I am going to try the Corbeau Evolution X. It is a fixed back seat making it little less narrower. I think I will give Corbeau's sliding brackets a shot. If sits too high with them, then I will try a Planted brand seat bracket and eliminate the sliders to gain that clearance.

Thanks all, I'll let you know how it works out.

The only reason to pick the Evolution X over the Evolution is if you have a C5/C6 corvette where the Evolution doesn't fit because of the reclining mechanism. Here's the Evolution installed in an AW11 MR2 which is similar size to the RX7. There are no clearance issues in either car for the reclining mechanism.

Attachment 740433

I’d be okay to give that a try, but Corbeau only seems to sell the reclining Evolution as a pair. I’d like to keep the cost down by buying only one seat. I can’t say I plan on having passengers in the car.

Need some more advice
 

So I have some good news….and need for more help.

I contacted Corbeau to enquire on purchasing a single LH Evolution seat. Luckily enough, they had one that they could sell me. So I went ahead and purchased it along with their sliding seat bracket. And I think it’s going to work. Shout out to chuyler1 for steering me towards the standard Evolution model, because the reclining feature is nice and probably needed.

I need some feedback on my floor and the seat bracket Corbeau sold me. There are some differences with the angles of the bracket legs and the shape of my floor. The seat bracket legs (mounting tabs) are bent at 90*. The angle of my floor is different. The frame cross rails on the car are at 70*, except for one which is like 80*. So I cannot correctly bolt the bracket to the floor. I was suspecting that Corbeau sent me a miss labeled bracket for another car, but they are insisting that their 20-year old design has been built this way forever at 90*. I see no evidence that the cross rails have been changed or replaced, it all looks OEM. I also think that the seat sits too far to the outside of the car. It really needs to come in about an inch or so.

I will give Corbeau that the seat frame is very close otherwise. If they were bent slightly different the bracket would bolt in as intended.

So my question is know whether Corbuea provided the wrong bracket, or is my car a freak? The latter is a possibility. I’ve learned that some early ’80 and ’79 have some small differences with frame components (I learned this previously). My driver seat also seems to have had the factory sliders changed or swapped around. When I first removed my seat some years ago I learned someone made a mod to relocate the inner slider further out by drilling a new hole in the front cross rail and adding an extension to the back rail.

After playing around with the seat, I think I would prefer to omit the sliders to gain a little more head room and too also move the seat inboard a little. So I am considering getting a bracket from a company called Planted. But before I order, I need to figure out if my car is a freak or not.

Thanks for your input in advance. Your help is much appreciated.
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...dbf8295b52.jpg
Difference in angles between bracket and floor mounts.
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...5e09264e1c.jpg
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...4e57825991.jpg
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...875e83e910.jpg
Seat looking pretty sitting on the floor.
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...f786be73a5.jpg
The hole drilled in the rail and extension. The seat I pulled out wad anchored at these two locations.

I ended up grinding off the rear tabs of the bracket, then using a spot weld drill to remove the rear stanchions in the car. I used some large bolts and a small stack of washers to mount the bracket through new holes drilled to make it just high enough to slide back all the way. It gives the seat slightly more rake, which for a tall guy like me is perfect. I didn't change the way the rails mount and it slides back all the way to the cubby. I'm 6'3" and I don't even have it all the way back. I just barely fit with my helmet on.

Most other seat brackets are going to mount the same way, if you are worried about head room you gotta cut out those rear stanchions.

to anyone who might see this, I was really inspired by a go-kart seat I drove on an aborad trip as just a nightly outing. I was 14 at the time. I'm nearing 16 now and have a project 83 GSL, and I want a seat that has the retro look that goes with the car, but also that side gripping feeling I got in that kart. I was looking at the classic bucket seat from Corbeau with a 4 point harness from them too. Im using this as my daily, god help me, but do you guys think this is a good option? (I'm putting in a cage as well, I know what happens when you bolt a harness to the floor)

Yolo7- I'm very interested as I'm 6'2", I've had those Planted seat brackets in my ebay cart for over 6 months, and I like the Corbeau seats,. So you ground the rear mounting points out of the car, cut the rear tabs off the corbeau bracket and did what? Drilled and bolted the rear through the 35yo sheetmetal floor? Ouch, I don't think I can do that. Every change I've made to the car could be reversed by a kid with his dad's hand tools. I can't bring myself to start drilling holes in the body. But I want to see how it works out for you and if you can comfortably drive with a helmet. In the stock seat my hair brushes the roof, so I can't go AutoXing until I get a different seat.

Yolo7, I have the same corbeau seat frames and they look exactly the same as yours. I had to modify them to fit properly. Can’t remember exactly what I did, it was a few years ago. I just remember being not so happy about spending so much on them and they didn’t fit properly. There weren’t any other options I could find at the time though..

So to clarify my question and what I have done:
1. I haven't cut anything out of my floor for the seats. I am 99.99% sure its the way it left the factory.
2. The Corbeau seat bracket does not match the shape of my floor.
3. Does everyone else's floor mounts look similar to mine? About 20* off of straight up and down?

I've reached out to Planted. The rep is telling me the photos on their webpage are the actual part. And it clearly shows the mounting tabs are angled and not straight up and down. So I will go out on a limb and pony up another $140 and see what I get. Planted says their brackets will work directly with Corbeau's sliders. Not sure if I want to use them, but its an option.

I'll be sure to report back and try and be detailed about what I am doing knowing there is at least one other person I'd be helping.

Thanks

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...734ab7de27.png
A photo of the planted bracket.

Have you at least put the seat/bracket in and sat in it, without bolting it down? The planted bracket isn't going to solve the headroom issues. you won't get the seat mounted far back without the sliders. First, it is near impossible and certainly frustrating to bolt it down, and second, you need the sliders to move the base of the seat behind the bracket for the proper leg room.

headroom sucks for anyone with a long torso. I have my seat on the floor pan and it still isn't low enough. I basically ground off the spot welds to remove the pedestals and bolted through the floor

Yolo7, can you compare the thickness/heights of the seat bottoms, between stock and those Corbeaus? The Evolution specs out at just 2.5" under your butt, but I'm curious how that compares to an OE seat with 100k miles on it.

I guess I'm wondering if just swapping to the Corbeaus would give you any noticeable head room, before resorting to cutting out the pedestals.

They won't. When you sink into the stock seat, your butt is below the rails, that doesn't happen with aftermarket seats, or at least not with corbeau seats. You will not gain headroom with an aftermarket seat unless it's side-mount style. You have to cut the rear perches out and mount the bracket to the floor.

So I have set the Corbeau seat on top of the rails and I clear with the helmet and some room. A lot better than the seat The car came with. I know the mounting plate will be a litter higher, but it’s worth the shot. I’ll find out soon enough because I order the Planted Mount last night.

I add again, that the seat my car with isn’t the OEM seat. So I can’t say how an OE would would compare. Below are pictures of the seat the car came with. You can see the outboard slider does not sit flush with the seat frame. This, along with the relocated mounting points for the in board slider are how I determined this.

I really don’t know how it’s all going to work out. While being taller is a perk for a lot of things, it sucks when you like sports cars. Especially the smaller Japanese types. But I have to give it a try. I’ll cross my fingers and let you know.

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...17613128b.jpeg
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...de778dd50.jpeg

Yes. Your floor is original.
Factory rails do not have 90 degree angled attachments. It would have made fabricating seat rail adapters way too easy.

Well I'm glad I sub'd to this thread. The only reason I was looking at aftermarket seats was to get my butt closer to the floor. If I have to remove the rear floor mounts to get another inch of headroom I'll do it but keep the OE seats and flatten the rear of the brackets. Drilling holes through the floors really skeeves me out though. Wonder if the sheetmetal floor is strong enough to just braze mounting studs onto.

Are you going to be the only driver? Seems I read this won’t be on the street. If so, lose the sliders/flat brackets and bolt to the floor. Remove the factory rear humps, use temporary shims(I used small plywood squares) to prop the seat to the perfect sitting position, then fab your own brackets. I took a quock look at your 5.0 build and you for sur have the skills,tools to do that. That’s the best way to get the helmet clearance. You may find that the steering wheel placement may not be perfect so this would be a good time to consider a removable mount that is easy to adjust with spacers.

Since you you are close by, you are welcome to a cage I have that was cut out of a wrecked Pro7 car. You can use the back half for a roll bar. You are also welcome to some out-of-date cam lock belts I have. Not sure if you can use them for auto-cross or not but they are in fine shape and you could at least use them for mocking up. Happy to give them to a fellow NorCal first gen builder.

I used washers that are about 2" in diameter and bolts that came from a seat belt mounting kit. Bolt went up from the bottom with one washer, then inside the cabin another large washer and nut. The seat bracket went over that with another nut and washer. That gave me the clearance to slide the seats all the way back without getting caught on the carpet.

What did you do to the rear mounting tabs on the seat bracket to bolt flat to the floor? Just bend them flat?

I cut them right off of the corbeau bracket with a grinder and drilled a hole on each rear corner of the bracket to use for mounting instead.

Mmmmmmm... smaller Japanese types. :fingersx: good luck. I'm subbed as I need all the head room.

https://www.cobraseats.com/seats.html?pid=24&cid=3

Compatable with oem lap belt
Looks mint
Not sure or price

Thanks for the info. Looks like it’s a couple hundred more but I like how it’s a side mount. I’ll see how things work out once my new bracket shows up tomorrow.

Let us know how you go. Pics of the fitment too?? I'm finding it really hard to find a seat that does cost a arm and a leg, will give me more headroom and work with the oem belt.

Here's photos of my Corbeau installation.
https://www.rx7club.com/build-thread.../#post12261236

Okay, so I finished putting the seat in. There was a lot of good information shared by others, some of which was very true.

To start, the Planted seat bracket is a really nice piece. The four mounting legs are a match to the car and bolts in easily. The two rear leg angels are a perfect fit to the car. The front outer was a scant off, and the front inner leg angle a little worst. Once you torque the front down, the bracket gives just enough to match the outer angle and bolt flat. I figure this should be good enough for my application.

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...e27fac1e8e.jpg

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...856a68aaf0.jpg
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...4012d14486.jpg
The front inner leg angle a little off.


I ended up using the Corbeau sliders. I may get rid of them later, but decided to use them to aid in the ease of installation. Because I require the seating position so far back, the seat bracket is about three inches short of being able to directly bolt to the rear seat fastener location. If eliminating the brackets, I could probably get some ¼” steel stock and use it as a spacer/extender. I think I would only gain about another ½ to ¾” if I did. I don’t think this would be too hard to bolt in, there is enough space between the seat and rear cross brace for access with the seat tilted forward.
The sliders lined up perfectly with the Planted bracket. The Planted brackets allows some side to side movement to position it to your liking, so I moved the seat as far inwards as I could to get me further from the roof side rail. I picked up some new hardened bolts and washers from the hardware store and it all went right in.

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...759724fc0d.jpg
The slider in my seating position.
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...35044eba9f.jpg
The seat bolt whole is a bout three inches off from the bracket for direct mounting.
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...ad40a7d741.jpg
The bracket is slotted to allow left to right adjustment.

In the end, I think I gained around ½ to ¾” over the seat I had. I am having to recline the seat back further than I wish. Depending on my posture, I can completely clear the roof, but it take a little bit of slouching. I like the way the seat feels, so I can live with it to start and change it later if I want.

The pedals are easy to reach. But the steering wheel needs to come closer to me. And the shifter is a tad on the far side. If I hadn’t done the V8 swap, the stock SA shifter location might not work so well (Ford T5 sits a few inches more rearward). So I will be looking for a new steering wheel with an extension and maybe a quick release. If anyone knows a semi affordable adapter/wheel I’d love to hear from you. I’ve started browsing the Grant product line.

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...7459a24a5a.jpg
The finished product.
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...f9866920d6.jpg
Knees hit the steering wheel.
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...da292ca062.jpg
Distance to the cross member with the seat at the rear most adjustment.
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...12eea230c7.jpg
I think I could get a enough access to direct mount if need be.
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rx7...a72e939dd4.jpg
Distance to the cross member with seat back in driving position. Taken from the inside where the cross member is raised for driveshaft.

If anyone wants some other specifics or photos I can try and get them for you.

How tall are you?

I'm 6'4''. with a lot of it being in the legs and with the standard setup of the car it was a struggle, knees caught on the wheel and it was too far away if I set the seat so that my legs felt right.
I ended up getting an eBay special deep dish steering wheel, I think 350mm (14"), this had two benefits, the first was that it pushed the wheel closer to me, which meant that with my arms fully outstretched then my wrists would rest on top of the wheel with my hands able to drop behind it. Which is ideal for me.

Being closer to me with a reduced diameter also gave me leg room as it pushed the wheel past my knees. I'll probably upgrade this wheel to something better quality in the future, but for a cheap purchase just to test it out, its worked really well.

Headroom I use FC seats and my head just clears the roof, if I have any kind of hairstyle that isn't flat to my head then I can feel it brushing the roof! I think I would struggle with a helmet so that's something that needs addressing.

But for your knee / wheel issue it might be worth getting a cheapo ebay wheel just to experiment first.

I'm using a grant wheel with a moderate dish to it, plus an extension to bring it even closer. You could use a quick-release instead of an extension as both will give you that extra 2-3". I forget the diameter, if you go too small you won't be able to see the gauges.

I’m 6’2”, and if you asked my wife (who’s always right ;) ), I’m taller in the torso.

I agree with then idea that extending the steering wheel out a few inches is more important than diameter. It’s gets the wheel beyond your knees. Just need to locate a hub adapter.

An issue I've found with the smaller wheel is that as Chuyler mentioned it can be harder to see the gauges.
Speedo is fine but oil pressure I have to cock my head slightly. But to be honest its rare I look that more than the odd time when driving.

Also with the smaller wheel its a bit more work to turn it, especially at slow speed, but also going fast. Now I'm used to it I don't find it too bad, power steering + rack & pinion would be nice, but hey ho.
The upside is that I can fit in the car comfortably, which I sometimes struggle with on the older Japanese cars.

Shouldn't thread be moved to the race tech section?