So my seat has had some play in the track that I can't seem to track down

I have verified that the track bolts to the car are tight, the track bolts to the seat are tight. When the seat is "locked" into position it will still move about 1/2" forwards and backwards. Has anyone experienced this and know what I need to work on? Could the mechanism be that worn out?

 

Are you talking about the seat back or the bottom cushion?

 

Seats are adjusted so rarely, "wearing out" is probably not what happened.
Besides, the mechanism is so simple and robust that it's typically corrosion (not your issue, apparently) or accident damage that cause problems.

In essence, the seat lock is a ratchet and pawl and if you remove the tracks from the seats, it's easy to understand and observe.
Does your seat move 1/2" at every locked position or just one in particular?

 

It moves in all positions, and I recently pulled it out to make sure all the bolts were tight. I understand how the mechanism works after pulling the seat out, which makes it so weird that I can't get it to stop moving.

 

With the seats out can you manually duplicate this free play?

 

is one of the seat racks not locking in properly? i had something similar happen because the racks weren't installed evenly but it would lock in if it moved just enough