Truck seats

Toby3

Member
Hi,

Interested in any views on truck seats. Have a Merc 1124 AF 4x4 (have posted it before under Toby2 couldn't reset password so now Toby3). Need to replace the seats as in the second row, they are benches with frames to allow firefighters to have gas tanks, now much fun to sit on. In the front we just have basic seats. Any views on Air, mechanical versus no suspension on the seats.

Also any good ideas on how to do second row so can convert in to bed ( have seen bench approach similar to train sleeper where the back folds up to create two bunks, alternatively looking at seats where the backs fold down so a bed could go on top but then have challenge of where to store it when not in use without losing to much head room.

Cheers Tobias
 

Toby3

Member
Hi, Any advice on the front seats - stick with non suspension, go with mechanical or air suspension. Anyone else replaced their seats?

Thanks for this.
 

The Artisan

Adventurer
Anything can be made to fit with custom brackets. I do this with customer cars. Go to a breaker yard find some seats you like, make sure they fit in your cab. Maybe you get lucky and find good condition, if not take it to a local trimmer and design it as you see fit
My buddy played with some seats I had in my shop. Really depends on budget.
http://forum.expeditionportal.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=363234&stc=1&thumb=1&d=1433004523
http://forum.expeditionportal.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=325773&stc=1&thumb=1&d=1433004568
Kevin
 

Vegard_S

Adventurer
Hi Tobias,

For our unimog camper build, we removed the stock seat with mechanical suspension, and installed Recaro Ergomed S seats on a fixed base. We find this setup to be very nice. No suspension in the seat means that you:
- Won't get "seasick" when driving on bumpy roads.
- Have better throttle control when driving on bumpy roads.
- Save some weight compared to having a suspensioned platform for the seat.
- Have the possibility of making a storage compartment underneath the seat.

Vegard
 

grizzlyj

Tea pot tester
Hiya

We have had ISRI mechanical sprung seats in a Mog which were ok.

They had a big knob you could turn with a kg scale to set the spring at a stiffness to suit your weight or what you wanted it to feel like. Since that was separate to the position adjusters you could have a hard seat or a really soft seat but at whichever height you want. But you need a tight seatbelt (maybe a fixed length not an inertia type?) to stop it bouncing you on every bump making throttle control a real issue. And the belt pulling against my leg to stop that bounce made it ache after an hour or two.

I imagine it would be possible to have some sort of lock out on any sort of suspension. A leather air seat would be nice on the road. With heating, cooling and massage :)
Or just a waterproof cover with beads on top for a hundredth of the cost!

Rock and roll type beds in the UK have recently become much harder to retrofit and still be legal. As a one off custom design and still be crash worthy that may not really be a sensible idea. Any cab with a big window area will be hard to fully insulate and you'll get a lot of condensation inside overnight.
 

Toby3

Member
HI, thanks for all the advice. Was at the Adventure Overland show in the UK this weekend so was good to look at different options that people had there. Still trying to figure out the second row to accommodate 2 - 3 seats, dog box and ideally some way of converting into bed area. Doesn't have to be the seats becoming the bed, could just be those folding flat and some sort of bed above it. Appreciate the condensation point, recognise that living in the cab area is not going to be the same level as a purpose built box but compared to camping out of swags or roof tents trans Africa its still an improvement and allows us to make the most use of the space given the main box is only going to be about 4 metres long.
 

Iain_U1250

Explorer
We fitted some Range Rover leather seat into our truck. We found them very comfortable until it started to get hot, then wearing shorts made it quite hot and sticky. We fitted sheepskin seat covers and that was better, but I found the seatcovers made the seat a bit uncomfortable o longer trips. The seats are also quite heavy, being all electrically adjustable. These are the Range Rover seats - I made the bases for them.

2015-12-05 19.34.29.jpg

We now have some BMW seats we are going to try, they have a bit more lateral support, and are lighter, and are all manual. They are leather, but my clever wife is going to recover them with Alcantara, a dark grey/light grey mix. They have to be done in a week or two.

These are the new ones, they are also a bit thinner on the back rest, and will be much thinner by the time we have removed the extra padding on the back of the seat. We are also going to fit adjustable lumbar support bladders to them.

2017-09-16 16.10.12.jpg
 

The Artisan

Adventurer
E46 sports seats. Please show some pics when you finish them, always love seeing others works. I specialize in BMW upholstery, I have a set of manuals I might put in my fuso.
Kevin
 
Last edited:

ianc

Adventurer Wannabe
Hiya

We have had ISRI mechanical sprung seats in a Mog which were ok.

They had a big knob you could turn with a kg scale to set the spring at a stiffness to suit your weight or what you wanted it to feel like. Since that was separate to the position adjusters you could have a hard seat or a really soft seat but at whichever height you want. But you need a tight seatbelt (maybe a fixed length not an inertia type?) to stop it bouncing you on every bump making throttle control a real issue. And the belt pulling against my leg to stop that bounce made it ache after an hour or two.

I imagine it would be possible to have some sort of lock out on any sort of suspension. A leather air seat would be nice on the road. With heating, cooling and massage :)
Or just a waterproof cover with beads on top for a hundredth of the cost!

Rock and roll type beds in the UK have recently become much harder to retrofit and still be legal. As a one off custom design and still be crash worthy that may not really be a sensible idea. Any cab with a big window area will be hard to fully insulate and you'll get a lot of condensation inside overnight.

The ESRI seats do have a lock to stop the suspension. Or at least mine do int he Vario
 

grizzlyj

Tea pot tester
Hi

I don't think mine did, or certainly not obviously.

The other thing that probably made quite a difference was we had quite heavy springs on the front from it's previous life. It was very hard at times even on deflated tyres.

Our next truck will be standard suspension with standard ex-army fixed seats, waterproof covers and then those cheap bead covers to give an air gap between you and the waterproof material. The only time that becomes an issue is wearing shorts the beads trap leg hair, so either a towel on top of that or shave :) The cotton towel helps keep you cool too, so I think that's a good solution for a cab without a/c, with curtains you can pull to partially block the sun on you from the side when in the middle of nowhere, not in traffic!

If I have to change those seats I might fork out for Recaros, you can now have side airbags in one model. Not sure if they're off-roadable though, or suitable with an old non-ecu truck.
 

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