Spider seat swaps

["Bain, Bill" <Bill.Bain@domain.elided>]

My '83 Spider has a set of Recaros (blue) from an older Porsche 911.
The driver's Recaro bolted right up to the adjuster rails off the old
Alfa seats, BUT, I had to use the adjuster rail from the old passenger
seat so that the lever faced out toward the door instead of in towards
the interior because the extra length of the Recaros compared to the
stock Alfa seats covers the handle otherwise.

The biggest issue is that just about any seat you might use is wider
than the stock Spider seat and the stock seats are a tight fit,
particularly on the passenger side. Also most aftermarket seats (can't
speak to Miata seats) have their adjuster controls on the outside of the
seat and that's a cozy fit in a Spider, to say the least. Hence you make
have to swap the passenger seat and the drivers seat.   For Recaros,
you'll need to make an extension out of flat bar stock that moves the
mounting holes to the floor out about 3/4" to accommodate the wider
seat.  On the passenger side, the only way I could find to make the
Recaro fit was to raise it up using the Porsche brackets, which raise it
about 1" so the seat base clears the console. On the passenger side I
used the Porsche adjuster tracks as well.

Later Alfa seats give much more thigh support than the earlier ones
since they har longer with amore pronounced knee bolster -- not sure
when they changed but it might have been only on the Veloce and Quad
models after 1986.

Lastly, while my Recaros do give better lateral support, they are much
firmer than the stock seats so they are not really all that comfortable
for long trips.  They hold me so firmly that there's not much room to
wiggle around, which is good, but there's also no way to change position
either, which can get to be fatiguing as well.  For back support, maybe
an auto upholstery shop could fit one of those inflatable back supports
into the stock seat?



Bill Bain 
AROC Atlanta 
'83 SPider 
'87 Milano 

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