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Leather Recaro Seats

The leather seats were collected from Bob Hammond in the New Year after a long wait.  Bob is a very busy guy and you can’t rush these jobs.  The seats look amazing and the leather is thick and luxurious.  In the end we used the grey leather from a jaguar XJS as it was the closest match to the original Ford shark grey colour.  This exact colour is no longer made but there are plenty of shades that are a close match.

The rear seats were fitted first.  This is a real fiddly job and much patience is required to get them aligned and straight looking.  The trick is to remove the seat backs from the metal frame which is easy to do by undoing the hidden bolt on the back carpet.This allows the frame to be fixed in place and adjusted.  Again it is best to do this with the seat frame upright and locked into place on the catches.  It took me a while before I was happy with all the gaps.

With the rear frame in place and the seat backs refitted, the base was put in the car.  As they are notoriously saggy I purchased some sofa foam from Dunelm and cut it into place so it sat in the cavity under the springs.  Doing this made the seat bench quite a squeeze to get into place and fit the locking screws to the floor.  As many people suggest this is easier if you sit in the seat while doing it as this will squash it down into the correct resting place.

I have to say that the foam has really improved the look feel and comfort of the rear seats - even though nobody will actually ever use them!

Fitting the front Recaros should be a five minute job but I encountered a problem when I fitted the passenger side as the slider frame had cracked and buckled the runner (see photos below).  According to the Capri Club this is an extremely common problem and they are very hard to source.  So with this in mind I duly pulled the seat chassis apart and sent the cracked runner off to be welded at our local metal works.  The part was easy enough to fix and only cost me a beer.

The chassis was cleaned and repainted with black Hammerite whilst it was still in bits.  The rather flimsy nylon bearings were cleaned and refitted so the whole thing looked brand new again.  So much for that five minute job!

Finally all the seats and leather bits were finished and the interior looked and smelled amazing once again.

Rear seat backs and the metal frame were fitted first. The frame requires quite a bit of adjustment to get it spot on.


Foam inserts from Dunelm were cut and shaped to fit the underside of the seat springs to improve comfort.


Front Recaro seats back fro the trimmers resplendent in brand new light grey leather

 


The seat bench with brand new stitched leather ready to be fitted to the Capri


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Bolsters were replaced and the centre cloth cleaned and reused

 


The seats look brand new and are extremely comfy to sit in!

 


It wasn’t a huge amount of un fitting the rear seats properly.  New foam was cut to support the underside


Front Recaros go in after having all the leather replaced.  Tilt handle had to be replaced on one seat

 


A cracked seat rail runner is a very common problem with Capri Recaro seats.  The bent runner jams the seat locked


Runner was straightened and welded to fix the problem.  Cleaned and painted before a seat frame rebuild


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