BRZ seats in the FiST

[zanethan]

After some discussion with other forum members I've decided to be the guinea pig on this experiment. I'll be attempting to fit BRZ seats into the Fiesta as an alternate to the rare and exceedingly expensive Recaro's. (I do t know how anyone is finding these things for under $1500 at this point.)

Based on initial measurements it should be possible. My initial idea is to try and fit them in the same way that the FoST Recaro's are being fit. Essentially fit the base of the BRZ seat to the frame of the FiST and move the entire back over. I'm even going to attempt to move the airbag over to the BRZ seat from the FiST. Not sure when I'll get a chance to really start looking into this but at this juncture that's my plan.

Without further adieu I present to you the donor seats.

They're a bit dirty but will clean up nicely and for $450 I can't complain yet. (And based on my search you can find these for $450 all day). I do have the head rests as well but had take them off to prevent damage.

Initial impressions of the seats is that they are a good hybrid between the base and Recaro's. They aren't as bolstered but are also probably more comfortable for big guys like myself.

If anyone has suggestions as to best go about this please chime in as I'm flying by the seat of my pants as I go here.

 

[jay_red]

can you get pics of the brackets and and how they attach to the seat? They look great and hopefully we can make this work with relative ease...

 

[zanethan]

This is the only one I took. I'll get some more tomorrow.

 

[LargeRubberFist]

Brz has one of my favorite driving positions/seats. Take measurements on how much rear leg room you lose in the backseats for me after you get these in will you?

 

[CSM]

Subbing because it seems like a cool project!

 

[nickstewartroc]

From the work I did making a powered FoST base work in my FiST, the first thing you'll need to do is grind off the "rivots" that hold the at least the one front foot on since it is offset. Might be able to do what I did and grind off the rivots from both seats and bolt in the one from a FiST base

 

[M-Sport fan]

Brz has one of my favorite driving positions/seats. Take measurements on how much rear leg room you lose in the backseats for me after you get these in will you?

They're OK, but I was thinking that the headrest was integrated into the Toyobaru seat, like most aftermarket race style recliners are (and many of the Nippon nameplate 'sporty' rides are), instead of separate like both of our factory options.

I will still purse a non-marque/nameplate, aftermarket, one-piece backrest/headrest seat option, yes, even for MUCH more coin than these,

 

[zanethan]

They're OK, but I was thinking that the headrest was integrated into the Toyobaru seat, like most aftermarket race style recliners are (and many of the Nippon nameplate 'sporty' rides are), instead of separate like both of our factory options.

I will still purse a non-marque/nameplate, aftermarket, one-piece backrest/headrest seat option, yes, even for MUCH more coin than these,

The Toyota ones are one piece the Subaru's have a separate headrest.

 

[zanethan]

From the work I did making a powered FoST base work in my FiST, the first thing you'll need to do is grind off the "rivots" that hold the at least the one front foot on since it is offset. Might be able to do what I did and grind off the rivots from both seats and bolt in the one from a FiST base

Were the rails just riveted on or were they riveted and welded? Did you just swap over the Fiesta rails to the Focus base when you did that swap?

 

[zanethan]

As promised here are some more shots of the brackets. They appear to be bolted on but the rails are about 1" narrower than the St's.

As far as dimensions go the seats are approximately the same so they'll fit assuming I can get them to bolt up.

 

[VoxZef]

Interesting idea. I actually traded in my FRS for the FiST. Luckily I found one with Recaros. I find the FiST recaros to be much more supportive and comfortable than my FRS seats were. Although the FRS seat are much more supportive than stock FiST seats. With how many kiddies crash the FRS\BRZ, seats should be pretty readily available.

 

[nickstewartroc]

Were the rails just riveted on or were they riveted and welded? Did you just swap over the Fiesta rails to the Focus base when you did that swap?

I don't recall how the rails themselves were attached, what I had done is ground down the rivots on the feet that are attached to the rails that you bolt down to the car and swapped over the feet from the FiST base (also having ground off the rivots)

 

[jay_red]

As promised here are some more shots of the brackets. They appear to be bolted on but the rails are about 1" narrower than the St's.

As far as dimensions go the seats are approximately the same so they'll fit assuming I can get them to bolt up.

Seeing how those bolt on, one possible way to get them in the car would be to get a pair of universal sliders (would most likely need to have new holes drilled, or it looks like a possibility to remove the feet from the BRZ sliders to make it flat) then bolt them to the Planted Fiesta bracket. Obviously this would add like $300 (or less if sliders are not necessary) to the cost of making these work, but it would still be well under the cost of FiST Recaros. Obviously the ideal solution would be to make it work with Frankenstein-ing together the BRZ and Fiesta parts, so hopefully you can find a solution that works. I saw you said the rails are 1 inch narrower than the Fiesta, but can you see if the bolt holes from front to back are the same distance as the fiesta? I notice both seats have straight "feet" unlike many other seats where something is offset.

 

[SneakyPete]

Why are the Recaros so rare? When i looked at FISTs, almost every dealer had them loaded with Recaros.

 

[zanethan]

My guess is that there are far more of them out there but many don't know what they have. The ones that do, however, are charging a premium because the demand is high.

That or all the junkyards got together and decided to starve the market of Recaro's to make millions lol.

 

[jay_red]

Why are the Recaros so rare? When i looked at FISTs, almost every dealer had them loaded with Recaros.

When I was shopping for my FiST one of my main requirements was Recaros, but after searching and searching, none in my area had them, even the new ones were all base seats. They are almost non existent on the used market, and when they do come up, go for insane prices. You are much more likely to find a FoST with Recaros, and those can be had for around half as much as Fiesta ones (and can be fitted into a Fiesta with relative ease)

 

[M-Sport fan]

My guess is that there are far more of them out there but many don't know what they have. The ones that do, however, are charging a premium because the demand is high.

That or all the junkyards got together and decided to starve the market of Recaro's to make millions lol.

ANY of these people who bought them NEW still remember that $2K sting very well, so they want to recoup most of that.

 

[zanethan]

Update. I got the BRZ seat broken down. And there's good news and bad.

The good news:
The BRZ seats are fairly easy to break down. And can be easily bolted to a universal rail system in a worst case scenario.

The bad:
The cushions don't appear to be transferable between frames(I knew this was a long shot but I was hoping). That being said it appears that the "pan" of the FiST seats might be removable and the "legs" could bolt up. I'm not sure of that at this point.

At this point I'll have to break down the FiST seat to glean any more insight into the swap.

 

[jay_red]

Good to know that they can be made to work with brackets if not some other way. I look forward to seeing you tear into it a little more, and I might stop by a local wrecker this weekend and pick up a pair myself.

 

[zanethan]

So I took another look this morning and I'm going to have to cut up the FiST frame if this is to work.

I found a set of base Fiesta seats for $150 that I'm going to pick up so I'll have my originals unscathed incase it doesn't work.

Basically my plan moving forward is this:

I'll going to use heavy gauge angle iron to turn the bottom mount BRZ seats into side mount seats then bolt them to the FiST vertical rail brackets using grade 8 bolts. I feel that this is still safe as I'm not altering the integrity of any of the mounting points and will be using steel that is of equal strength to the factory.

Then I'll transfer over the seat belt buckle and occupancy sensor. I'll look into moving over the airbag but I likely will just by pass this.