e21 recaros in an e30?

[JAM]

anyone ever do this? im looking for some new front seats, mine are pretty haggered and a friend of mine has a set from an e21 he parted out sitting around he'll sell me for t3h cheap. plus the bolsters looks super rad/comfy...

pics? installation ideas from someone who has done this in the past?

thanks!

jam

[Tricked 323i]

anyone ever do this? im looking for some new front seats, mine are pretty haggered and a friend of mine has a set from an e21 he parted out sitting around he'll sell me for t3h cheap. plus the bolsters looks super rad/comfy...

pics? installation ideas from someone who has done this in the past?

thanks!

jam

Easiest way to do it is get some of the cheap slider brackets that come off the knock off seats on ebay and weld mounting tabs on them.
Kevin

[Shift_Now]

I wasn't so lucky to have two seats in good condition, so I took one bolster off the ratty seat (the slider with teh seat belt clip), and put in the place of the other slider. So now one seat have two seat-belt clips, and all you have to do is remove the extra seat-belt clip, and your're good to go. The set-up doesn't look too bad, but it was a nice temporary fix.

[scobaru]

I love the e21 recaros over the e30 sport seats. post pics when u do it!

[JAM]

bump

anyone have some pics or a detailed write up of some kind?

i want to know what im getting myself into here heh

[Tricked 323i]

bump

anyone have some pics or a detailed write up of some kind?

i want to know what im getting myself into here heh

I did this bracket for Ely's seat I made him. You can see I cut the ends off the sliders then welded new extending tabs, this moves the sliders to the insides of the holes in the floor pan. Then Ely used 2 pieces of plate steel and mounted them on to the bottom of the seats. He drilled new holes in the plate steel and then mounted them to the sliders. PM Ely if you want details. Rs4Pro3
Kevin

[uberCerealkiller]

i can vouch for the above seat very nicely done. seen it in person many times.

[JAM]

poor ely, ive hastled him enough already as it is...

well, i just picked up these seats and they are ubher clean there is a rip about an inch long in the drivers side left seat bottom but the pass seat is mint!

im thinking about hacking the sliders off of my stock e30 seats and having them welded to the e21 seats... good idea?

[td325ic]

Read this thread on bimmerforums, it says how to install them:

http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=676858

The problem is that the recaros have their sliders at different heights. The inner sliders on the seat are raised as they mount on the tranny hump in an e21.

To overcome this and be able to bolt in the seat in an e30 you need to find an additional pair of outer sliders, the ones which mount lower and to the floor. These sliders have the handle attached to them.

The lower sliders will swap into place of the raised sliders, which will then give you a level seat. If remember correctly the seat will pretty much bolt into an e30 after you swap the sliders. I think the bolt holes even line up.

You may be able to get the extra outer sliders from a beat up e21 recaro seat in a junk yard, or watch ebay for them, or just do a WTB on an e21 forum.

I know people have been doing this for awhile now and this is the common method.

[ColdAccord]

jamzig if you bail or want to trade seats let me know. I want to get my seats recovered in m tech cloth some day and want some e21's up front when I do

[02stu]

FTW, no one gets the two handles to slide forward though

[Cloudbase]

FTW, no one gets the two handles to slide forward though

What does this mean? Did you cut the handles off. I'm researching this. I understand I need an extra set of outer rails, but I don't understand why no one gets two handles to slide forward??????

[whterice]

I just used the stock sliders on the e21 seats to mount them in my car. I had 4 - 1" spacers made up with holes drilled directly thru with a nut welded inside the spacer to accept a 10mm bolt to bolt the seat to. It was what the factory used to mount them in the e21 so it should be good enough to mount them in the e30. To bolt the spacers to the floor I just used the factory e30 bolts cut down slightly so I could get the bolts into the spacer. they fit perfectly fine in the car. Just have to swap the seat belt receivers to your e30 ones and bend the tab slightly so it doesnt rub on your center console

[jakkerd]

I have these in the car.
I'm told they are e21 recaro's adapted from factory to fit the first e30's.
Not sure if it's true, but they fit without brackets and are extremely similar (if not the same) to the e21 recaro's.

[AbsorbantNut]

I have these in the car.
I'm told they are e21 recaro's adapted from factory to fit the first e30's.
Not sure if it's true, but they fit without brackets and are extremely similar (if not the same) to the e21 recaro's.

I have these too, was sold under the impression of them being from e30 320i euro car. Rear seat came with factory head rests and padded with springs in the rear instead of foam.