Father & Son Build - EMPI Race Trim Seat Installation

Nathan gets to work installing new EMPI Race Trim Off Road Seats and does a decent job of figuring things out. There are some generalities in the instructions that assume the user has installed similar seats before. As Sam has experience with the kit, he jumps in to help and the questions are quickly answered, the problems are solved and the seats are ready to be bolted to the floor.

Video Transcript

Hi guys, I'm Sam, and I'm Nate.

I'm going to go on a mountain bike ride. Nathan's going to try and figure out how to work on these seats and get the brackets, the sliders, and everything else figured out. The kit we have was missing hardware, missing some seat springs, and whatnot, so it'll be interesting to see what he can figure out with the hardware missing. Then, I'll come back from my mountain bike ride, get cleaned up, and then I'll jump in and give him a hand. On that note, I am out. Nathan is going to get to work.

So now, looking at what's inside the box and seeing as it's missing some stuff, it's not a good sign, but hopefully, we can figure something out.

Looks like some instructions, so that's good. Here on the instructions, photo one on this thing is just mounting the brackets to these, I'm guessing. So here we are. We got the bracket with the handle and then the other side like that, just put to the handle. And now we have the giant box thing that I'm guessing just holds up the seat. Put that right there. Got the tools and hardware, which I'm pretty sure that that is a 13, so let's try to mount the brackets. Grab the instructions once again. So, that's how they go on. Okay. So yeah, first of all, the mechanism, you pull this, then it goes up, then you can slide your seat forward and backwards, so pretty darn cool.

These, I'm guessing, have to come off, so let's try to take those off. They're just little plastic things that go over the threads. So now, yeah, that just... that. And now I have to do the other side. Wait, isn't there supposed to be maybe a link that gets crossed because how do you... maybe that's the missing hardware because that's supposed to go like that. How is that supposed to also open? Oh, oh, it's that spring. Wait, but we only had one of them. That's probably the missing piece, the spring.

Okay, guys, I'm pretty darn sure that the missing piece here is the other spring because I can only find one of these, and they're really necessary. On here, you can see, yeah, they mount to the arm right there and then they go all the way over to the other side on the other bracket, but we don't have two of them, so that's probably going to be the missing piece.

Which also, I'm not sure how they got that loop into there 'cause we have springs on top. I don't know if you're supposed to just push them down and pull it out and put it on, maybe? No, let's try. Okay, guys, I got that on. That was pretty easy.

Okay, now let's try to get these pieces off and see what we can do about that missing spring. Literally, just you unthread them, and then throw them away. So yeah, so that is how they're supposed to go on. Now, oh yeah, we just need to put the nuts on the bottom. Yeah, let's see. Oh yeah, so it just goes to the other side over there, which is somewhere here, and say it looks a bit almost too long to actually fit over there. Strange. Oh, actually, don't think it goes over there.

See, this is kind of confusing 'cause on the instructions, it shows that, but it doesn't reach over to that side. It's too long. But for some reason, I don't know, it's strange.

Okay, with that sidetrack, we just put this, put these on real quick. Put on... oh wait, hopefully, this works. Don't think there's any torque spec on that, probably not. Just getting tight.

Now the spring, somehow, some way, we have to put them here.

Hey, Mom, just putting the seats in. We're trying to. It just, it's missing a spring. I'm trying to figure out one side. Yeah, maybe we just have to... here, one second, let's try to figure this out.

The rod looks a bit too long, and I'm missing the other one, but everything else is here. Okay, let me just send a text to Dad, hopefully, he sees it 'cause here... oh yeah, this has to go that way in, and that has to go... so it's like a tiny bit too long. Shoot, don't wonder if you have to shorten them, maybe. Yeah, probably not.

Yeah, so this is backwards. Yeah, these are probably actually backwards, so this is probably actually supposed to be on the other side because this almost lines up right here. Yeah, like that, uh, and then those two up there 'cause this way it goes out, but these two don't work like that. So this setup can be for the other side 'cause I was looking at the mounts, and they didn't line up that way. So this has actually has to be for that side where they line up like that. We need to swap these over to the other side.

Oh, that looks better, that that lines up so much better. Just look at that, guys. Just for some reason, these go out on both sides, which is, you know, kind of a bit strange, but yeah, I'm pretty unsure that that is the way that it's supposed to go. So now that we have figured that out, let's try to do everything to how we did it before.

Well, that is mounted, and now here, huh, just try to figure out this thing here. See, has Dad texted me back yet about the issue? No, oh no, not yet.

So now that we got this one done, now we should probably just do the other one and wait for hopefully an answer for why this thing's too long.

Okay, guys, I got the other one all built. I'm pretty darn sure that I'm not supposed to put washers in between this and the frame because now I'm all out of washers, and I'm pretty darn sure that we're supposed to have more, but I'll have to ask my dad once he gets home from mountain biking 'cause I'm not sure, and also, of course, we don't have a spring, and the other one's too long, so we'll have to see what will happen about that. But yeah, we'll see, uh, once he gets home.

Hi, guys, I'm back. Mhm. And now we are just trying to figure out the spring thing.

So, the springs, as they come, are too long. So, as we look at this, that pulls that way. Mhm, and then the rod pulls it that way, pulls that. So we need to connect from that to that. Yeah, so we're just going to make a new bend in our string. You want to go get me a pair of wire cutters? So, this is intended to go over both of them, huh? Yep. So perhaps I should have put that on that way first, but we'll get there. So, we'll try, try and duplicate this. Yeah, I try to get the other side, huh? Do we need anything like... so that one spring is bent. Uh, need like pliers or something to bend it? Yeah, that'll be handy. I can try with this.

Okay, just one question. Are there supposed to be washers in between here and this piece? I don't know 'cause now I'm out of washers 'cause it was like eight washers per seat, two for every corner. Well, you probably don't need two for every side, but yeah, whatever. Oh, that's what I was thinking because then we also have the seat that we have to mount, and there's probably supposed to be washers with that too.

There we go, and like so. We've got, huh, another one, huh. That side, custom shortened. Yeah.

Well, do you guys sell that individually at work, or no? No, but yeah, all we got to do is just get some wire, metal rod, or wire, or whatnot, mhm, huh, just bend it back to place. Huh, look at that, huh. And say, is it... yep, that works, huh. So, I mean, it's not even... right there.

Now with this side done, we'll work on getting the seats mounted. Yeah, I don't necessarily know that there should have been a washer on this side. Um, so you want to grab the 3/8 drive and the impact, whatever the heck it needs for that, and we'll pull that off. The impact is way faster. Yeah, 'cause I was just using a ratchet, and then we mount the top rails to these seats as well.

So, just mainly the washer on needs to go then, huh? Yep. I almost did it right. Almost. I mean, at least we can get one seat in, huh? Yeah.

Now we can put the top plates on, and then we can put our seat on the top plate. All right, so on these guys, we've got two choices for mounting. We can either mount inside or outside, and now I see the use of spacers because of the linkage. Yep, boom, and we'll have our seat handy.

My guess is we need to go to the innermost position. Grab a measuring tape, and we'll actually measure this and be smart about it the first time. 14 inches. So if we were to mount those at the innermost position, roughly close enough, just inside of 14 inches, like that. Put our spacer in over the top of the carriage bolt, come on top of that.

And, alright, now I think we are short on bolts for these guys, but short on bolts, yeah, we're good. Do we have regular bolts to bolt here to here? Uh, no, but we do have the square ones that it came with. Alright, let's take a gander 'cause we still need four more for that seat over there. You have these things? Yeah, no, those are for this seat over here.

There we go, times two. Yeah, that looks awesome. Huh, that's one seat almost done. Thank the floor and putting some fence wash on, can finally sit in the car properly, huh? Well, maybe, there we go, get that slid back so you can fit underneath there, but there you go, boom.

That that is nice. Like, you can slide the seat forward too. That's true, it's so smooth, huh, 'cause it's brand new. Yeah, I mean, might be a bit too far forward, huh? Put your arm straight out on top of the steering wheel, on top, straight out. So yeah, you're fine. Can you reach the pedals nice and comfy? Yeah, nice, boom, perfect, and I can see too.

Alright, you work on that, I'm going to work on this seat out here. I think somebody likes his seat, mhm, 'cause finally, I don't have to sit on a bucket.

So, for this seat, since this hardware kit was missing, I am going to make my own tension spring out of the original accelerator cable for this car. Take this, take a wire crimp, and crimp that on there, and then I'll run that through there, bring it around, and crimp it back again. Are you looking for the metal or the rubber? The metal, yeah, huh, oh yeah, huh, 'cause you can just crimp it together. Huh, cut that off, and they actually sell stuff like this at local hardware stores too, cable crimp specifically for this type of stuff.

Come in, those should be strong enough, right? Yeah, right out there, amount of dust I just blew off it, keep that for future use whenever we need a cable. I mean, shoot, might work better than the other one. Other things you could use is a barrel nut from a carburetor.

Oh, looks like it works, huh, just like that. M, no big deal. Alright, you want to get the top mount plates and all the hardware and impact.

Like so, set that in the car. Probably should bring the seat back here first.

There we go, I got seats. Now this is awesome, it's like a full cab almost. Now, there we go, we got seats, huh, we have seats. Time to go for a drive, try to go for a drive. Nice, lots of room, yeah, plenty of room, lots of room for activities. Uh, once I actually do get taller, I can still drive this car pretty comfortably. I mean, far for go pretty far forward. I mean, I can lit put my feet basically up against the nice front gas tank holder thing. There you go.

So I'm almost 6' tall, I'm shrinking with age, and I fit in here. Nathan, how tall are you? Five, maybe 5'1 now. 5'1, and he can put the seat all the way forward and still reach the pedals and then some, yeah, all the way forward, and that's just mounting these around the stock seat rails, like these seat mounts are designed. So, I mean, pretty darn good, pretty darn handy. That's all the way back, and I can put my legs all the way straight. Now, I have short legs, yeah, it's a good amount of room. The only drawback to slide slide sets are that it's very difficult for somebody to get in the back seat on this side, kind of a pain in butt, really. But, I'll see if I can't come up with some way of making this thing tilt forward perhaps. Let's see if we decide to run a rear seat.

Yeah, it would be kind of difficult for anybody, yeah, that is a human back there, maybe a, a human and not 10 years old or not older than 10, yeah, 'cause I mean, yeah, I could get through here, just, yeah, kind of difficult. I'll work on that later on, but for now, Nathan, we have seats, we have seats.

Alright, with that, guys, we have some seats, we've got some seats to sit in. Yeah, I still need to drill four holes for each seat bracket to bolt them through the floor pan, uh, and then use some fender washers and nuts on the bottom side to hold them in place down there, but of course, this is all temporary because these floor pans are getting out, yeah, uh, but we will use these seat mounts when we put the new floor pans in, just because they work very, very well. Yeah, I mean, super smooth too. Position's perfect, the height is perfect, I still got a good amount of headroom, uh, even if we put a roll cage in here, there should still should be plenty of room. They're ready to go, one step closer to being able to, well, it's nice to drive a car when you have a seat to sit in, so yeah, one step closer to being able to drive this thing onto a trailer and off to a trailer, so we can go to the Desert Dubs third annual car show coming up on April 20th in Tempe, Arizona. Mhm, if you're in the area, stop by, we'll see you there.

I'm Sam, and I'm Nate, and life's full of good people. If you can't find one, be one. Later, guys.