My25thTransAm

Is it possible to swap the passenger seat into the driver's seat? I have a 25th Anniversary Trans Am that has the white leather seats and could possibly get a nice passenger seat for cheap, and would like to just pull the parts off the seat and install them somehow into my current driver's seat. Silly question I know, but you guys are the pros and I desperately need a new driver's seat!

Thanks for any feedback!

trilkb

iTrader: (4)

in short...no.

you could do it, but it wouldnt look right in certain areas, the seat belt strap holder being one of those areas, it would either be on the wrong side, or you would have a hole in the leather from removing it.

1995blacktattop

iTrader: (2)

actually on a trans am as long as you have your old drivers seat for the mechanical parts i think you can make it work. you can definately swap the upholstery if you want to go that route but if you want to swap some of the mechanical stuff i think that might work too. the camaro would have a hole in the leather but the trans am's seatbelt holder attatches to the plastic headrest backing and you can swap those over easily. when i reupholstered the seats i unbolted the seatbelt holder from the headrest and left it in the car.

like the above poster said, the seatbelt holder will be on the wrong side but if you remove the seatback plastics (mainly the first one, i don't think i had to remove the plastic with the net on it to get the headrest out) and remove the pins holding the headrest in and then remove the headrest from the seat. you can then remove the screws on the bottom of the headrest and seperate the headrest from the plastic backing where the seatbelt loop goes. then you simply put the newer leather covered passenger side headrest on your driver's side plastic headrest mount. the same could most likely be done with the rest of the seat. You would need to remove the reclining mechanism and use the one from your old drivers seat. this does not require you to remove the uphostery though. IIRC the metal pieces on the lower sides under the plastic button/cover is the same passenger and driver so you may not have to swap those. the seat tracks i'm pretty sure are the same as well but you'll need to remove the seat from the tracks to get the plastic trim off that covers the rails which you'd also want to swap since they are different on the driver and passenger side. i dissasembled my seats for reupholstering a few years ago and have pics of all of this. here's a few that should help you.


you'd probably have to move the lumbar/bolster inflator assembly from the old drivers seat to the passenger seat. it looks like this underneath





and here is the metal part i'm talking about behind the controls and how i think the hole is on both sides



the seat frame


headrest and back of seat with trim removed (first pic of rear of seat is the passenger seat and second is the driver, notice the different position of the rear seat access latch)








so basically I think if you move the new headrest foam/fabric to your drivers side plastic piece, change the controls through the seat over to the other side and swap the control button and use your drivers seat side plastics, swap out the reclining mechanism with the one from your drivers seat and switch over the lumbar/bolster stuff from your old seat to the new one it can be done. if not, i'm pretty sure you can swap the upholstery to your old seats, and possibly the pads too (the upper pad might be different left to right but i beleive its only the fact that they reinforce the foam on the outer side of the pad as seen in this pic of a brand new drivers pad i bought) to your old frames. the upper and lower upholstery is not different side to side. if you must remove the upholstery from the seats, that will require the purchase of some hog ring remover tools and also new hog rings to reattatch the upholstery. this is only for the upper part of the seat as the lower part is velcrowed and clipped in. you'll probably also have to move that bracket in the pic below which is opposite of the reclining mechanism. i "think" it's removeable but i'm not 100% sure since i was only reupholstering the seats and not trying to make a passenger's seat into a drivers seat.



hope this helps.

01ssreda4

iTrader: (96)

Hell yes you can do it. You have to disassemble the seats but by all means, get the seat!!

trilkb

iTrader: (4)

well ive been pretty radically proved wrong!

oh well, it doesnt look easy tho haha. Best of luck to you if you go that route