Paul's 2011 Race Red GT Build

[Paul.]

My 2011 GT had the 401A leather option, but since I’m doing the front Recaros anyway with Shelby leather, I wanted to retain the back seat and have it match. My car is a daily driver and boulevard cruiser, so I thought keeping the back seat was a good idea.

I forgot to take a picture of the rear seat installed before I began. To remove the seat cushion, just find the two plastic “posts” under the seat that install to the floor pan. Push on them to release, then just lift up and it comes out. Takes two seconds.

Here’s the seat back after the cushion is removed.


Here’s the pivot sold the seats can fold down. It’s held in a place by one bolt that you’ll need a 13mm socket to remove it.


You’ll also need to remove the two bolts on either side of the seats. Then the whole seat back pops out.


We’ll start with the back seat cushion.


When you flip it over, you’ll see a bunch of plastic clips holding the skin on. The pics below are not all-inclusive, but you get the idea.






There is also on plastic push-pin on either side of the seat.


I used a trim removal tool to pop this. Besides the 13mm socket, it’s actually the only other tool you need to do this whole job.



A few of the clips push into slots in the plastic seat base, rather than clipping on an edge. The trim removal tool can help with these, or a pair of long-nose pliers might help too. Still, it’s not hard. Once you’ve unclipped everything, you can just pull the skin off. I removed most of them, but the clips on the leading edge were a little tight so I started peeling the skin off from the back all the way around the front, then the clips came off easily. Here’s what you’re left with .



Then grab your new skin, and start re-installing everything. This is a pretty straightforward job, with a bit of tugging to get everything seated just right. (pun intended) Make sure you get the seams driven down into the grooves in the foam so the Velcro attaches and pulls everything tight. Here’s the finished seat cushion.


Sit back and take some satisfaction at completing the cushion, because the seat backs are a little more involved. Still not difficult, but it takes a little longer. Here’s your starting place.


Flip it over, and look at the corner for a small Velcro tab. You’ll need to unhook this.




Moving to the other corner, you’ll have the familiar plastic joints that are used all over the interior upholstery. They’re basically interlocking plastic tabs that you snap together and fold over to hold everything tight. Once you take one apart, you’ll see how they work and go back together. Lift up, and pry them apart. This corner one is easy and you can actually slide the two pieces apart.





More of the same with the large clip at the seat bottom.



Once you get it open, lift the flap and you’ll find some Velcro strips attached in the middle. Detach these.

 

[Paul.]

Now you’re going to need to start pushing the skin up toward the top of the seat. You won’t be able to remove it entirely because it will be stuck under the headrest, which we’ll remove next.


Flip it over and you’ll see the foam pad.


Lift the foam pad and you’ll see a metal box. This whole assembly is what holds the headrests in place.


There are two plastic buttons just above the metal box. It helps to have another set of hands for this part. Push both buttons and have someone pull the headrest out of the seat back assembly.


Here’s a better look at what everything looks like without the cushion in the way.


Now we start on the headrest.


The two flaps at the bottom of the headrest just snap together. There’s a little groove in one flap, and a t-shaped tab in the other.



Seam pulled apart. Hecho en Mexico.


Carefully pull the material out from around the headrest pushbutton.



After that, all you do is pull the headrest internals out of the skin. Very easy. Here’s what you’re left with.


This was not made in America, or Mexico I would guess.


Reinstall the new cover, and your headrest is done. Then, back to the seat back.


Here’s the new Shelby skin installed. Don’t forget to lace the seatback release pull through the side of each seat so you can fold your seats down later.


Do that twice, and you’ll have a complete rear seat all done. Mine still had a few wrinkles in certain places, probably from being boxes up, but I think that will release over time with some good old fashioned Phoenix heat.


Then reinstall them in your car, and voila! Done!



Finally, you’ll have your old skins left over in case you ever want to return to stock, or sell them.



The whole job takes maybe a few hours. It's pretty darn easy I think. Definitely makes the interior look sharp. With the low cost and availability of takeoffs, it is definitely an excellent upgrade. You spend all your time in the interior, so might as well make it look nice.

Paul.

 

[swedensky]

so what are you selling the skins for?? =D

 

[Gremlin85]

Well done with the write-up! Definitaley agree on how easy this looks. I've always been afraid to touch my interior but this really helped me be less afraid.

Car is coming along great!

 

[Paul.]

so what are you selling the skins for?? =D

Not sure if I want to sell them yet. If I keep them, then I could put my old seats back in if I ever sold the car, which would allow me to sell my set of heated power Recaros for something like four grand. I'm trying to figure out what my best option is right now.

You can check with Rehagen to see if they have a set. I think they're selling GT skins for $549 - just not sure if they have 401A leather with the stripes and such.

Well done with the write-up! Definitaley agree on how easy this looks. I've always been afraid to touch my interior but this really helped me be less afraid.

Car is coming along great!

Thanks very much. I'm glad I can be helpful with the write-up. TOB's write-up on SVTP on how to swap the Recaros is what gave me the courage to tackle this project. Nothing is difficult about it really - you just have to be careful and take your time.

Paul.

 

[UltraKla$$ic]

If swed don't buy your OEM leather seat covers, I'd buy them for the right price.

I won't pay $549 bucks though..........LOL!!!!

BTW, your interior looks sweet with the new covers!

 

[Paul.]

If swed don't buy your OEM leather seat covers, I'd buy them for the right price.

I won't pay $549 bucks though..........LOL!!!!

BTW, your interior looks sweet with the new covers!

I think it's likely that I'll keep them. Nobody is going to pay much for them, and if I sell them I won't have anything to put back in my car in the event I want to return it to stock and sell it. A set of power Shelby Recaros just sold on SVTP for $3500, so I'll definitely want to be able to sell mine someday when it comes time to upgrade cars.

Thanks for the compliments. I'm hoping to have the front seats completed next weekend.

Paul.

 

[Paul.]

A couple new parts came in this week while I was working in Vegas.



Left - new evap system since my charcoal canister is cracked. This happened while the car was under warranty, but the dealer predictably told me to go fuck myself. I might have hit something they said. Morons. Like I can hit something with the underside back of my car so hard that it would crack the canister residing safely BEHIND A HUGE PLASTIC SHIELD. Ridiculous. Meh, I don't have time/patience to fight with stupidity. The whole assembly was only $130 from Tousley.

Middle - new seat warmers to install on my Recaros! Planning on finishing up that project this weekend and enjoying my badass new seats.

Bottom - Roush rear splitters. They match my side splitters.

Top - front mud flaps.


I've got a little work ahead of me to install all this stuff, but nothing particularly difficult I think. The seats will be the toughest part for sure.

Paul.

 

[Boaisy]

So you can wire the heated seats into the Recaros? If so, then I know what seats are in my future. I can do without the power adjustments, I prefer manual anyways. I just like the heated seats, especially how the weather is right now.

 

[Paul.]

My car came factory with heated seats, so it should be plug 'n' play for me. If your car does not already have heated seats, then I'm not sure how difficult it is.

Paul.

 

[Boaisy]

Mine has the regular heated seats and I've always wanted to go Recaro, but the lack of heated seats on those worried me. If there is a kit to make the magic happen, then a set of Recaro's will be on my wishlist .

 

[Paul.]

With your factory heated seats, it will be a breeze I think. I'll post pics of what I did later next weekend hopefully. I'll post a link to TOB's thread on SVTP with a million pictures on how everything comes apart.

For you guys that don't have factory heated seats... I've also been doing a little Google-Fu, and discovered that trying to install completely OEM heated seats in a car that didn't come with the comfort package from the factory is actually quite difficult. Apparently, comfort package cars have additional provisions in the fusebox, an additional relay module behind the switches in the dash, and even a different calibration in the computer to perform the "auto-shutoff" function that the OEM heaters have after ~10 minutes.

Luckily, there are LOTS of aftermarket companies that come to the rescue with seat heater kits. In fact, there are quite a few different articles about aftermarket heated seat installs on a few forums - you just have to Google around a bit.

This company seems to be well-liked for seat heaters, and it's WAY cheaper than what I paid just for the four warmer elements from Ford. (which cost me over three hundred bucks)

http://www.heatedseatkits.com/

Paul.

 

[Paul.]

My heated, power, leather Shelby Recaro passenger seat is in… and it works!

Not gonna lie, this is kind of a lot of work. I started this project at 11:30 a.m. today, having already stripped the Recaros down previously, and didn’t finish until after 7 p.m. Of course, I was taking my time and stopped for lunch, but still, it was no picnic. My back is sore and my fingers are cut up.

…and it was so worth it.


Here’s my best shot at a how-to, keeping in mind that I’ve omitted the overwhelming majority of seat disassembly as Tob has covered that exhaustively already.

Here is my factory 401A black premium leather passenger seat. My car has the comfort package so both my front seats are power and heated.

First things first, remove the negative battery cable, and prepare yourself for some work. You need to remove the airbag fuse for safety and to help prevent a potential airbag light later. Or so I’m told. Don’t know where the interior fusebox is? I didn’t either. After some Google-Fu on the internetz, I discovered that it’s in the passenger kick panel. There’s a little door that you pull off, then a paper cover that is taped and velcro’d on.

Bam! Fusebox. Pull the red 10 amp fuse - #31. It’s already missing in this picture.

It’s that one – where the hole is. (your car may have less fuses than mine, I have pretty much all the options so virtually every slot is filled)

You can look at the map on the cover.



Then unbolt the four bolts (13mm and 15mm) that are holding the seat in place. If you have power seats, you actually might want to remove these bolts before you pull the batter so you can slide the seat forward/backward for easy access to the bolts. I did. Once that’s done, put on your weightlifting, and prepare to jack up your back. My OEM passenger seat weighed in at 57.8 pounds. (using my ultra-scientific bathroom scale)


I brought it inside, and flipped it on its side on the rug. Here’s what it looks like underneath.


Found this tag with a date on it. Neat.


I highly recommend you have a set of trim tools for this job. I bought this cheap seat at Harbor Freigh years ago and they’ve served me well.


Then, follow TOB’s incredibly detailed instructions on seat disassembly. This will take a little bit. DON’T LOSE THE DANG CLIP THAT HOLDS THE SEAT TILT LEVER! That thing loves to go flying and traverse different dimensions of time and space.

Once I was far enough along to split the seat back and bottom, I snapped a few pics of the seat heater wiring and connectors.



Note that the seat back heater goes through the upholstery. You have to disconnect it at the seat base, then pull it out.


Here’s the two seat heater connectors. The grey one does the seat back, the green one is the seat cushion heater.


Seat back and cushion are officially separated.


When you pull the cushion, it exposes the OCS. (occupant classification system)


Here’s a pic of the cushion and foam.


When you peel the leather back, you can see the seat heater. Note that these are not Velcro’d in like the Recaros. There appears to be a rod and some hog rings retaining the leather skins.




Here are the two bare seat bases before I started swapping stuff.




This is the Recaro OCS sensor. It looks quite a bit different from my OEM one.


It is riveted onto the frame.


This is the OCS sensor from my factory seat. It’s much larger, and held in with three rivets. Two up front and one through the top of the seat frame.




While the Recaro should be totally plug ‘n’ play as far as OCS systems go, I am paranoid, and figured I might as well swap everything since I’m neck-deep in this mess already anyway. Sooo, I started drilling rivets.


Pop the green push-pins holding the OCS bladder in place to reveal the top rivet.


There it is.

 

[Paul.]

To remove the OCS bladder from the seat, you have to slide the connector retainer off of a metal tab on the seat. It’s held in by a very small metal tab that you just pry up gently with a screwdriver. Then it will slide right off. Disconnect the connectors too.


Should look like this.


Seat tracks with OCS removed before swappage occurs.



I don’t have a welder, and even if I did, I’m a colossally crappy welder, so rather than cut and re-weld the extra metal bolster supports from the Recaro to my original seat, I unbolted the “tops” of each seat track assembly and swapped them. Remove the four nuts on each seat track.



This is everything blown apart. Recaro manual track on left. OEM power assembly on right.


Recaro track.

OEM track. There is some wiring that you’ll need to remove using a trim tool so you can reinstall it on the new upper half from the Recaro.


Using my big rivet gun that I got to put new door handles on my foxbody notch, I riveted the OCS modules back onto the now-swapped upper halves. Then I reinstalled all the wiring.



This is the completed power, heated Recaro seat track.





Here are both seat tracks next to each other after the swap.




Now onto the seat warmer pads themselves. On the left is the seat back warmer. Right is seat bottom warmer.



Seat back warmer PN.


Seat bottom warmer PN.


Side-by-side upholstery.


Note that the cushions themselves are different. The Recaros have a Velcro groove in the bottom that the OEM seat cushion doesn’t.

This is problematic because the seat heater covers that groove completely.


The seat heater pads are held in place by double-side tape strips on either side of the pad. Lifting up the OEM pad, you’ll find a small recess cast into the foam to accommodate the heater element terminal thingy. This is also problematic because no such provision exists on the Shelby foam.


Time to get creative. Here you’ll notice the Velcro groove on the Recaro cushion that holds the leather skin tightly in place.


This strip sewn into the covers gets pushed down into that groove.


When I put the heater over the top of the cushion, I paid close attention to where the heater wire passed through the pad. There was a “straight” section where the wire itself didn’t interfere with the groove, but the pad did.



See what I’m talking about? The wires pass on either side of the groove.


I used a sharpie to draw some straight lines across the pad, paying close attention to avoid the heater wires. Then I grabbed my scissors, and got to cutting.



I got most of it out of the way. There was still a section in the center that had to remain because I can’t cut the wires. Still, most of the groove was exposed. This was a good thing.


Next up, I had to do something about making a recess in the foam for the little connector thingy.

 

[Paul.]

After mocking it up, I used a sharpie to mark where I was gonna do some damage.


Then I used a razor blade to cut a little hole with a “pigtail” provision on it.



Then after taking some measurements, I VERY CAREFULLY cut away some of the material that gets pushed down into the groove. My goal was to ensure that it didn’t stick up too much and create a bump in the upholstery once installed. Don’t cut your expensive leather covers!


Then I mocked up the cover to see how it fit before I peeled the tape and installed the heater pad for the last time. It tucks in perfectly, and everything looks nice and toight. Toight like a Toiger.



Pull the cover back off. Flip the heater pad. Pull off the orange film to expose the tap.


Install the pad for the last time.


Install your leather, being careful to ensure that all the Velcro is pushed down into the grooves and is held tightly. If you don’t do this, your upholstery will look like crap.


Seat back heaters were next.


The seat back heaters have this weird gap in the middle, presumably to fit the architecture of the OEM seat backs I’m sure. However, since I didn’t disassemble the OEM seat backs (because they were held together with hog rings and rods) I don’t have pictures. I just tried to figure out how these pads might fit best on the Recaro foam. I used a sharpie to mark the wires to ensure I didn’t cut them.


I cut a slot in the top like I did before to provide for attaching the Velcro.


I didn’t want the big gap in the middle because it pushed the seat heater down pretty far to a section that your back wouldn’t be resting against while driving. I resolved that somehow I would bring the sections together, kinda like this.


So, I VERY CAREFULLY trimmed away all the pad around the wires so I could manipulate everything more easily and not create a lump in the upholstery. Not sure if this was the best solution, but it was the best I could come up with at the time.


Cut away a small section in the upholstery again.


Mock up a provision for the connector thingy again.


Cut the hole.


Made sure that things fit to my satisfaction, then installed the heater pad.


Installed the skin per TOB’s instructions. By the way TOB, thanks for the advice on zip-typing the leather flaps up where the clamshells pass through the seat. Mine were cut just like yours, and your trick worked perfectly. In this picture, you can see the seat heater connector on the left, and the yellow airbag connector on the right.


Bolt the halves together, and reconnect all of the various electrical connectors, harnesses, and clips. Then do any final reassembly per TOB’s instructions.


BAM! Here you have a heated, power, Shelby leather Recaro passenger seat. This is quite an endeavor, and this is a pretty expensive seat. The completed passenger seat weighs in at 62.2 pounds, which is 4.4 pounds heavier than the seat that came out. These are NOT lightweights.


After installing it in the car, I went for a quick drive with my girlfriend so she could verify that her butt was, in fact, being warmed by my new seats. She did confirm that she had a hot ass, and all was right with the world.



Driver side, which should be easier, is still to come. I’m going to tackle that this weekend. More to come. I hope this write-up is helpful.

Paul.

 

[Boaisy]

Didn't realize that the OEM seats were almost 60 lbs. Holy shit. Wonder how much the power equipment weighs because if I go Recaro, the only thing I'll transfer/add is the heated seats.

 

[Paul.]

Cloth manual Recaros weigh 54.8 pounds. So you only gain ~7 pounds per side by having manual vs power. That's not enough to make me want manual seats.

 

[Gremlin85]

Brilliant. Simply brilliant.

 

[UltraKla$$ic]

Amazing detailed write-up!!!!

Those seats are gorgeous!!!

 

[Tight Lines]

Are you sure your write up didn't take longer than the actual installation??
Very nice of you to do such a well detailed write up for others to follow. Nice Job, Paul and the seats look great!