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Having a 5 year old truck with 62K miles on it, I just couldn't find a good deal on Katzkins for an older Supercab. Lots of great deals for newer Super Crews but none for Supercabs that I would feel like spending that much on an older truck. Still paying for two college tuitions has me pinching pennies a bit. Instead I opted for DIY Clazzios w/heaters. For just about 600 total, they showed up yesterday just as we were starting to watch Florence move in here in NC. I managed to get everything installed today, but the rain and wind are getting more intense now so I wrapped it up without fine tuning them. I'd have to pull my wife's car out of the garage to have room to keep working but in honesty, I think my hands are about done for this round. I'll need to go back around and cinch everything up tighter once they settle in for a few days, but overall I am quite pleased. For an older truck that I didn't want to spend a ton of money on, I think they look great. They look way better in person than they do in these pictures as the camera really seems to emphasize the shipping creases. From what I've read, the residual creases here and there from being compressed in the shipping box will fade away over the coming days/weeks, especially when I get a chance to go back around and tighten everything up. I was happy to find a "Heated Seats" slot in the fuse panel which made hooking them up a breeze. Hard to tell how good they work with temps in the high 70s here, but they do get warm. Anyway, for about 600 bucks including the heaters I am very pleased with them. They also are very comfortable with their thick memory foam. I have a friend with a 2018 Lariat. His leather seats look very nice, but to my backside, feel a bit too firm. YMMV
The requisite 'Before' pic. The pics don't show it, but after 5 years, these things were a bit dingy. The driver side butt holder was showing some definite wear.
First up I put the headrest covers on so I wouldn't have to dig my knees into the new seat covers to put them on. I also put the heaters in place.
The heater switches took a simple 3/4" hole to mount. Figured these spots were as good as any.
Each heater set has a relay. I mounted them up under the seats.
And here they are installed. The center console still needs some follow-up. I found the part that goes over the cup holders quite tacky looking so I just tucked it under for now. After Florence gets out of here I am going to work on the center console a bit. The hatch top cover was scrunched up in the box and has the residual creases to show it. If they don't fade, I would be fine to just take the cover off and go with my original gray cloth hatch cover as it's a pretty close color match to the Clazzios.
I was pleased that they have fixed that gaping hole they used to have for the center rear seat belt opening. I hated that and was pleasantly surprised at the redesign.
I went with dark gray all around as they were in stock, ready to ship and on sale.
Heaters aside, how long did the covers take you to put on?
Hard to say as I had other stuff going on to prep for the storm today and did them in intermittent spurts when the rain was light or taking a reprieve. All that tucking and pulling really takes a toll on your fingers and hands for sure. I expect I will be feeling it even worse tomorrow. The area of skin between my fingernails and first knuckles is a bit tender. If I had to guess, I'd say maybe 3hrs for just the covers and another hour to install the switches, mount the relays and run the wiring up to the fuse panel and test everything. So 4hrs total? If I were to do it again tomorrow, I think I could do it in half that time now that I've figured out the tuck and pull techniques and might see if I could do it even wearing work gloves of some sort.
The instructions that come with them are total crap. They are some kind of translation from Chinese to English I think and most of the verbiage along with the pictures of each section are useless. It will have like one picture of a seat and say "Follow along the seat". Wow..how helpful! I found better guidance on YouTube.
Although this video is of a Super Crew and the style is slightly different (at least on the ones I installed) in that the center jump seat design has changed as has the back seat design in that they got rid of that gaping seat belt hole and the bottom cushions cover the entire seat bottom instead of just wrapping around the front, I found this 'How To' video quite helpful to get me started after giving up on the included directions. There are many other helpful videos too, even if not F150 specific:
I pulled out that tacky looking cup holder cover I had stuffed underneath and completely cut it out. This allowed the cup holder to sit down in flush and overall it just looks better. If Clazzio ever does a redesign on these, they should make it this way. There just was no way to make that piece laying over the cup holders look good.
Here are the after shots. The shipping creases in the top door faded just a bit overnight and I think will be gone by the end of the week.
This is the piece I had stuffed under the cup holder yesterday. I decided to do the Stone Family hack in the link above and just cut it out completely. Removing the top and attaching the cover to the little fabric hooks under the cup holder was very easy and took about 5 mins.
With that portion completely gone, the cup holder now tucks in nice and flush. I think it looks way better without that piece on top and my vote would be for Clazzio to design them this way. There are still some residual shipping creases in the lid, but they have faded a bit overnight and I think will be gone by the end of the week.
Definitely looking better from this side with the cup holder sitting flush now. Overall I am pleased with the entire install. Time to watch some TV until this storm passes!
These things are looking better every day as the shipping creases fade away. I would definitely recommend them. I set a reminder to post check in pics a year from now since some are curious as to their long term durability. Happy Hump. Over and out!
Just to check in as I just took this pic 5mins ago for another thread. Here they are after 10mo. I've carried around co-workers, friends, family members, grand-kids and dogs over these past 10mo. They still look great and in fact due to the shipping wrinkles faded away, may even look a bit better than they did when I installed them!
09-15-2018, 05:25 PM
Clazzios installed. Florence who?
