has any ever dealt with removing a bench seat and installing bucket seats?

 

no, but i want to, yea i know that didn't help much

 

it shouldnt be to hard, just alot of time

 

One of my friends has, and I was going to.

It's not too hard. The main thing you need to remember is that you need to basically create a square brace under the cab beneath each seat to which you bolt the seats to so that there is some strength to hold the seats down should you have to brake suddenly... Seatbelts are also an important concern.

 

thanks man

 

I've done it. I went from a 60/40 split bench to dual buckets.

Bolts holding down your bench are T55 torx. You'll have 4 on the driver, 4 on the passenger, and 2 on the center hump rail. I'd suggest using a breaker bar to remove these. Mine were locked in with cement, so i was only able to crank out 3. Even then, i broke 2 bar heads on those 3. I had to grind the heads off the rest and pound them out, then retap for new carriage bolts.

I burned the carpet grinding, so had to replace that as well. You're also going to see that once the center rail is removed from the hump you're going to be left with 2 holes that go directly through the frame. You'll want to fill these because they are a direct flowthrough to the ground.

Unsure what you're talking about with braces. Not needed. How do you think the bench is held down? The buckets are a direct bolt on into the frame. The bolts are huge. Those seats arent going anywhere. As well i'm unsure what your concern is with the seatbelts. My knowledge is about the 97-03, however, i know that the female end of the restraint is bolted to the bottom of the seat, the top locked into your side pillar.

 

is there any way of removing the carpet before grinding?

 

Unfortunately, no. The seat rails sit on top of the carpet, not below. You have to get the seats out prior to removing the carpet.

 

im doin a 60/40 to racing seats right now. i removed the pass side all 4 bolts without breaking one. i built a little square thats the same size as the base of the racing seats and im going to weld that back to the stock slides with some modification. theres a little bit of **** in my truck lol

the other pic is it sitting on the rails its about to be bolted to

also go under the truck and look for the seat bolts and spray some PB or liquid wrench etc to break it loose. that helps

 

Hah... you're lucky. The dipshiz who owned my truck previously loaded a ton of plumber's cement or something over the crowns of the bolts and put some sort of threadlock on the bolts prior to screwing them down. I wasnt too happy about it.

I got them in though. DEFINITELY more comfortable as dual buckets than the split bench. Also gave room in the center to mount a reverse mounted 12" sub. The basket sits right between the seats whereas i was pretty stuck with my 10s before.