Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

I've had the rear seats out of my +2 for a few months now, while I've been fitting seatbelt brackets and renewing the felt everywhere.

I'm nearly at a point of refitting the rear seats, but it's occurred to me that the my rear seats may be secured in a non-standard way. I have an L-shaped bracket on the parcel shelf which the back rest hooks over - I think this is good - but I also have 2 screw/bolt holes in the middle each side of the back rest, which go through the fibreglass and can be accessed inside the rear wheel arch. Is this normal?

On the lower seat pads, I have an L-shape bracket which is screwed to the front of each pad and bolts through the fibreglass behind say, where your knees would be.

Can someone advise on what the original fitting should be.

Ian

from the experience of my last two.....they have had no additional fixings.....
it all sort of butts together and holds itself together without bolts or screws.....
I think the bracket to the quabs behind the knees sounds good tho'........stops everything shooting forward.....
just because its not original I wouldn't not re-install it.........if it works.......
altho' if it doesn't need it when you've put it all together then don't put them back.....
up to you.......
put it back together then you'll see whether it'll be self supporting or if you need the help of the screw and bolt

Good advice. Just wanted to check that I wasn't missing a magic bracket or clip somewhere. I also wanted to minimise the number of holes in the bodywork.

So the squabs were meant to just stay in place by will power? Do all Lotus drivers practise gentle, progressive braking? Or maybe they just don't look behind them.

Hi Ian.
The rear seat backrest, does as you say hook over the ?L? shaped bracket on the parcel shelf.


The rear seat cushion has 2 ?L? shaped brackets, 1 at the back, 1 at the front.
Rear bracket is attached to the seat cushion only. The front Bracket is screwed to both the cushion and body.

I will take a photo of the cushion and post shortly.

The seat bases are held in place by the two self tappers in the L brackets,the ones in the wheel-arch are " added extras",if you don't want to re-fit them , then bung the holes up...

John

Ian,
I've put my early rear seats back recently and also have the long L bracket that goes over the top of the L bracket fixed to the parcel shelf.
I have two holes either side at the top (sort of brackets) that the parcel shelf is screwed down to.
My seat bases (squabs I beleive ) have the brackets that you mention at the front, but also have them at the rears that face upwards, behind the seat back. I'm pretty certain that they are original.
I beleive the seat back was attached somehow but I didn't bother with that as everything else seems to hold it in place.
HTH

Kev.

I too have the little right angle retaining pieces on the squabs which are held into the body by self tapping screws. Since these always fall out leaving our daughter in a strange position I have moved to super high quality Velcro stuck to the bottom of the seat and body which seems to work a little better.

Ian.
Photo's of the rear seat cusion with brackets.

Im missing bits......
I'll have to rectify that......

lol......
Im guessing as all my previous cars had been retrimmed these were not put back on after trimming......doh!

Thanks everyone very helpful.

I will post some pics tonight showing what I have. But basically I'm missing the right angle brackets that face upwards at the back of the Pads/Squabs. I guess these just tuck behind the back rest when it's in place.

I think I will keep the bodywork holes the PO made in order to bolt the back rest down. The upwards facing angle bracket on the pads/squabs may try to pull this away otherwise, and damage my already damaged and very fragile centre tunnel cover.

Some pics I took tonight of the my fixing points. Looks like the PO did a fairly decent job of keeping the seats in place, so I'm going to keep the holes through the bodywork for fixing. It does feel like the original method of essentially fixing one thing to another (squab to back rest to parcel shelf) is a bit flaky.

My Seat Squabs/Bases (where does the name Squab come from??).
I only have the front, lower L-shape bracket. Looks like I'm meant to have another at the back facing up.


The back rest showing screw holes each side which get hidden behind the decorative clip-on panel. A PO job but probably a wise move. (Note how in storing the back rest I have managed to lay it face down on a set of clips, doh )/


The holes in the fibreglass for the back rest which I can access via the rear wheel arch.


The holes in the fibreglass for the Squabs which I can access from under the car. (Yet to lay felt here until I figure the fixing points I need).

Ian,
I'll have to check when I get home tonight, but I think mine has the same screws for the backrest so those may be original. I'm fairly certain that I'm the first person to have mine apart given how all the screws were shot blind and straight into the 'glass and there is only one hole for each rather than multiples from past re-assembly.

Interesting. When I took mine apart I actually found a wooden block behind the backrest. It had been screwed into the bodywork, then the back rest was screwed into the wooden block. I assume this was to prevent multiple fibreglass holes on reassembly. It was as good as useless however and didn't secure well at all and I ended up just using a bolt all the way through. The wheel arch is easy enough to access when needed.

The Veg wrote:Ian,
I'll have to check when I get home tonight, but I think mine has the same screws for the backrest so those may be original. I'm fairly certain that I'm the first person to have mine apart given how all the screws were shot blind and straight into the 'glass and there is only one hole for each rather than multiples from past re-assembly.

The Veg wrote:Ian,
I'll have to check when I get home tonight, but I think mine has the same screws for the backrest so those may be original. I'm fairly certain that I'm the first person to have mine apart given how all the screws were shot blind and straight into the 'glass and there is only one hole for each rather than multiples from past re-assembly.

Interesting.
Today I removed my rear backrest, so that I could remove, repair / strengthen my tunnel cover.
Looking closely at the rear of the backrest, I found 2 screws, 1 broken, the other just showing.
These were behind the removable panel, so could not be seen from the front.

The position of the screws were 24 cm from the top and 8 cm in from each side.

So when its refitted, I will secure the backrest with suitable st. st. screws.