I popped in to see Reinhold at White Pointer Fibreglass, as I wanted to buy the seats, plus have a look at the Westfields etc that gather at his shop every Saturday morning. Unfortunately we slept in and arrived just as he was shutting up shop. But he was glad to talk to us and point out modifications etc he's made to his car.

The driver's seat is narrower than the passenger's seat, and Reinhold got me to sit in his car to test the fit. Very tight is the only description. I may be forced to think about losing some weight if I want to be comfortable driving for any length of time. Now with the seats in, I'll be able to arrange where the steering column/ gearlever should be positioned for the optimal driving setup.

I picked up a set of Mazda 323 seat runners from Salisbury Wreckers. They look in pretty good nick. I now have to figure out how to fix the runners to the White Pointer seat shells, and then how to fix the runners to the chassis. Apparently, the method of fixing the runners to the floor can affect registration, so I have to get that right

Here are the seat runners fastened to the floor. The floor mounting is done with M12 high tensile bolts with a large flat washer and spring washer. In Queensland, you must also use a steel plate of minimum dimensions 75mm x 50mm x 3mm underneath the floor mount. As far as I can tell, there is no requirement for the seat mounting to the runner, which in this case is high tensile M8 bolts.

The WhitePointer fibreglass shells are bolted to the runners using M8 bolts through 13mm square steel tube. One problem was how to tighten/loosen/adjust these bolts once the seat is upholstered? One very neat solution I have seen, is to have the seat cushion free to lift up from the front of the seat. I think it was clipped or velcro'd to the front. I exchanged my 375mm driver's seat for the 395mm wide one. It's too tight now, so when upholstered, would be even tighter. Anyway, it seems to fit well.

This is the passenger seat, which looks pretty much like the driver's seat, except I have decided it was not necessarry to have an adjustable passenger seat, so I have bolted this straight to the floor using M8 bolts and 13mm tube in the seat channels. One side effect of this, is that the driver sits higher than the passenger. I don't know whether this is a good thing yet, but it saves nearly 3kg.

The seats have been upholstered, and this is the result. Not bad eh? Other builders had told me that there weren't many upholstery shops that were willing to do a job like this. If they were, they charged like the proverbial bull. Lledo Trimmers at Murrarie Brisbane, did a great job and charged only $250 per seat. When I dropped the seats off, they asked me what colour I wanted the piping, so I had to make a decision on the spot. Yellow. I was considering painting the car black, but I have been talked out of this by a coalition of the caring including my wife, and John Bosci. I guess a black clubbie is going to be pretty hard to see in the rear-view mirrors of trucks. Anyway, yellow sets off the black wheels and carbon fibre bits that I intend to fit.

The new seats fit perfectly in the Westie. I was concerned that the 395mm wide seat might not fit in the driver's side when padded out with upholstery, but there are no problems with the fit at all. The driver's seat is about 80mm higher thab the passenger's, because the passenger side has no runners, but they are very comfortable and look the duck's guts. I have cut holes in the seat shell shoulders for a 3 inch four-point harness, and I will have the holes properly trimmed once the car is registered for the road. The ergonomics is definitely in the 'Italian' style, with the steering wheel and gear shift at full arm's length with the seat set up for optimum leg length. OK, this is a sports car, so I guess you can't expect a Morris Minor setup.

I borrowed a pair of Klippan Lap/Sash belts from another builder, John Webster at Birkdale. Thanks John! Of course, a one hour job fitting the belts turned into a four hour marathon. I had to remove the seats to fit the belts, but that was the problem. The mounting bolts on the passenger seat were damaged, and were rotating in the mounting frames (under the upholstery). Luckily, I managed to undo the nuts and remove the seat, but thought I'd have to rip the upholstery off to fix the bolts. Eventually decided to weld a metal strap between the front and rear bolts, thus immobilising them, and this seemed to do the trick. The lap/sash belts are a requirement for registration in Queensland.