Aftermarket Bucket Seat Upgrade

[EJChevy]

Has anyone had experience replacing their stock seat(s) with aftermarket, fixed-back buckets? I'm going to do the swap soon and would like some input from someone who has experience doing this.


Regards,

Eric

 

[tommyc6zo6]

Well, after much back and forth and wanting to keep my 3LZ interior pretty with the 2-tone ebony/sienna colours, i just ordered a pair of fixed back Caravaggio race seats.
They’re not real race seats of course but I hope they will afford the smallest sacrifice from street comfort ingress/egress and with the OE ratcheting belts hold me a bit better for the few track days I do these days.
It was a toss up between them and Marrad ST3 with the same OE colour options available.

I ‘almost’ went with Marrad, advantages being tighter fit, lower seating, less weight. Also, with Marrad the OE belts come through openings in the seats, like a harness would. This would surely be snugger, but may also be a bit less practical on street.

Disadvantage was it being a bit more awkward to deal with them being in the USA, and since I want Z06 logos in the headrests, that kinda involves a 3rd party but, admittedly they were willing to take care of all that. Marrad are more of a real race seat, with side mounts and manual sliders. I’d have had to separately buy all the connectors to fool the airbags.

Carravagio seats simply mount onto the existing heavy OE bases, retaining full power. But, this makes them a bit higher than stock. I’m 5’11, so this may not be an issue, but the alcantara inserts are held in with Velcro so I can remove them if my helmet interferes with the roof. Also, the OE belts go over the side bolsters, so I’m not sure they’ll be able to be ratcheted down as tightly this way, but it certainly makes getting in/out much friendlier for street use. These Caravaggio seats are clearly a bit less track-orientated...but may make a better compromise and they are including the connectors for the airbags.
The Caravaggio seats end up costing less than the Marrad ones, optioned out my way and are just easier to deal with being domestic.

When I got my car a year ago, I almost bought a real race seat, harness etc, at much lower cost of course. But then had an epiphany, that I didn’t want to start down a path of modifications which I had gone on with my last car over 30 yrs. I had turned it into a formidable track weapon, winning many time-attacks, but had rendered it virtually unstreetable.

Now I’m older, ‘been there, done that‘ and want to keep the pretty 3LZ interior kinda intact at this juncture.

Caravaggio told me delivery would be about 6weeks, but frankly, I’ve heard negative stories about that from a friend.
We’ll see...

cheers
Tommy