huge sale in car seats

[Hans Efde]

The crisis is affecting many of us, but for us consumers there can be a bargain. I noticed several companies on Ebay clearing their stock of car seats before the end of the year. Seats are being sold for less than half of their original retail price. I just bought this set:
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I paid 144 euro for the 2 and shipping will be less than 14 euro. A bargain but I noticed the other colors being auctioned for even less.
If you are into REAL carbon, I see bucket seats going for around 100 euro. And that's INCLUDING the frame and slider system. Usually sliders and frame are over 100 euro alone! Although shipping is more expensive at 38 euros for Europe, still an unbelievable bargain. I used to see real carbon seats going for over a 1000 euro. Keep an eye on this one:
http://www.ebay.de/itm/291029344705?ssP ... 1423.l2649

It looks like there are more on offer on German Ebay than on UK Ebay, so it may be an option to search for "schalensitz" or "sportsitz" as well.

My new seats won't go into my Midas (but if people want to know if they fit, I can trial fit them) since I am quite happy with my Cobra kevlar bucket seats. Reupholstering with grey alcantara is still on my todo list. The seats I bought will be used to convert to office chairs. My son and I have both old office chairs, but the frame is still fine. So I figured out it should not be too difficult to bolt new seats to the old chair legs, possible by welding a small support frame from a few strips of steel. We'll see.

[Hans Efde]

I finished the first seat conversion. Details on my facebook page:

It's possible but only with low office chair frames. I used an Ikea Snille frame for this conversion.

[DavidL]

You've done something I've often dreamt of! I'm in the market for new seats for the Midas but I know what I want - leather MX5 seats.
MX5 because I know they'll fit, leather because I have a problem with excessive dog hair, and it shouldn't stick to leather...

And once I've found leather seats, one of my original seats is too good to throw away, but would make a nice office chair. I didn't realise you could buy just a base for one, a trip to IKEA is now in the offing.

[Hans Efde]

Yes it's a very easy job. But I am not saying you can just buy the base (but probably you can). Anyway these things are very cheap (35 euro's new) or else plentiful secondhand available for a tenner or so. Today I stripped down a Jules desk chair . It's frame is even more suited for conversion:

It has a gas strut, flat base and a tilt which is useful for counteracting the tilt of the seat.
I chopped the lugs off (too wide for the seat) and bolted 2 strips of steel to it. Put a few washers under the aft bolts for final tilt:

And another awesome deskchair, slightly higher than the other one but just enough for me. Comfort of these seats is a 1000 times better than the ordinary office seats.

Here's a detail of the seat frame.This one has 2 strips of steel underneath on which I installed the anchor nuts: