F-550 Bucket Seat Conversion (quick'n'dirty)

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I don't normally post my work, but this might help somebody in the future so here it is.I finally got tired of riding around sitting on the steel seat frame of my '99 F-550's worn-out bench seat - the previous owner had worn through both the cover and the foam from the edge to about 6" in.  A year ago I priced a seat repair job and when I was told $300 I decided I'd ride on steel awhile longer.  But last week I'd had enough.Went to the local u-pull-it and found out they don't let you back there unattended anymore.  Instead they took me to a shed that had a few seats in it and told me to pick.  Much as I hate Kia's, the cheapest set of seats that looked like it'd work was from a '99 Kia Sportage.  Bought the set for $50 and came home.  Bonus: replacement seats will always be dirt cheap from now on.Ye Ole Work Truck can't afford to be down long, so you'll have to excuse the poor paint job and less-than-perfectly-formed brackets.  But it sure is stout, and dang if it isn't comfortable, too!  I used steel from my scrap pile, so most of this is 2-1/2" x 1/4" flat and 4" x 4" x 1/4" angle, cut into whatever shape I needed.  Also used a piece of 3" x 4" x 1/4" rectangular tubing as a spacer at the left front.  Two 1/2" bolts, a 3/8" bolt, some spare 12mm x 1.75 bolts, and a 12mm x 1.75 tap to clean out the Ford-provided unused bucket seat holes, and that's pretty much the sum of it.  The key to making this an easy install is that I swapped the seats side-for-side so the brackets were close (The driver sits in the Kia's passenger seat), and drilled out the Kia seat's right rear bracket bolt hole to 5/8", bolted it down using the old middle seatbelt mounting hole, and used it as a reference point for everything else.  You can see that the seat's outside had to raise up 3" (see the tubing spacer) and how I dealt with that.  Final clencher is that aside from welding the tubing spacer to the Kia seat frame, I didn't modify it at all except to rebend the front mounting tabs a shade with a hammer.  So when/if these seats wear out, it won't take but an hour or so to exchange them for new. Passenger's seat isn't installed yet, but it should be close to a mirror image of the driver's side.  Not exactly, b/c of differences both in the Kia seat and in Ford's bolt holes, but close.Bottom line: it could have been done cleaner, but this took about a day to design and install, and that was all the time I had.  Now that you know what seats can be used, and a basic design to copy from if you'd like, there's no reason *you* need to be riding on the seat frame anymore, either. Attached Images
Reply:Simple design, yet very effective. You didn't mess with the seat or seat brackets... much, just built tonka strong attachment points/blocks. I say you did good Qualified & experienced at welding scrap metal
Reply:Way cool thanks for posting. Might just encourage me to do the same for my F350 been sitting on oil diapers and duct tape for a year.
Reply:Thanks jeep and FB, I wandered out to the shop for an hour this afternoon and am already half done with the passenger's seat - both rear mounts are bolted down and I'm ready to start on the front piece.  It's a whole lot faster when you already have a general design to work from.There's a lot of space now between the seats, so I'm thinking about building a center console with space to store 4 Lincoln 10-lb rod cans at a 20-degree angle off horizontal, my clipboard, a couple of cupholders (can't use the ones in the dash b/c the PTO/dump lever setup is in the way), and whatever else I have room for.  Maybe hardhat or welding shield.  I'd like to attach a couple of armrests to it also.
Reply:you know that you can't get them dirty now right?Miller thunderbolt 250Decastar 135ERecovering tool-o-holic ESAB OAI have been interested or involved in Electrical, Fire Alarm, Auto, Marine, Welding, Electronics ETC to name a just a few. So YES you can own too many tools.
Reply:I love it. Great job
Reply:You must be lucky enough not to have seat belt laws there...
Reply:I would go back to the parts place and look for a console that fits your space.  To accommodate the rods tube and other things I would remove the top of the console and make a new one.  Actually you might be able to modify the original top.  Great job so far.
Reply:Originally Posted by AntiblingYou must be lucky enough not to have seat belt laws there...
Reply:Originally Posted by dumb as a stumpyou know that you can't get them dirty now right?
Reply:Originally Posted by AntiblingYou must be lucky enough not to have seat belt laws there...
Reply:Originally Posted by duaneb55 I see seat belts in the first and second photos.Nice install tbone.
Reply:I just can't think of any zany, hairbrained comments for this one. What more can I say than, nice job there! And if you want to keep them nice, I use two bath towels, one for the seat back and one for the seat. Then I cover that with a twin size bed sheet. My '01 F350 seats are like new!"Where's Stick man????????" - 7A749"SHHHHHH!! I sent him over to snag that MIC-4 while tbone wasn't looking!" - duaneb55"I have bought a few of Tbone's things unlike Stick-Man who helps himself" - TozziWelding"Stick-man"
Reply:Originally Posted by Stick-manI just can't think of any zany, hairbrained comments for this one. What more can I say than, nice job there! And if you want to keep them nice, I use two bath towels, one for the seat back and one for the seat. Then I cover that with a twin size bed sheet. My '01 F350 seats are like new!
Reply:Ah looking back I missed them, my bad, I'm used to super duties that have the seat belts built into the seats.
Reply:Got busy halfway through the passenger's side seat, so I just finished it today. Attached Images
Reply:Been considering doing this exact same conversion to my '98 3500HD.  The OEM bench is tired, smelly, and just plain ugly.One thing I noticed is it looks like you have better acess to the space behind the seats and more room for stuff in the cab.  Is this handy or not a benefit?Benson's Mobile Welding - Dayton, OH metro area - AWS Certified Welding Inspector
Reply:any plans for a center console?
Reply:A_DAB_will_do, yes, it's EXTREMELY handy to have that open space.  I used to stack certain tools on the seat with me, but that hole between the seats has a lot of room.  I have a deep plastic tool tray with a handle on it that fits in there perfectly, and the shifter is there to block it from coming into the footwell under heavy braking.The only thing I don't like is that anything you put behind the seats now is visible from outside the cab, and wasn't before.  That will be fixed if I ever build a console for it.Smokin_dodge, yes, I would like to put a console in but it will have to wait awhile.  This past year I spent a few thousand on some engine-driven welders to rebuild and resell in my slower times, and I've got an SA-200 and a SAM-400 which need to be finished up now that it's wintertime, so I can get the money back out of them.  I'm putting the F-163 on the SA-200 back together as we speak.When I add the console, I'll post it to this thread also, but it will be at least January with these machines I'm working on and with Christmas and all.  Maybe later if my workload picks up again, which is what I'd really like to see happen.