Aspire seats in a Festiva...?

[2foci1festy]

OK, I searched and didn't find anything. I was doing some junkyard diving yesterday and ran across a Festiva that had been side swiped and on closer inspection I noticed that it had Aspire seats in it. Due to the damage I couldn't get the doors open and look at the mounts. Is this a direct bolt in swap with no modification needed? My drivers seat vinyl is shot and the fabric stained pretty bad on the passengers side. I was thinking of just getting seat covers but if I can snag some seats from a newer Aspire....

[2foci1festy]

Anyone...anyone....Bueller....Bueller?

[aithanmier]

should have done a little more reading, i did a post on this a little while back, the mounting brackets on the aspire seats a a little different, but the frames are identical, the aspire seats are a little cushier, with thicker foam, so you can just break out the pliers and pull all the hog rings from your festiva seats and the aspire seats and swap the foam and covers onto your festiva seats, then they bolt right in of course. should't take more than 30 min or so per seat, and they are alot more comfortible afterwards imho.

[2foci1festy]

I knew I saw something about it at some point but I couldn't find it. Just to confirm...pull the covers and the foam from the Aspire seats, put it on the Festiva frame, reattach everything, bolt in the Festiva and done?

[biggc1]

I never tried this but you could prolly leave the festiva seats in to do the change.

[aithanmier]

only if your mr fantastic... there are 10 hogrings to remove and reinstall on the underside of the seat. you also need to remove the back from the base on the inboard side to get the covers off, and take the one bolt that you can get to out on the outboard side (the reclining part). you can't get to the other one because there is a spring in the way (a big spiral spring that returns the seat back to the upright) so just use a pair of sissors to cut from the base to the bolt hole on the bolt you can't remove. then you can remove the lower seat cover. (the cut won't be seen once the recline mechanism cover is reinstalled) it sounds complicated but once you see it you'll understand. just be careful and don't get in a hurry, if something isn't comming loose you missed a hogring. put them all back in when you reinstall it (even the pita ones at the top of the seatback) or the cover will be loose and not fit right. it's not a difficult project and will really make the interior "pop" if you get some nice aspire seats. I found an aspire with the deluxe interior and it looked like new, now my seats make my carpet look bad lol.

[rotinaj13]

no i would remove them any how more room to work! but it would b nice if i was one of the fantastic four... what is an aspire with the premium interiour never heard of that option

[aithanmier]

just nicer interior lol. i'm not sure if it was an option separatly, but the aspire i got my seats out of looked like it had the se package, the fancy 2 tone seats.

[rotinaj13]

warning not pc correct

just watch out when ur g/f or wife sits in the pass side thats how stains r made LOL trust me i know

[festivagt]

Aspire seats in Festie....

The seats just swap over if you swap the lower tracks off of the festiva seats onto the aspire ones. Drill out the rivet's that keep them from being pulled apart and swap them over. Shouldn't take more than a half hour a seat.

[89fester]

I picked up some Aspire seats this weekend. The only rivet I see keeping the tracks from separating are the ones on the end that hold the floor bracket to the track. Assuming I drill these out, how did you re-attach the bracket once the track was re-assembled? Weld? Bolt?

Do any of the 8 mounting points on the Aspire seats work in the Festiva? Can you just swap one or 2 of the brackets and make them work?

I might hack the Festiva seat up and try to re-use the bottom of the frame for a pair of leather seats I got from a friend. They are a dark charcoal from a Durango RT, and are about the same size as the Festiva, but a helluva alot more comfortable. They have no tracks though.

89 L