The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Interiors 1951-3100 Seat spring repair

Just started to install new upholstery and found several critical springs broken and rusty. Does anyone make a replacement seat spring assembly or springs. Does anyone have a good seat bottom for sale.

Place a part wanted ad in the Swap Meet.

It might be easier/better to find a better seat frame with better springs. If you have a significant amount of rust on the springs, you will not like the feel of the seat once you are done. Springs lose their "sproing" with rust.

you can also try your local upholstery shop. They may be able to sell you what you're looking for to repair your seat.

On springs...my trucks springs are in good shape, however after installing new Jim Carter covers last summer I'm not a fan of the stock seat springs. If on a longer than two hour drive, the old backside is not happy at all.

Now this could be my fault I admit. When I researched diy upholstery I saw several folks used hardware cloth (1/2") and carpet to cover the springs. My thinking in doing same is it'd unitize the springs, preventing sags/low spots as I made the truck a daily driver. Well, mission accomplished, and on shortish drives the seat is fine. But long dives, not so much.

Since your springs are already compromised, my recommendation is to consider ditching them and go to a plywood/firm foam seat. Some good how-to articles on line. I do believe on this forum.

Good Luck, Ron

As Ron has described/suggested, the Jim Carter upholstery installation kit is woefully inadequate and does not match the number of layers and the thickness/firmness of the original installation.

One missing layer is the stiff coir matting, which can be somewhat matched with piece of strong very short nap carpet.

Denny Graham did a nice photo write-up on a good installation. He might have found coir matting or a synthetic equivalent. I'll see if I can find his posts here.

Even with the correct layers, the old seats will never be as comfortable as the seat cushioning in a modern vehicle.

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Denny Graham

As Tim said, these old seats will not be as comfortable as the modern seats. In a post a while back, I was reminded by a member of this forum that these are trucks, or in better terms a tractor with a cab to keep your head dry, not a Cadillac.

Tim