Quote:
Originally Posted by Obioban
Slides are absolutely the greatest failure point. We use the same slide provider as Recaro, and have redundant fail safes to keep the seat attached to the car as they fail 100% of the time in pull testing (which, unless you're running a seat back support, is what you do any time you go into a wall backwards). We have tested the slide provider than Sparco uses, and they're significantly weaker. For my personal cars, I'd only use the slides that BMW provides (as they're designed to take belt loads or reverse crash loads), or bolt the seat directly to the floor (which lets you properly locate the belts, which you can't do for any position but one with slides).
VAC seat mounts:
Their underlying issue is being slotted front AND rear where the seat attaches (meaning only friction hold it in place, so it can built up inertia in a crash-- only one side should be slotted, so the seat can't move), and not enough material between slots. Every other seat mount maker I can think of only slots one end of the mount (which should be the front, as they take less load on average).
Using my best MS paint skills, first his seat failed at orange, then it failed at red:
|
Another +content post.
The only reason I was considering slides for my Recaro Halo seat is ingress and egress. The Z4 Coupe doesn't have a huge door & piling 195lbs of 6'1" dude in and out of the seat would be easier if it could slide. I suppose that for the race seat, i could go directly to the floor mounts and hope that I can see over the dash.
Interesting about your comment of the Recaro vs. Sparco sliders. When I bough the car, it came with Sparco, but I suppose that after your comment, I will source the Recaros. I don't have the original sliders as the car didn't come with them, and I wouldn't want the motorized stuff anyway.
I totally see why the VAC mounts failed. Quite frankly, I'm shocked that they would use slots front and back. The bolts there aren't that tight to start with--while I wouldn't want my finger to be subjected to that clamping force, it's not as if they are super tight. Normally, I would expect a fitted hole in the front and a slot in the back.
Anyway, I am not using that part as I have the Recaro Side mounts for the Recaro seat and the Sparco side mounts for the Sparco seat. What I have from VAC are the floor mounts at the base of the side mounts you marked only.