Stripping the interior, bucket seats and 6-point harnesses.

There was now only one major thing left to do to The Trackbitch before our first track day in one weeks time, lose some unnecessary weight and put in some better seats with harnesses.

The seats were picked up off eBay; two used Cobra Monacos in blue (shame we couldn't get red to match the car) we felt the seats were a bargain at £100 for the pair and with the person living two miles away it would save on a fortune postage. Harnesses were also picked up off eBay, we were only looking for 4-point but some 6-points turned up and as our seats had a hole to stick the extra two points it was a bit of a bonus. We again got lucky on the price as we paid £130 inc. delivery for two used 3" OMP harnesses with aircraft buckles, they were still in date too, FIA approved until 2012. Demon Tweeks sell these new for £293 for two, so we were very happy to pay less than half price. Next up were the seat rails to allow our Cobras to fit onto the original 5's seat mounts, unfortunately these had to be bought new due to time constraints, so another £130 was forked out.

All the old seats were pulled out with great ease, first the rear bench, rear seat belts, rear interior trim, next up was the two front seats and seat belts. Inside an hour the car had been stripped.

Old & new seats and the rear interior

Old & new seats side by side - bit more support on the Cobras.

Work in progress - Team Baron in the background.

To my surprise the harnesses went in with ease, holes were drilled in the boot well for the main shoulder straps and clipped onto proper bolt mounts. The side straps just used the fixing points for the old seat belts, however we still need to fit the bottom straps correctly using mounts (we did not order enough), we have been able to fit the driver's seat with the full 6-points though, tying off the straps onto the bottom of the seat rails.

With the correct Cobra to Renault 5 seat mount adaptors the seats were easily bolted in, there's obviously no tilt but the seats slide forward and back allowing each trackbitch team member to be at the right distance from the pedals. We had thought that it might not have been possible to have any adjustment back and forth, so were pleased when the mounts allowed this.

View of cockpit with new seats and harnesses

View from rear of new seats & harnesses

Finally, after many days of hard work we were ready for our first track day. It was now just under a week to wait. We've also managed to sell all the seats (front & rear) on eBay and through the owners club, this added £95 back into the bank account. In total we've only paid £265 for our new interior.