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I've been searching for a set of factory third gen Recaros for years. I'm sure my reasons are common to many on TGO. The Recaros are adjustable, but still manual. They're rare. They look slim and streamlined, but still have support. And they're just 80s cool and fit our cars so well aesthetically.
A few days ago (after thousands of Facebook and Ebay searches), I came across an '84 T/A, being sold for parts. As luck would have it, it's local, so I went to see the car.
The top-of-the-line early third gens are visually awesome and this one was no exception. But the structural parts and undercarriage were rusted beyond recognition, too far gone to restore. What a shame.
But it had the seats. I felt better at least knowing some of it could be saved.
The donor car:
After TWO failed (40 mile) trips to get the seats, beaten by unassailable rust on the seat tracks both times, I managed to rescue them. As I was loading them up that night, the tow truck showed up to haul the car off to it's scrap yard grave.
RIP.
I got home that night and looked them over. They need some major work, but even in their current state, I feel vindicated for years of searching. I used to think it was stupid that Pontiac marketed a Trans Am named after the seats. Now I kind of get it. Back in '84, these had to be amazing.
40 years, and many owners later, and there's some wear, abuse, and missing pieces. Clearly they need bolsters, covers, trim, and paint. Maybe more...but there's potential.
I wasn't able to find any comprehensive resources for Recaros on TGO or really anywhere on the net, just sporadic threads and comments. Parts were never that common to begin with, and all of them have been long-ago discontinued.
I'm confident that I won't be finding another set to exploit for parts, and won't just be able to go down to Walmart to pick this stuff up. But some baseline research tells me that other brands have used the LX base as a seat (Fox Mustangs, VWs, etc.), so I'm banking on some parts interchangeability between those and the T/A versions. That expands the pool of options. Everything else will have to be improvised.
So I'm going to document the restoration in this thread. Lots of pictures, lots of details...should be fun (except for the bank account). And hopefully it can be a resource for others.
My first call was to Hawk's. I knew the answer before I asked, but had to be sure or I'd feel pretty stupid if I was wrong.
Confirmed. No covers, no bolsters, no trim available. Every seat they've had, they've sold intact (and immediately).
Lethal Interiors (Princess) doesn't do the covers. Ron at JJ Custom is out of the biz. No replacement foam for the T/A seats specifically, but some searching (thanks TGO) turned up that the '79-'82 Mustang Recaro may have had identical foam.
There is a place in Cali called Griffen Motorwerke that is a Recaro dealer and sells Recaro parts. They have been a source for seat parts that I buy for the Recaro seats that come in the snow cats, at work.
Anyway, Give 'em a call....see if they can maybe help you out. (510) 524-7447
This is definitely a worthy project, and I hope you can restore them to factory new. Recaro seats are very cool, and I'm surprised that seat cushions and seat cover kits aren't readily available. There are some recaro covers on ebay, but the '84 seats are an LX hybrid. This is what I was able to find:
Nice score!
You should’ve taken the whole car. Looks like it had lots of good parts. The 82-84 birds have a lot of unique pieces that aren’t easy to find anymore.
if youre on social media the recaro seat groups have been helpful. I ended taking 2 rough pairs to make this one good pair. Cost me 1400 for front and rear at my local shop.
@formularpm I seen that car pop up, I didn't look closely at the interior, nice score. Crappy they hauled that off, I live north of Omaha, but have a place to store a car for parts. I would have taken that steering wheel to rebuild for my car. Nice to see someone else local on the thirdgen site.
The other thing to possibly do is find an upholstery shop and see if they can make new covers from those. Carefully remove them from the seats and you have patterns for the new ones, time consuming, but is one way to make new covers. In the past I've removed all the stitching and than laid each piece on the new fabric, traced it and cut it out. I had a friend that had an industrial sewing machine sew them together.
that's exactly what my upholstery guy did - he used the existing covers as templates to make new ones. i decided to customize my seats and make them look a little more modern.
17RamGTA,
For sure, cool to see someone else local. Not many third gens in the area (I'm way out west in the suburbs). I got a quote from a local guy over on 84th, who did my last set of covers and carpet. He does good work, but the quote is pretty steep. Going to keep shopping that.
battmann,
Those turned out great. Color goes well with the paint, assuming they're in that T/A.
As expected, there aren't a lot of spare parts floating around for these seats. And there are a ton of variations on the LX style seat, with each version seemingly having different trim (shapes, mounting areas, etc.).
After some hours of research, turns out that some of the older 80s BMWs had similar seats from the factory. The BMW crowd calls them "E21" (I'm assuming it's an option code of some kind).
And good news is that the side trim on the seats is identical to the Trans Am versions. Bingo.
They actually share the same Recaro part number printed on the inside: 079.40.356.00.
Next problem is that the seat belt guide doesn't match anything I've seen on a third gen.
Here's my Formula:
And here's the Recaro:
This one wasn't as difficult. The Recaro guide is the same style as the two-piece '76-'81 F-body parts, as well as a host of other late-70s GM cars. The left and right sides are different.
Classic Industries had them to me in less than a week. Cross another part off the list. Just need to find the right shade of interior paint to match my '89's medium-dark gray.
About 10 years ago I stumbled upon an 83 Recaro trans am at a junkyard about 2 hours from my house.First attempt to get them out failed due to the studs in the floorboards spinning.Came back the next weekend with a sawzall and cut them out.Cost me a whopping 10 bucks a seat.
They are still sitting in my shed as pictured
$10 a seat. That deal is probably never coming back. Thinking there may not be another set in a junkyard anywhere these days.
That junkyard only charges 15 dollars for bucket seats now.
I couldn’t believe that no one took them.Even in the poor condition they were in I couldn’t pass on them for 10 bucks each.Worth way more that that even as cores
Some of these parts are HARD to find. I didn't appreciate how many different iterations of the LX seat were out there, but they're virtually all different.
My driver side seat is missing the recliner ****. I was hoping that the BMW seats had the same **** to make things easy, but no dice.
Here's the T/A Recaro:
And here's one of the BMW's. There are about three different versions on the Bimmers...none of which match.
The recliner on the old Mustang seats is more of a triangle shape and isn't close either.
Days of searching later and finally found a match. Turns out some 80s Porsche 911s had the Recaros and an identical ****. Part number is 911-521-381-02. A company called Suncoast makes a reproduction also- part number SKUSK91. https://www.suncoastparts.com/produc...gL7Zosw_xnnwm-
After some trial and error, I discovered the only way to get the **** off is to hold the retainer spring with a screwdriver (don't break it, you won't find a replacement) and turn the **** clockwise until the retainer drops into the recesses.
I made a call to Dave Varco at Aardvark Racing in CA. He had all the remaining trim pieces I needed, but he also mentioned that he does upholstery work on the VW and Porsche versions of these seats.
His quote was about half of what I got locally, and price was much lower even shipping back and forth from Nebraska to Southern California. A few months later and they were back. He was able to duplicate the exact look, with the factory-style combination of leather/vinyl, pallex cloth, piping, and carpet (back seats).
I'm super impressed with the work, and would recommend him to anyone looking to get Recaros redone in 2025.
Looks good. Now that you've exposed his excellent work, and that he can get Pallex cloth, he might find himself getting more 3rdgen work. Did you give him such a heads up? Is he willing and prepared for that? A search shows Aardvarc Racing as permanently closed, but this came up, and it's at the same location. BMW 2002 Parts
That is awesome! Your seats look great! Recaro seats are difficult to refurbish. I hope the Aardvark shop gets business from thirdgen owners now that you’ve shown what he can do. Recaro know-how isn’t common, and he seems to charge a reasonable fee.
I made a call to Dave Varco at Aardvark Racing in CA. He had all the remaining trim pieces I needed, but he also mentioned that he does upholstery work on the VW and Porsche versions of these seats.
His quote was about half of what I got locally, and price was much lower even shipping back and forth from Nebraska to Southern California. A few months later and they were back. He was able to duplicate the exact look, with the factory-style combination of leather/vinyl, pallex cloth, piping, and carpet (back seats).
I'm super impressed with the work, and would recommend him to anyone looking to get Recaros redone in 2025.
Agreed that know-how on some of this older niche stuff is getting hard to come by. I know there have been a few Recaro experts over the years who have closed up shop, and found some dead ends. Can't be many guys left who know them well and are willing to do the work.
Originally Posted by LAFireboyd
Looks good. Now that you've exposed his excellent work, and that he can get Pallex cloth, he might find himself getting more 3rdgen work. Did you give him such a heads up? Is he willing and prepared for that? A search shows Aardvarc Racing as permanently closed, but this came up, and it's at the same location. BMW 2002 Parts
Yeah same company, different name. A similar style Recaro also came in 80s BMWs and Porsches. I think that's what his specialty is, but he was willing to take these on too.
