OP
OP
CanadiaegeanBlue
Senior Member
- First Name
- Humza
- Joined
- Jul 1, 2017
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- 17
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- 874
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- 1,556
- Location
- Toronto
- Vehicle(s)
- 2017 Honda Civic Si Sedan - Aegean Blue Metallic
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- Thread starter
- #211
Picked up a pair of Recaro SR-11 from another Mitsubishi Evo 10 owner! These are a cloth - suede material, BUT get this...Heated, and with Side Airbags! Now, don't just rush to find yourself a pair just yet because I have yet to install them, and there is a possibility one or both of those features may not work. I'm speaking with my buddy who does all the work on my car and thankfully he's done plenty aftermarket seats as well. The Civic has 2.2 OHM resistors, the Evo is 3.3 OHM - he may be able to bridge them, so let's see. What's more involving is that he has to take apart the Si seat to remove the weight sensor, and take apart the Recaro and install it in there.
The passenger side seems to be more complicated, and I can live without the seat airbag but under no circumstance give up the front airbag, risking passenger safety. Will have more details, follow along
Planted Seat Mounts ordered via @MAPerformance
The price is pretty consistent irrespective of where you purchase these from but I see MAP doing good things for the community, and since I have Recaros from an EvoX, and these guys are very well known in the Evo world so it was pretty easy asking questions over the phone. Tony was of great help, and knew exactly what I was trying to do
PN's:
PLT SB290DR - Driver
PLT SB290PA - Passenger
This is going to be a long post, but summarizing what's up to date with the Recaro seats. Driver's side is in, I've been driving around for about a week, and loving how much of an upgrade these are over Si seats for me! They've got more lumbar than the Si seats, the bolsters are higher and more solid vs. low foam bolster Si seats, and I haven't lost the ability to slide back and forth, and recline. I feel very snug, and am not sliding around like I used to in the Si seat. As a factory seat, the Si buckets are good but if you've been following the build the car is far from factory now so the seats became inadequate. I don't think I'll ever go for fixed buckets, those are overkill for any daily Civic.Driver's side Recaro Evo X seat is in! Not easy getting to this point of just bolting them into the car, some fabrication was required. Still have to swap all the wires from the Si seat over to the Recaro. More on custom work later.
They feel great, and hug me maybe too well in the thigh area whereas Si seats just wouldn't keep me secure as a 32 waist guy. First short outing went well minus the dash being all lit up since the wires aren't plugged in. Will tackle that, and hopefully after a few rides my thighs will be nice and broken in because I'm definitely feeling some soreness after my first half hour blast around the area, which if it doesn't go away I may only keep the Driver's side to spare my passengers. They do hug great in the twisties!!
Another thing I love is that the base of the seats is lower so glutes are more sunk-in, and the lats are slightly raised - I much prefer this position, it's more secure and I feel it helped with my pedal position in relative to my feet. Hard to explain, but essentially the Si seats are flat making them easier to get out of, but not as secure.
Here's the fine print. Having Mitsubishi brackets on all 4 corners of the rail that were riveted and spot-welded meant that the seats wouldn't just sit on the Planted Seat Mounts for the 10th Gen Civic. As you can see in the pictures, my buddy had to remove each one carefully without compromising the rail. This part was beyond my skill level, comfort, and not having the right tools so I trusted him as an experienced builder. We also had to remove the silver brace where the wires are mounted, the seat wouldn't sit flat on the Planted mount otherwise. Once on the Planted Mount, the holes on the rail didn't mount perfectly, they were off by 2mm so had to ream out the mount slightly. Once it sat, used high strength steel bolts, and locking nuts to ensure the seat isn't going anywhere. The Planted mount also comes with it's own seat belt buckle bracket which was just barely hitting the buckle bracket on the Recaro rails, so the option was to shave the Planted mount a little to get full range of sliding movement forwards and backwards, or let it be and slightly reduce how far back I can move the seat - I chose the latter because I can still move back far enough to get in and out of the car comfortably. I'm 5'9", by habit I move the seat back every time I get out of the car, and move it back up every time I get in.
We've yet to wire the seat heating, and the airbag SRS light is still on. Once I get some more time I'll visit my buddy again to finish this up, and work on the passenger seat as well.
Verdict to this point: it's a great affordable option for a set of quality seats that, BUT there's a lot of work involved. If you just want better seats without any hassle find a pair of Type R seats. Second option would be universal fit Bride, Recaro, Sparco seats with planted mounts and the appropriate rails. This is the third option simply due to difficulty of install, but rewarding if you can do it right.
