M1008 Seat Upgrades/Improvements

[BradL84D30M1008]

Hello, new member here, bought an '84 M1008 last Friday.....

Most important/immediate thing to do to improve driveability is a better seat option!

Original bench seat is missing covering and foam on driver and passenger sides where everybody slides in across the seat......and I couldn't adjust the seat back.

I searched the forum and found lots of info on seat upgrades for other vehicles, but nothing specific for the bench seat in an M1008.

Any common swaps from other GM vehicles? Bench to buckets, etc.?

Easy thing to do is repair/re-cover the existing bench, but really need some adjustment front to back to compensate for lack of tilt steering!

Thanks in advance for any and all suggestions and insights.

 

[Sharecropper]

I took the bench seat out of my M1028 and installed high-back HMMWV seats on custom steel frames. The whole process is documented towards the end of my rebuild thread. I have had 2 major back surgeries and the bench seat was killing me. I drove my truck over a hundred miles yesterday and was completely comfortable throughout the entire trip. The HMMWV seats provide a lower mounting position on the truck cab for more room under the steering wheel. Also the ability to adjust the incline to a comfortable back position makes all the difference. The only tricky part is the fabrication of the custom steel brackets. I suppose you could source factory GM bucket seat brackets or the entire bracket and GM seat, but I wanted that "military" look and feel. My next trick involves building a custom console between the seats and matching HMMWV gauge cluster to mount on the transmission hump.

Hope this helps.

 

[BradL84D30M1008]

Wow, your interior is "sparkling"compared to mine, those seats look great! Thanks for the pics.....

 

[Recovry4x4]

There were a bunch of new seat bottom factory covers sold a while back. They are still in the classifieds really cheap. I used this combined with a new piece of seat foam and came up with a dandy seat for my truck that still seats 3.

 

[firefox]

Where did you get the new seat foam? Is it specifcaly designed as seat foam?
Thanks!

 

[Recovry4x4]

Where did you get the new seat foam? Is it specifcaly designed as seat foam?
Thanks!

I honestly forget where I got it. With some searching I found this post. http://www.steelsoldiers.com/showth...y-Part-2&p=1612651&highlight=seat#post1612651

Go to posts 1130 thru 1133 for info on what I did!

 

[BradL84D30M1008]

Thanks for the tip Recovry4X4, that seat looks great

 

[Dillard88]

There were a bunch of new seat bottom factory covers sold a while back. They are still in the classifieds really cheap. I used this combined with a new piece of seat foam and came up with a dandy seat for my truck that still seats 3.

where did you get the center console? Thanks