Last day of 2010, and I’m not particularly motivated, but I did get out and finish up the seat in the Diamond T. It’s now mounted, rather than just propped roughly up in the cab, and I’m very happy with how it looks, fits, and most of all, how comfortable it is.
The top of the seat back has four wire hooks, which drop into slots cut into a ledger mounted to the cab, and bottom simply rests against the 2×4 you can see the edge of behind it. That’ll be covered with carpet or leather, to match the seat, and there’ll be a filler panel mounted to the door jamb to cover the gap which will look like a seat frame.
The center armrest has a rear panel, which folds forward and will allow access to the storage area behind the seat. It won’t show and there’s a surprising amount of room in behind. Good to hide a purse or little stuff. The armrest is rather wide, but there is room for my leg between it, the steering wheel and shifter. It’s tight, but we won’t be driving with it down very often.
At first I wasn’t very enthused about the high back, built-in headrest look of the modern seat, but setting in the cab quickly revealed that it’ll be much more comfortable, and safer than the original, low back seat. The cab has a flange which joins the center panel to the side panels, which is right behind the driver and passengers heads, which would be great for fracturing a skull in the event of even a minor rear end collision. This is much better. It’s a Hot Rod anyway, right?
As Frankie is usually traveling with us the arm rest will have to be up!