Vectra B GSI Seats into MK4 Astra

Been a long time since I ventured on here 🙂

Right being as my new year's resolution in 2011 was not to post on car forums or answer PM's, I'll make this brief.

Fronts

1 They are a straight fit - BUT only if you get the adaptor bars form the Vectra donor car. All these do is enable the standard Recaro subframe fit to the standard VX Astra/Vectra floorpan. Make sure you get these as they are very rare and will cost you an arm, leg and bollock to buy separately!

2 They do tilt, as they are off the shelf Recaro kit - in fact there is a tilt lever on each side of the chair, so they are better than standard in that respect.

3 They do not tilt and slide

4 The electrics on the seats hook up to the standard Astra loom plug and play - they use the live feed for what would be heated seats in standand Astra fare.

That should be all you need to know 🙂

5 Recaros although comfy are utter crap in the way they are made, and you'll find that inside they are cracked, snapped and bust. Luckily the come apart very easily and for the sake of a few bolts and penny washers they are an easy fix

Rears

1 The back rest fit perfectly but only after you swap all brackets with those off the Astra rear backrests - That's the bit that bolts to the floor and the bit that bolts to the backrest. Vectra brackets don't work and they are not pick and mix. But it's 2mins work to swap them over.

2 The bum rest does not fit. I got a local upholsterer to fit the Vectra covers onto the Astra base - it cost me £70 for a professional job. I've seen loads of other solutions to this problem and I consider them all to be pikey bodges.

Material

1 Recaro are the most unhelpful company to deal with and will try to a) fob you off, b) send you in the direction of one of their re-trimmers who are devoid of customer service skills or c) tell you to contact VX. It's a standard recaro material - so VX can't help

Added to this the retrimmers will try to charge you silly money per metre for the fabric, but they are too friggin lazy to sell you any,

3 Be persistent and Recaro will eventually rescind and get you some form Germany - it was less that ½ the price that the tosspot re-trimmers were asking.

There are more in-depth threads on AOC, but I'd wager they are buried under a ton of puerile post by those who are too idle to search, and but there should be some gen on www.ffoeg.com/FS3