I see plenty of bomber seats, see gasser laundromat seats, see mini van seats, hell I've even seen seats made out of shopping carts. What about vintage (pre 65) cessna, or similar small aircraft seats?
I'll be mounting 1958 Piper airplane seats in mine, nice cool little seats! They even still have the plaid material on em'!
I think they are cool and appropriate. Early 170 like ca 1950 had round backs. Very cool. Are you going to use the rail system that goes along with it? Quite a few AD's on them. The lock holes in the rails get worn and the seat will slide back during take off or in your case a burn out or launch.
YES! The first '32 Ford Hot Rod I ever saw had aircraft seats in it. If you have some of the Little Pages magazines from the early 1960's the car was featured in it. It hurt to see the magazine feature 30 years after I saw the car, it was a show car in my memory. Car was a '32 Cabriolet out of Westport, Ct. Feature title was The Rake if memory serves me correctly. If I can find the issue I'll post photos. Bob
Small aircraft are usually pretty narrow so the seats out of them ought to fit well in a lot of rods where bucket seats out of later model cars would be too big. There is a set out of a 60 Cessna on Ebay that would work in a lot of early cars but the shipping is as high as the seats.
not sure if I'll use the rails, it will be a while before I get to that point of the build! No pictures of them, they are buried up in the loft of my shop!
I don't know what rail design Piper used but I know the Cessna ones very well. They were a round topped I style with 1/4 inch holes in the top. I spent many hours replacing them in my dads 170B in the mid 80's.
Where I came from (No. Cal) I never saw a bomber seat installed in the 50s and early 60s.. pretty much bench seats with horse blankets for covers.. any extra money went into motor, tires, brakes etc..anyone who could afford a relatively new car kept the stock seats and upholstery.
I don't know how traditional bomber seats are in hot rods. There was a lot of surplus stuff around after WW2 and hot rodders being hot rodders would have used them, after all they perfect fit. We would go to San Pedro War Surplus everything except live ammo was available from '45 to the late '50's. Now days the surplus is new repro stuff and foreign stuff. . CRUISER
Safest airplane in the world, it can just barely kill you. I wouldn't want to spend any kind of serious seat time in light aircraft seats. I spent a month in a Cessna 150 one day. Shawn
Are they that bad? See this is what I don't know, never sat in one. There appears to be several kinds of construction and the later they are the better it seems. I don't know aircraft, buy also looks like the higher end planes had better seats. That only makes sense.
I don't like the way they sound, just like a 6 with splits. '31Vicky, I can't imagine why they would not be considered traditional, they come from the correct era and they are small and light. If someone says that they are not traditional tell them that they are racing seats.
I would guess WWII surplus was used a lot more than Cesnas and Pipers. Did they commonly part out 10-20 year old private planes back then? A lot of them are still flying from the 40s and 50s, most still selling for at least $20,000
Yes Was this a test? did I pass? Hey I got an idea bolt them in there and post a pic some 20 something will let you know if they are traditional or not.
Yes another great point that I was pondering. I'm sure there were a few, there's always an exception.
Some of these aviation guys are more intense about there aircraft parts than we are about our hotrods. A few years ago I saw a set of front seats for sale. The name of ths aircraft escapes me now but according to the owner it was rare, a short run and quite valuable. His seats were not airworthy and advertised as such, that the structure was previously repaired and failed again. I just liked the seats and figured I could fab up a new bracket easypeazy. Once he found out they wouldn't be going into the exact aircraft they belonged in he refused to sell them to me. On and on about how cool they were and how cool the aircraft was and that they needed to be in that one specific plane. How he was specifically marketing them to owners of that plane & at a significant price reduction so that someone else may have been able to get theirs back to original. He never though anyone but another owner of that plane would be looking at them. They were cool, 1961 vintage & would fit & look perfect in a period model A. Anyway, ill be starting on my floor soon and would like to have my seats there before I get going.
Lost of aircraft salvage yards around, especially in the midwest. Gen aviation is way bigger back where you are and guys tear the tail dragger's up pretty regular on the little grass and dirt strips. I would search around for some early Cessna 120-170 seats. I thought I had a few photos of our 170 but can't find them. Early Piper 140's are plentiful too
Like most things the problem is with operator errors. Cubs are meant for slow and low flying. And when you have some flying only a couple thousand feet up, it really isn't much room for mistake. Height is your friend since it gives you more time to adjust if a problem arises. Other issue is the stall speeds. Pilots Sight seeing and flying with doors open tend to make tight turns at low speeds resulting in a stall. Don't have any statistics to say if they are dangerous or not but they are truly a fun plan if flown correctly. Sorry getting off topic
I was referring to the ass/seat relationship that develops. Im sure flying anything is fun for at least a little while.
The Jalopy Journal
