Seat Belts for the Kids
28/02/10 08:51 Filed in: VW Camper
Another modification by the previous owner was the removal of the seat belts from the rear bench. Unfortunately, that’s a serious safety issue for traveling with children.
This was a good chance to upgrade to three-point seat belts using an upgrade kit from GoWesty (I’m getting the feeling these folks are going to be getting a lot of my money).
Installing the three point belt is pretty easy, but you do have to cut a hole in the lining. The instructions say you can find the factory mount point by feel -- well, that’s technically true if you know what you’re feeling for. I actually had to stick my hand behind the lining by pulling off the weather stripping in the back and carefully peeling back the lining. You’re looking for a rather large circular indentation in the insulation about the size of a 50 cent piece. If you push in you’ll feel a round, plastic slug in the mount point. I took a few snapshots with measuring tape to show where it is.
From that point, it’s just a matter of unscrewing the slug and screwing in the new belt mechanism, like so:
Just in case you were uncertain about whether the universe has a sense of humor or not, even this simple installation turned out to be a challenge. The first hangup was a missing bolt. When the original seat belts were removed the bolt for the lower mount point was discarded. Of course, none of the spare bolts from the kit fit, either.
The second hang up was the mount point for the replacement receiver. It was seized up enough that it broke my 1/2” ratchet wrench. Well, it was a cheap piece of junk, anyway. Plus, my metric set didn’t quite go high enough; it stops at 13mm and this bolt is 17mm. The imperial 11/16” was close, but not close enough for a seized bolt. A couple hours soak with WD40 and a trip to the auto parts store for a breaker bar and 17mm socket and they popped right out.
While I was at it, I replaced the bolts with eyelets so I can mount car seats with a pair of carabiners hooked into the latch straps. I don’t know why I kept the old belt hangers; they’re really just in the way. I’ll probably pull them back off.
The last upgrade was the permanent muffler bracket. A perfect fit, almost. The bracket should mount with two bolts but the exhaust pipe is in the way.
I had to rotate the bracket and just use one bolt. It’s a pretty solid construction; hopefully it will hold well enough.
This was a good chance to upgrade to three-point seat belts using an upgrade kit from GoWesty (I’m getting the feeling these folks are going to be getting a lot of my money).
Installing the three point belt is pretty easy, but you do have to cut a hole in the lining. The instructions say you can find the factory mount point by feel -- well, that’s technically true if you know what you’re feeling for. I actually had to stick my hand behind the lining by pulling off the weather stripping in the back and carefully peeling back the lining. You’re looking for a rather large circular indentation in the insulation about the size of a 50 cent piece. If you push in you’ll feel a round, plastic slug in the mount point. I took a few snapshots with measuring tape to show where it is.
From that point, it’s just a matter of unscrewing the slug and screwing in the new belt mechanism, like so:
Just in case you were uncertain about whether the universe has a sense of humor or not, even this simple installation turned out to be a challenge. The first hangup was a missing bolt. When the original seat belts were removed the bolt for the lower mount point was discarded. Of course, none of the spare bolts from the kit fit, either.
The second hang up was the mount point for the replacement receiver. It was seized up enough that it broke my 1/2” ratchet wrench. Well, it was a cheap piece of junk, anyway. Plus, my metric set didn’t quite go high enough; it stops at 13mm and this bolt is 17mm. The imperial 11/16” was close, but not close enough for a seized bolt. A couple hours soak with WD40 and a trip to the auto parts store for a breaker bar and 17mm socket and they popped right out.
While I was at it, I replaced the bolts with eyelets so I can mount car seats with a pair of carabiners hooked into the latch straps. I don’t know why I kept the old belt hangers; they’re really just in the way. I’ll probably pull them back off.
The last upgrade was the permanent muffler bracket. A perfect fit, almost. The bracket should mount with two bolts but the exhaust pipe is in the way.
I had to rotate the bracket and just use one bolt. It’s a pretty solid construction; hopefully it will hold well enough.