Power seat into 07 Chevy Roadtrek

[booster]

I have been thinking about putting a power driver seat into our 07 Roadtrek 190P on the Chevy chassis for quite a while.

I have several reasons to do it and only one not to. The first reason to do it are that I would like to be able to sit a bit lower, I think, and the stock OEM power seat looks to go about 3/4" lower than the Roadtrek swivel base manual seats so up and down and tilt base would be nice. Second reason is so I can adjust when driving easily as the road conditions and time driving make sometimes I would like to do that and the manual seat is tough to move while driving, at least safely. Third is that the Roadtrek setup makes it extremely hard to get to the fuse box if you need to look at a fuse as there is not cutout on the sides of the pedestal and the Roadtrek base interferes with getting the cover off the fuse box. The only reason not to do it would be that I will lose the rotator but the driver seat isn't very useful for us turned as it can only go about 160* before your legs hit the cabinet behind it and it is hard to get to if you are using the fold out table. Our driver seat hasn't been rotated in many years.

I have been watching Craigslist for a long time without success finding a used track and associated parts, including the pedestal, and have called junk yards multiple times unsuccessfully. Most yards around here don't inventory what the vans have in them so you have to go to the yards to see if they have vans and if they have power seats. There are very few with power seats it appears. Even the Hollander parts finder didn't show any unless I got the whole seat which would put shipping out of reach or they won't even do it. Old power seats are kind of famous for being pretty much worn out, also. I don't know if the parts to rebuild them is available.

I finally was looking for something else on the GM Parts Direct site and decided to look to see what is available new, but figured not much would be. To my surprise the tracks, switch, switch bracket and both color switch bezels were available. The pedestal and wire harness were not available. I found a pedestal on ebay but the yards probably would have them as they are the same as manual (winter here so I didn't bother). Searching the interchanges I couldn't find any other seat the used the same switch connector body PN that I got from the factory service manual so I went looking for the body only. I found them one place only. It was a liquidator that had 14 or them but they had no idea what pins it would use and I couldn't find any place that listed what pins were used. I had to buy all 14 of them, but by doing that it was still dirt cheap as I got free shipping. Having the connector body is a very good thing because it clips to the switch so a wire pull or vibration won't pull the pins off the switch or bend them.

In general it all just bolts together like from the factory, except for the harnessing which I had to make. I got pins to fit the oddball 3mm round male pins on the switch from a place that deals in old British motorcycles where they are used. They weren't for 12ga wire though, so they sorta kinda got crimped to hold the wire in place, and then soldered. To complete the connector I put the body on the switch and the wires individually on the pins from top of the body. The pins were loose in the body because they weren't connector style clip in, so I got the wires spread out and unstressed and filled the pin cavities with silicone non conducting caulking to support and hold the pins tightly in but allow a bit of flex. It worked fine. I also couldn't find a matching connector half for the motor connection so I replaced it with a 6 pin Weatherpak. This left just two wires to hook up to power and GM already had that wiring and breaker in the van so easy.

I had been suspicious that Roadtrek had moved the entire seat inboard a little bit, which I assumed was because of the rotation of it, but when I got it all in I found out that the armrest they add on the outboard side was hitting the B pillar. I took it al out (easy job with connectors on everything) and slotted the pedestal mounting holes to the floor and to the seat to move it over about 1/4". The armrest still hits the pillar but will push past it, just like was before, and the seatbelt can just sneak by the door panel, also like it has always been.

While I was at it, I replaced the macerator switch with a new and higher quality one as the very cheapo Roadtrek on was getting hard to get turned on unless you pushed on only one edge. Ignore the "start engine" on the switch, it was the only one I could find that was good for 20 amps in a decent switch.

All and all, not a bad job to do and if I had been able to find scrap yard parts would have been quite inexpensive and could have been completed in a couple of hours

Here is the front of the seat which is where they put the controls on these seats, so odd to use. The track is also shown and it like many other GM tracks.





This is the outboard side showing OEM pedestal. The side of part of the track shows and I think this is because the Roadtrek rotation handle came out in that area. The factory seats likely had a flap there.





Here is from the rear. I would also think that the factory seats would have a flap over this area also, but it probably would have interfered with rotation.

[folivier]

Nice job. I'd like a power base also and was wondering if a truck or Tahoe seat with power base would fit? I might lose the inside arm rest depending on year of the seat though. Losing rotation wouldn't be a problem.

[booster]

Originally Posted by folivier

Nice job. I'd like a power base also and was wondering if a truck or Tahoe seat with power base would fit? I might lose the inside arm rest depending on year of the seat though. Losing rotation wouldn't be a problem.

I had thought about that but wanted to keep the Roadtrek seat which I find comfortable and minimize any fit issues that would require major modifications. If you are moving the entire seat it probably would be quite doable. I have done those kind of conversions on other vehicles. It is very possible you would have to use the OEM pedestal for the vans, though, so it fits the bumps and recesses in the floor and stud locations which would be very hard to move with stuff under the floor like a Roadtrek.


The biggest issue that is unknown, I think, would be finding something that would clear the fuse box under the seat so you have to make sure that the motors and linkage on whatever seat you would consider are high enough to be able to remove the box cover. It might fine as it may be just the bar across the Roadtrek pedestal that is the problem.


Other concerns might be if you can reach down along the door to get to the typical side mounted controls as it is quite tight and if the truck seat tracks locate in the same place front to back and side to side. My impression is that a lot of the truck seats, I was thinking of Suburban or Tahoe, might be wider. Modifying the top of the pedestal wouldn't be a huge job if you have a welder and some fabricating skills. If the seat is wider, you would lose a bit of space between the seat and doghouse depending on how far back the seat is and you probably wind up sitting even more to the right compared to the steering wheel than you already do. It would have been nice to have the seat have power back tilt also, but that was not even and option on the vans, it appears. If you lose an armrest it would be the outboard one and you might need to get the seat cover patched to cover the hole.


One thing I did run into when checking it out was that many of scrap yards only sell the front seats in pairs if they are in the very good condition you probably want. If the plan is to both sides this is good, but if you only want one it gets quite expensive. Nice leather ones are often in the $7-900 range for a pair of them if they are 8 way.


On edit:


If you do look for a complete seat, you might be OK with a passenger seat if you can find an 8 way or even a 6 way if that is OK. The controls will be on the opposite side which doesn't work in console setups but our vans are wide open there.
You will many times more likely to find a passenger seat in good condition and single than a driver seat.