Seats and Seating Position

 26 Mar 2026

I actually started out to fabricate the brackets for the swirl pot and finish the fuel lines to the HP pump. But when I got into the middle of that project I realized that the fuel pump feed line, being 12mm heavy hose, will not make a nice 180deg bend out of the bottom of the swirl pot and join to the pump. So I decided to do the line with AN fittings and hard 180deg and 90deg bends - so much neater. So I had a day to wait for parts to arrive. I decided that it was time to fit the seats and work out the seating position and the steering wheel.

I had ordered a quick release coupling for the Momo steering wheel attachment to the Ford Sierra steering column. I suspected that the steering wheel would be a little close to my chest in the configuration described in the Build Guide. But the only way to know for sure was to get the seats in and set the position so that the pedals were workable. So I assembled the seats - like it's simple to say.

Fortunately, I got onto the Facebook GBS Zero Owners & Enthusiasts Group and found the reference to an excellent GBS video explaining how to assemble the seats and seat tracks so that they can be installed correctly. Otherwise I might have wasted much time experimenting with the seat mounting (which is not covered in the Build Guide). Here's the Youtube link to that video: Talk through the fitting of the Seats & Seat Runners on the GBS Zero’s…. Thanks, Matt. The stacking of spacers to get the appropriate seat angle and shortening of the adjustment lever took the better part of the day getting the hardware and grinding and fiddling with the stack of spacers front and rear. I don't think the results are particurlarly sturdy in the case of an accident, but hell, this car is a coffin anyway.

So getting the assembled seats in the car took more fiddling but once they were in the whole car comes alive! It is a good day to see (and feel) what having seats in the car does for me. And I confirmed that the steering wheel is about right in relation to the proper seating position - without the quick release installed. With the QR the steering is definitely too close to my chest; my elbows were in my ribs. But I had a plan to move the steering column boss to the forward side of the mounting bracket, which gives 1 1/4 inches more clearance. In order to do this I knew that I would have to cut off at least the same amount from the steering shaft because it was already almost bottomed out on the coupling with the lower shaft.

Out came the steering column and the cutoff wheel made quick work of the excessive length. I decided to go ahead and paint the shaft while I was at it because it was scarred up from getting off the original spring clip and replacing it with the set-screw collar. I am writing this while I wait for paint to dry. It's also nice to have the steering shaft out of the way while fiddling with the swirl pot.

I'm not satisfied with the arrangement of a full-sized nut and washer on the underside of the floor at each of the seat fasteners. They are vulnerable to striking the ground on road irregularities and forum comments concur. I searched the internet for a recessed, shouldered sleeve nut that would be more flush to the floor bottom and still have full thread engagement. I found some stainless steel nuts that I know will work well. I can use large spacers along with the carpet thickness on the inside of the floor to give the full 15mm of thread engagement. Here's the source: belmetric.com sleeve-nut-ultra-low-stainless NSLEEVE8LOWSS