Seat belts in Town Sedan

29FordGuy

29FordGuy

Member
I will soon be adding seat belts to my currently unfinished town sedan. I am a bit puzzled about how to run the seat belts through the adjustable front seat frame to the anchor. Anybody have some suggestions or how they did theirs? Thanks for help!
 
I faced the same problem on my 155A.

My resolution was to drill a one inch hole in the center of aft part the wooden seat platform and threaded the two center belts through the hole. I did have to remove the end attachment plates from the belt webbing. I reinstalled the webbing using a sliding bar to retain the webbing that is available from aircraft parts suppliers. Look at AircraftSpruce.com for those parts. The two outside belts were treated the same way and fed through an existing hole in the seat bottom. When I attached the end plates to holes drilled through the center wooden body cross member, I made sure that the seat was in the most aft position and left a little bit of slack in the belts. That way, if I have to adjust the seat forward in order for my wife to drive the car, there is enough slack to allow the seat to move forward. In case of an accident, I figure that my body weight will take up that little bit of slack and, hopefully, keep me in the car. I did consider installing a steel plate under the wooden cross member to help spread the load. Instead of that, I opted for the thickest large washers that I could find. Please ask if a few pictures would help. Gar Williams
 
Thanks Gar for your description. I understand what you did. Would a 1" x ~3" slot work the same as your 1" hole? That way I could still use the achors supplied with the belts. I am wondering also about the clearance between the bottom of the sliding seat and the top of the anchors. I am yet to reinstall my seat so will be able to check the clearance then. I just noticed that someone yesterday posted a question about seat belts in a coupe. I like the retractable unit on the side of the seat. Will need to check that out. Thanks for your help! Robert
 
The larger slots would work. Since I had the seat belt parts on hand, it was my preference to keep the holes small. As I recall, the clearance was tight under the seat. I may have flattened the anchors - mine had a bend in the middle - to help them clear the seat bottom when it was moving. Gar
 
I took the same advice from a earlier post from a fordbarner regarding the three inch slot, but after I cut the slot with a cut-off wheel, I rolled the edges back and slit pieces of tubing to slide over the rolled edges to protect the belts from chafing. The metal ends need to be flattened to slide under the metal adjustable seat frame. I addition, I found that the seat belt ends needed to be reversed from how they would normally be mounted, in order to slide under the seat frame. Use 1/2" carriage bolts for all fasteners. I also used 1/4" x 2" pieces of steel stap iron, of various lenghts, on the underside of the body as support bolsters.
 
I tried on my 31 straight ws Town sedan but gave up on the front seat because I didn't want to cut the steel upholstered backrest and only installed them in the rear seat mounted to the rear wooden crossbeam with a set of large washers.
 
With the seat removed, and using a dremil with a cut-off wheel, you should be able to cut the opening from the seat side without damaging the floor matting or upholstery. With the seat belt ends flattened, it becomes east to slide the belt ends down between the floor matting or upholstery for bolting through the floor member.
 
i installed them UNDER the seat in the front and under the seat frame, attaching them to the center of the floor behind the front seat,. They are covered by the carper and on the sides i attached to the body bolt on each side of the seat. MAKE sure you retract the seat ALL The way back to install or the seat wont be adjustable, Keep in mind i did NOT do shoulder belts.
 
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