2001 Mustang Seats In A Fox Body
The latest Fox body Mustang is now close to 13 years old. Your old seats may have
taken a beating over the years and an upgrade or replacement may be in order. The
Fox body seats are known for breaking and causing a gangster lean to the right.
There are many after market seats available like Flofit, Spearco, and Recaro, however,
a cheaper alternative may be to find a seat out of a newer Mustang. I recently
replaced a set of worn out Fox body stock seats for a set of seats out of 2001 GT.
The Fox driver seat had manual controls with the power lumbar support. The
replacement seat had a compliment of full power controls and lumbar support.
The issues that crept up during the install were minor, but are worth noting if you
plan on doing the install in the future.
- The seat bracket on the 2001 is slightly different. The bracket had a slight
interference with the large support cross bar where the front bolts are
mounted. Three washers were installed under the front bracket to allow the
extra lift for the bar. If you just bolt the bracket down you may bind the seat
bracket to the point it may not work. Don't install too many washers or you
may find your out of threads on the seat mounting stud. I didn't attempt to try to switch the old seat
bracket to the new seat.
- The seat belt female end is attached to the side of the 2001 seat. This merely unbolted and the electrical
wire was unplugged. The male half of the Fox seatbelt does not fit the 2001 seatbelt and there's no sense
in keeping both. The 2001 seat has the seatbelt holder attached to the headrest. It's attached with two
star bolts. If you have a cage, you have a problem. Otherwise, the holder should not hit anything
throughout the seats range of motion. The belt holder sits off to the side too much, striking the main hoop
on a cage.
- The last issue was wiring the power seat to the old pigtail. In the picture, the plug on the left is what is
poking out of the floor in the vehicle. It is a simple power and ground plug. The plug on the 2001 seat has
a four prong plug. The two plugs are not compatible.
Too avoid getting too creative on the wiring, I choose to tap
into the seat plug wires themselves to the rear of the plug
using the simple blue wire taps found at your local auto supply
store. You can use a simple flat spade connector for the plug
on the floor of the Fox. This will enable you to disconnect the
seat from at least one end if you wish to remove the seat at
a later date. Power was run from the Fox plug to both of the
lower wires on the seat plug (red lines). The ground was run
from the Fox plug to the upper left wire of the seat plug (black
line). All of the power functions, including the lumbar support
will work. I didn't trace the tiny wire in the top right location of the seat plug. However, it should just be the
seatbelt signal to the dash indicating it's connected. The Fox seatbelt uses it's own electrical connector from the
trans tunnel and it's separate from the seat.
On the passenger side, there are no electrical connections. You'll need to once again prop up the front of the
seat to make room for the seat bracket and remove the seatbelt holder if necessary.
The 2001 seats do sit noticeably
higher than the Fox stock seats.
If you're tall, this may be an
issue. The 2001 seats are much
firmer than the original seats, but
the upper side bolsters were less
functional. I think the stock Fox
seats allow you to sink in a touch
more which gives you the illusion
that the side bolsters are more
functional... Either that or the
seats were well worn and you
just sunk in more.
For those people who are tall and
need additional leg room,
Mustangs Unlimited, and I'm sure
a few others, sell a seat bracket
adaptor to extend the leg room
approximately 4.5 inches.
Pictured:
1993 Mustang LX Hatchback
Kenny Brown 6 point interior cage
installed. No rubbing or other issues
noted (with the seatbelt holder
removed...).
