Hatchback seat compatability

[Frostybear]

Hi,

Do Mk3 facelift seats from a 5dr hatchback fit in the mk3 facelift estate?
From what I can see, all facelifts come with a load hatch/ski hatch in the centre seat. Some of the prefacelift don't have this.

I have cloth seats in my estate at the moment, thinking of upgrading to leather or half leather half alcantara (very hard to find these in Ireland).

Cheers

 

[Cainy1989]

I know the Ski hatch was an option on the Irish cars, I had a loaded FR and even that didn't have it for some odd reason, not sure if the facelift seats had a different spot to unlatch the seat back, In the newer cars theres a lever in the boot not on the seat itself, but other than that they should fit

 

[LeylandVCDS]

Yes they do, they are a direct fit. I've done this very job on my facelift ST estate, with a half leather/half alcantara FR interior that I previously had in my 5 door pre-facelift hatch. Interior was originally taken out of asalvage pre-facelift 5 door FR hatchback

The only difference is the estate has the extra seat back releases in the boot area, the locking catches are different in that they don't have the extra bits to attach the cables from the boot area release - BUT - it is an easy enough job to swap over the latches between the seats.

Potential problem - the estate seats have a black plastic blanking plug in the side of the squab to access where these estate cables fit onto the latches. The hatchback seats don't have this access. - BUT - again, it's easy enough to fold out the fabric to attach the cable, either that or cut the fabric , attach the cable and clip in the plastic cover from your original seats. I personally didn't bother cutting the fabric, I've just put the cable in and put the fabric back over.

A little bit of fiddling about, but yes the job is 100% compatible.

The first pic are the original cloth interior I took out, second is the FR interior I put in, and the other two show where the access hole is and where the cable goes into the seat back. Last photo is a close up of the seat back of the original estate rear seat, with the access hole for the release cable that is covered on the hatch seats

Hope that helps.