Opinions on removing rear seats!

lockly

Active Member
Jan 7, 2008
82
0
rye east sussex
Afternoon ppl im after your opinions about taking out the rear seats, i took them out yesterday and the car feels a bit quicker i think but can't make my mind up if it looks 2 chavvy or not!
 

WeeJase

pert
Jun 2, 2001
8,595
0
they must weight about 20-30 kg,that won't make that much of a difference.why not just fold them down to lower the centre of gravity of the car.would improve the handling.
 

TazB

Xbox Gamer Tag = TazCupra
Mar 23, 2007
666
0
Glasgow
If your going to do it, maybe go the whole hog and remove seats, trim, carpets and get a roll cage in there!

agreed or a massive ice install lol. i think its just gonna look odd with out something in the empty space.
 

lockly

Active Member
Jan 7, 2008
82
0
rye east sussex
cheers for the replys it does look a bit weired as it its just a big boot now:lol: but i thought i could notice a differace in acceleration as i removed the sub and amp aswell, its mainly 4 santa pod at the end of the month.
 

veezee

Power Hungry/Clueless
Jun 10, 2008
126
0
London
If it's just for Santa Pod, put up with the oddness if you think it makes a difference for now. So long as you know how to put em back, it's not an issue, surely?
 

Bean

Torque Junkie... Gimme mo
May 4, 2009
224
0
Portsmouth
I removed the seats out of my old car, advantages yes as obviously power to weight ratio improves and therefore acceleration is improved, but not really noticably.

If u were to remove the seats take the spare wheel and accessories out when runnin the strip aswell that alone is another 20ish kg atleast.

however on my my old car there was a brake bias valve which detects the weight over the rear and adjusts braking ratio's (front and rear) accordingly, it can become jammed causing breaking issues- essentially non use of the rear breaks which of course causes its own problems...
 

NickyJam

FR - gone, not forgotten
Mar 17, 2008
1,669
0
SW LONDON
rear weight on the mk4's is already pretty low in comparison to the front end so will only make minimal difference in straight line speed...handling will be badly affected though
 

jamest87

lead foot
Feb 10, 2009
208
0
thanet. margate
i took my seats out when i took it drag racing but put them back in after didn't really notice any difference in speed but i did notice that the rebound was quicker on the suspension...
 

edewer

Active Member
May 14, 2007
160
0
Newbury/Reading
yeah they dont seem to have too much weight at the back. am doing a track day soon and wondering on wehter seats out is a good idea?
 

basssound

Active Member
May 31, 2007
286
0
Rotherham, South Yorkshire!
is everyone serious in this thread? effecting handling, increased acceleration hahahahaha
The seats weight about 20kg, infact, remove the spare tyre, seat belts, roof liner, carpet, passenger seat ect... and you may see a difference on the 1/4 but for everyday driving, not much TBH

lol
 

techathy

^^ my name, my thought >>
Jul 9, 2009
115
0
Cambridge
If you're just doing it for faster times I don't see the point, if you're doing it for general performance on the road along with giving the car a slim down then it depends on how far you go. With my Panda I was only taking 5kg here, 10kg there but added all up and it was the best part of 90kg, that's about 10% weight reduction. The extra acceleration was hard to perceive without a back to back comparison but in a straight line you noticed the difference against a stock car & I gained 1 or 2 mpg.

As for handling, I duno how stiff the Ibiza chassis is but for handling removing the seats can have a serious impact on handling as they effectively brace the rear of the car. This essentially makes the rear of the car softer, which increases understeer & is often mistaken for losing mass at the rear. Okay a Fiat Cinquecento probably isn't a good example for an Ibiza but in one of them you can actually see the chassis twist externally once the rear seats are removed. This twisting resulted in more understeer initially then sudden oversteer as the chassis/suspension lost proper control of the rear wheels.
 
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