When we bought Erica one of the compromises we had to make against our ideal vehicle specification was that she had a double front passenger seat, whereas we wanted a single. We knew it was something we could change, although we had also come to realise that single Peugeot Expert passenger seats don’t get advertised for sale too often* (because the vast majority of Experts come with doubles), and when they do they can be silly money (as in £600 for a second-hand one). Thus we thought our best bet may be to buy a driver’s seat in France when we’re over there some time. Given the current state of travel, we acknowledged that may be a couple of years down the line.
Then a week last Sunday we were watching a YouTube video where someone made a passing reference to a seat swivel, which reminded Mick that we hadn’t searched Ebay for a while. A couple of moments later he pointed me towards an auction and to cut the story a little shorter than what I tell in this week’s video, three days later we found ourselves in possession of a single passenger seat for £40.
A single passenger seat in itself has a huge benefit over the double: you can get from the cab into the living area without going outside (arguably it has a negative too: we can no longer give anyone a lift anywhere). A swivelling passenger seat is a bigger bonus as it not only gives an extra living-space seat, but it also creates more room (plus easy access to chuck things like daypacks in the front at night).
As the swivel plate was going to be four times the price we’d paid for the seat (I could have got one cheaper, but I went for a model with safety certificates), I didn’t want to commit to that purchase until we’d fitted the seat and knew that everything was okay with it. Again, I expected there may be quite a delay between the seat fitting and the swivel fitting. As it turned out, they happened two days apart.
Both activities were really simple … save for a couple or three time-consuming stumbling blocks (one of which involved the electrical connection to a seat that no longer exists which triggered a fault on an air bag that has never existed).
Anyways, enough wittering, if you want to see the video of all this coming to pass, you’ll find it here:
Then a week last Sunday we were watching a YouTube video where someone made a passing reference to a seat swivel, which reminded Mick that we hadn’t searched Ebay for a while. A couple of moments later he pointed me towards an auction and to cut the story a little shorter than what I tell in this week’s video, three days later we found ourselves in possession of a single passenger seat for £40.
A single passenger seat in itself has a huge benefit over the double: you can get from the cab into the living area without going outside (arguably it has a negative too: we can no longer give anyone a lift anywhere). A swivelling passenger seat is a bigger bonus as it not only gives an extra living-space seat, but it also creates more room (plus easy access to chuck things like daypacks in the front at night).
As the swivel plate was going to be four times the price we’d paid for the seat (I could have got one cheaper, but I went for a model with safety certificates), I didn’t want to commit to that purchase until we’d fitted the seat and knew that everything was okay with it. Again, I expected there may be quite a delay between the seat fitting and the swivel fitting. As it turned out, they happened two days apart.
Both activities were really simple … save for a couple or three time-consuming stumbling blocks (one of which involved the electrical connection to a seat that no longer exists which triggered a fault on an air bag that has never existed).
Anyways, enough wittering, if you want to see the video of all this coming to pass, you’ll find it here:
(*There was one on Ebay for about 3 weeks before we took delivery of Erica but to buy the seat before we had the vehicle seemed like tempting fate and by the time Erica arrived it was no longer available. I can’t remember whether it was £125 plus £25 delivery or £100 plus £25 delivery, but it was one or the other. That's the only other seat I've seen at what I would consider a reasonable price.)
Another blockbuster. You could solve the cinema crisis in the wake of the non-appearance of Bond. I bet there was great satisfaction in tracking down that seat - it is all part of the fun.
ReplyDeleteAnother comment for which I didn't get a notification. I wonder if it's just me or if it's another general problem with Blogger?
DeleteIt was so serendipitous not just that Mick stumbled across that seat, but that it was so cheap *and* such a short detour to collect it. Satisfying indeed.
Any glimmer of hope that I may be getting a little better at this video-making malarkey has been eradicated this week. It seems that I did't use the phone mount at all during the heater installation, so it's shakey pictures and wind-noise on the mic a-go-go in this week's installment.