Any advice on choosing racing seats for an 89 E30; this is a D.E. event vehicle only, rarely street driven, budget minded, but decent quality desired. Looked over e bay and have no idea if this stuff is acceptable or not that is sold as new. JDM, Turino, etc.brands. I'd be happy with used, if any leads can be offered. By the way, I know I have to offer the same restraints for an instructor, but does that mean both seats have to be racers?
You could probably find stock E30 sport seats pretty handily via ebay, craigslist, or local pic-n-pull junkyards, if something ez-2-fit with sporting pretensions works, assuming that's not what you're trying to get away from already. The stock sport seats are ok in the bolstering department, but not great. You typically don't need identical seats for BMWCCA driver's schools, afaik. If you're considering 5 pt. harnesses, consider that there is some debate about whether it's a good idea to have 5 pt. harnesses in a vehicle without a roll bar. Same might be true for 4 pts.; 4 pt. straps can snug one into the seat a bit more than a stock seatbelt, but it only goes so far - difficult to keep the waist belt properly positioned, since snugging up the shoulder belts always pulls the waist belt up. One consideration is the trade-offs between rear-seat access and safety with a one-piece seat vs. hinged-back reclining 2-piece seat. If you're looking 1-piece, Sparco & Recaro seem to be popular choices. If you find a seat that you like, if you can find a clean one that hasn't been in a wreck (again via whatever source you can - ebay, craigslist, racing 4-sale forums, etc), that can be a way to save a few bucks. Can't comment on the quality of the generic copycat seats you see all over ebay; however, seats are an integral part of the safety system of the car, not something you want to have potentially suffer a failure in case of an incident. Safety isn't something to skimp on, which is a reason to consider the more mainstream brands. A reclining seat might be more comfortable for daily-driving, everyday useage, or transiting to & from the track; Unless you're driving really long drives, you probably could be reasonably comfortable in a 1-piece seat driving to and from the track - lots of people do that. Here's just one website quickly googled-up - http://www.motorsportseats.com/corbeau/index.html HMS Motorsport is a Roundel advertiser, oft-times O'Fest vendor, and long-time club member & supporter - lots of safety info there worth considering; plus a writeup on how to choose a seat; read that. http://www.hmsmotorsport.com/research http://www.hmsmotorsport.com/docs/How_To_Choose_A_Seat.pdf
