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Speaking of my seat 'obsession', I haven't owned quite as many seats as steering wheels over the past 15 years or so - but it's got to have been in the 100's ....
Although the original HF seats in my car are comfortable over short distances, I wanted to source an alternative set of 'period' bucket seats that could be swapped in for longer trips.
Amongst my current 'stash' I did have a few possibilities - including this '68 Recaro Rallye :
- but, although 'back in the day' the choice of seat for competition was very much down to the preferences of the individual drivers, I don't think a Recaro would have been a likely option - although I
have seen one car with them fitted - albeit at a (much) later date ...
The 2 most common makes seen in Factory (& privateers') cars were Bordigari & Fusina - both of which are very rare/hard to find in decent condition these days - & when they do come up for sale they sell for significant amounts (certainly for far more than a 'cheapskate' like me is prepared to pay !!
).
Accurate replicas are available in Italy but, again, too expensive for me - at least until I've exhausted every other possibility ...
So it was just a case of regularly searching all the usual sources throughout Europe - without any success.
There
were a few seats that cropped up - but they were either in poor condition requiring complete re-upholstering (in which case you may as well go down the route of replicas) or their asking prices were too rich for me.
I wasn't restricting my search to just Bordigari or Fusina but, as mentioned earlier, any seats had to be of a style that could have been fitted 'in period'.
After several weeks without any hint of success, I widened my search &, on a site I hadn't checked before, I came across post asking for help in identifying a pair 'old' bucket seats- with a few small poor quality/under-exposed pictures ...
By saving/editing the photos I was able to see enough detail to make them potentially interesting so I fired off an email to say that, although I couldn't identify the seats, I'd be interested in buying them if they were for sale.
Fast forward few days & the poster provided some more info & came up with a figure he thought they were worth - they had been found in the loft of the house he'd just moved into where they'd apparently been stored for the past 40 yrs !!
The seller lived about an hour away from me so I arranged to pop over the next day to look at/measure the seats & if they seemed suitable for my intended purpose I'd buy them at his asking price.
The seats turned out to be in very good condition & although there were no manufacturer's identification markings anywhere, they certainly had a similar look to some of the Bordigari/Fusina models - so I paid the (full) asking price ...
I'll need to fabricate some suitable mounts/bases but they look as though they might fit the bill - at least in the short term.
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