Chucks928

On my 82 928, my winter project is re-doing the interior but one issue I,ve hit right off the bat...for the life of me I cannot get one of my back seats to fold down! The mechanism is either frozen or jammed..the plastic **** will not budge and it wont release the seat back to let it fold down. Anyone run into this? I dont want to break anything but I,m not sure how to get the release to work.

joejoe

Pull the plastic **** off, then surround. Then get vice grip, hammer or such and give it a whack. This worked on my '81.

OTR18WHEELER

My '79 had that problem, it was really stuck.
I just manually released the latch at the catch with a screwdriver to pry it loose. Worked fine after that.

Chucks928

Thanks..I did try to pry it from the where the release is,but no luck. I,ll try removing the **** and surround tomorrow. Hopefully that will move it.

homan

had an 80 both sides frozen when I bought it the catches on mine were frozen sprayed a little wd there carefully and worked it back and forth till they loosened

Chucks928

Thanks guys..I had to use the "vice grips and hammer" trick to get it to let go. I sprayed it with Tri-flow to get the latch mechanism to move,but I,m going to end up taking the seat out to clean it up properly.It was coming out anyways. Thanks again!

M. Requin

Good thread, but poor title. I had the same problem a few years ago, OTR18WHEELER's approach worked for me. But the next person coming along won't be able to use search to find this useful info. Why not ask one of the mods to change the title to include a ref to back seat won't fold down, or some such?

Chucks928

good idea Martin...

Alan

The latches are much harder to release if the seat back has stuff jammed underneath - bunched carpet, wiring etc. Force the seat back backwards as hard as you can - then try to operate the release.

Alan

Chucks928

Alan, thank you for the advice. After using the vice grips and a little help from the hammer,I did get it to release. The problem,now that I have it folded,is that I think the rear hatch had been leaking at one time and the latch is somewhat rusted. It moves but only with a help. I,m going to have to get it apart and clean up the latch mechanism to get it working normally.The rear seats are shot and have to be re-covered so they are coming out anyways. Another winter project!