Understeer

Here is a quick DIY guide to replacing the Porsche OEM seats in a 992 with aftermarket seats, in my case Recaro Sportster CS. This took a lot more effort for me than it should have due to the lack of available documentation, but it's a fairly easy procedure and hopefully others can benefit from my experience.

Surely there are others here with a 992 who find the Porsche seats uncomfortable. My GTS came equipped with the Sport Seat Plus 4-ways. Despite having a very average male body (5’ 10”, 165 lbs) and never having had trouble with seats in any vehicle, I was suprised with the lack of lumbar support and the very odd protrusion in the middle of the back of the OEM seat. This was a major problem for me from the moment the vehicle arrived, and 6000 miles later it wasn’t any better.

I asked several dealers about swapping for one of the three other OEM seat options and nobody thought this was feasible, so I embarked on trying to retrofit aftermarket seats. I was not looking for a racing harness for the track, but simply a more comfortable seat for my daily driver. I went with the Recaro Sportster CS with the heated seat option due to their strong reputation.

I learned a ton from this post however that was for installing OEM buckets into a 991 so there were a number of key differences.

Note that I only installed the drivers’ side seat. I decided not to install the passenger seat as it would require defeating the seat occupancy sensor; I wanted to keep the option open of having my daughter sit in the passenger seat so I didn’t want to defeat the occupancy sensor logic.

Also note that the OEM seats have thorax (side) airbags built-in to the seats. Recaro in fact does make a version of the Sportster CS with airbags, however they apparently did not do the certification process for the US market so they are not available for sale here. If I were to do this again, I would probably try to import one of these from Europe just to have the additional safety of the side airbag.

!!! WARNING and Disclaimer !!! (thanks to the aforementioned post for this language)
This is not a guide, it’s just documentation of what I did, and I am NOT recommending you follow suit. Any tampering with the car’s air bag system, seat belts, and seats can put yourself and your passengers at risk. I do not take any responsibility for what you do with the information detailed in this post/thread, this information is offered for you to use or not use at your sole discretion and understanding of the serious risks involved.

Porsche 992 aftermarket seat installation Part I: Physical mounting

Seat: https://www.vividracing.com/recaro-s...150714701.html

Note the Sportster CS is the same as the Sportster GT with different stitching pattern.

Online documentation from Recaro regarding mounting kits is extremely sparse and unclear so I ended up wasting money buying more parts than I needed. Here’s the mounting kit you want to get:

https://www.vividracing.com/recaro-b...155229852.html

Note that this *does* in fact include the seat belt holder that is required, so you do not need to purchase this belt holder separately despite the instructions online that claim you do (ask me how I know).

Important note: the Recaro belt holder does not actually fit the Recaro Sportster CS and it requires taking a Dremel and slightly enlarging one hole, and grinding down the bumper that sets the angle of the seat belt receptacle. Recaro really needs to get their act together!

I also ended up purchasing this track kit which you do not need to do. However this kit includes a set of spacers and longer bolts so if you want the seat to be in a slightly higher position, then you can purchase this kit or perhaps find those parts elsewhere. I used the spacers and I like the additional height but it's probably fine without them.

I purchased the Cantrell Motorsports RECARO Sportster CS Slimline **** which replaces the stock Recaro **** which rubs against the side of the interior and limits seat travel.

You will need to purchase a Porsche seat belt receptacle that you will mount onto the Recaro seat belt holder. Here is the part number: 992-857-755-B

Porsche 992 aftermarket seat installation Part II: Electrical connections

The best way to do this is to purchase the identical electrical harness that is in your OEM seats and then you can make the necessary connections from that harness and mount it under the new seat. This way when you swap the seats out it’s simply plug and play, and returning to stock is simple. For my car, the harness in the OEM seat was labeled 992-971-385-S. This part has apparently been replaced with 992-971-385-J which worked perfectly.

Please note that before you disconnect the seat, you need to disconnect the battery from the car and wait 10 minutes for the airbag capacitor to discharge.

There are four electrical connections required for the driver’s seat:

1. Airbag
2. Seat Position Sensor
3. Seat belt receptacle sensor
4. Seat heating

Let’s go through these in order:

Because the replacement seat does not have the airbag, there will need to be a 2 ohm resistor installed otherwise you will have an airbag warning light on the dashboard. Recaro makes this one which is what I used, although there are cheaper options on eBay. Look for the yellow and purple connector on the wire loom which is for the airbag, and make the connection.

The seat position sensor was previously a separate part however for the 992 it is actually built in to the wire loom that is linked above so you don't need to buy one separately. You simply need to ziptie this part so it doesn’t come into contact with a magnet which would trigger it.

The seat belt receptacle sensor has a connector that plugs right into the appropriate connector in the wiring loom. Easy.

For seat heating, Recaro describes how you can run a wire under your carpet and add a fused plug into your fuse box. However then you would lose the OEM seat heating switch functionality in the center console. As it turns out, you can just wire this right into the same wire loom harness and not worry about running a new wire. There is a 4-pin connector with two thick and two thin wires. After some testing, I connected the two thick wires to the two Recaro seat heating wires and this works like a charm. Just set the seat heat switch on the side of the Recaro seat to “high” and leave it there. Then you can switch using the 3-mode seat heating switch in the center console and it retains OEM-like functionality.

That should do it! Make sure you put a towel over the door sill when moving seats in and out so you don’t scratch up the sill. I’m really happy with the new seats; they are infinitely more comfortable for me and I also like that the headrest is much closer to the back of my head so when I accelerate it is a far better experience. And of course the seats are very well bolstered and give a more locked-in and sporty feel than the OEM seats. Photos are below.


This is the hole on the seat belt holder that needs to be enlarged slightly with a dremel.


You can see how it doesn't overlap here with the hole behind it. You can extend the hole with a grinder to allow the bolt to pass through.


Here is the bumper that sets the resting angle for the seat belt receptacle. You can grind down the bumper to adjust the angle.


Another view of the bumper (note the bolt is not seated correctly in this photo)


Bottom of OEM seat.


Bottom of Recaro seat with new wire harness connected.


Recaro airbag resistor kit.


Wire harness.


Seats removed.


Rails installed in car.


Mounting kit with instructions. Note torque settings for bolts.


Seat is installed!

Chalk992911S

Badass!! Thank you very much for taking the time to post such a quality DIY with all of the information you did. Your outcome looks factory, and I’m guessing the support those give you are an incredible improvement. The height selection is chosen when installing (spacers) correct?

991.1 Guy

Looks great! I wish someone would figure out a way to make a better slider handle for the OEM seat to replace the stupid one that's on there. Just a bar across the front would be perfect like the Recaro.

aggie57

Nice post; I've put Recaro seats in several road cars over the years and they really made a difference. In the old days we never had to worry about airbags and occupancy sensors though, and of course they were purely mechanical without heating etc. So much simpler, fitting them correctly to get the right clearances and so on could be fiddly but much simpler than now!

Understeer

Thanks! Yes the height is fixed and can be set higher with spacers.

aryork

Ha! I just posted this

https://rennlist.com/forums/gt4-spyd...ash-light.html

and your post showed up as "similar." Great info, and I think I will follow your instrux. As I say in my post I already removed the OEM driver seat and my airbag light is on. Based on what I think I recall reading, I am hosed on getting that light off unless I go back to the dealer with the seat - is that correct? I'm not so concerned with that light, but I'd rather not have the seatbelt light on. That part seems easily solvable. The individual gray electrical connector on the buckle actually fits on the large yellow connector by itself. Kind of interesting Porsche made it that way.

eclou

what was the weight differential between the Recaros and stock seats?

aryork

The 996 GT3s are about 20 lb less per seat, and that includes the slider and sub bar on the 996 seats.

Understeer

Update: looks like Vidid no longer has the Recaro mounting kit in stock so the link doesn't work. The correct Recaro part number is 86.26.16 which you can find through other retailers that carry Recaro parts online.

f4bones

for those wishing to do the passenger side as well, I did a write up on how to add the passenger occupancy detection sensors - it's a VW controller and inexpensive - I used a Porsche pad and wiring harness - pretty simple retrofit . . see this thread

​​​​​​https://rennlist.com/forums/992/1347...ort-seats.html

cyn

Thank you for such a clear post on the instructions. I have a 992 GT3T that I got preowned and it was spec'd with the LWCB seats. They are great for "active" driving but I am finding after about an hour or so of touring/cruising I'm getting a really sore upper back and shoulders. I've been looking at swapping in either the Recaro Sportster GT or maybe the new(ish) Sport C model (but I can't find any owner reviews of those). The issue with the lack of a side airbag and the passenger occupancy sensor have had me worried. Seems like f4bones has figured out the occupancy sensor though so that's good. The lack of airbags I'll have to continue to contemplate - no rush and this is great info, thanks!

f4bones

I really wouldn't worry too much about deleting the airbags - the side airbags in the seats do very little, and it's a simple delete with a resister. The PODs delete is another story - I've successfully retrofit it on several seats now, but haven't been successful in deleting it altogether in the 992. However, I have some time scheduled with @rnlst_log (Mars) to see if we can figure out how to program out the PODs sensor. I imagine it will require a similar work around to that used in programming the matrix lights - IE tell the car its a EURO model - program - then re-program back to US spec.

Understeer

Recaro does have versions of the seats with side airbags however they are not for sale in the US market. If you order them from European retailers that ship internationally or from eBay sellers based in Europe, you can find the version with the side airbag.

f4bones

You will also need the seat position sensors on both seats - the airbag system has 3 components that are required:

1. Seat position sensors (both seats)
2. Airbags - (both seats)
3. Passanger Occupancy Detector and sensor pad (RH seat only)

I think the easiest route forward to install Recaros in a 992 is to purchase the LWCB wiring harness - they are amazingly cheap:

1. RH - 9GT-971-385 - https://www.sunsetporscheparts.com/o...QtMGwtaDYtZ2Fz
2. LH -9GT-971-386-A - https://www.sunsetporscheparts.com/o...oom-9gt971386a

At $17.29 each, they are an amazing value. These have the connectors to the car harness, and position sensors already wired in . . can't buy the connectors for that price. The PODs sensor referenced in my other thread for the LWCB plug right into this, and there are two models of the VW sensor box that I've verified to work with the LWCB pad:

1. 4M0 959 339 B H12 06S
2. 4M0 959 339 B H16 17S (this is the stock Porsche part)

There may be other sensor boxes that work, but I've validated these two PNs and was able to program them, and calibrate the sensor pads. . .