71 SB Seats wont slide on bushings

[Longmont1302]

The seats in my 71 Super Beetle wiggle a lot (they rock on their tracks). This is likely due to the fact that there are no bushings on the seat rails. I got some bushings (mine look like this: http://www.jbugs.com/product/113881213.html) and put them on the rails. Now I can't get the seats to slide over the bushings on the rails.

Next I took the passenger seat back out, took the bushings off, sprayed some silicone in the track on the seat. Now on one side I can get the bushing to slide though the seat track, but not on the other side. The track on the seat doesn't look like it's been squished and it;s all pretty smooth. Any suggestions? Pry it apart? Sand it down?

[bnam]

Its been a while since I did mine, but I recall having to clean the tracks on the seat real well.

[Cusser]

Just had the driver seat out on my '71 Super yesterday to do some work on the pedals. My plastic bushings went to VW Heaven decades ago.

We cleaned off the pan seat rails and I applied stick lubricant (looks like a deodorant stick) to the pan rails, works/slides fine. GT1953 may have used aerosol lube on the actual seat part rails.
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1970 VW (owned since 1972) and 1971 VW Convertible (owned since 1976), second owner of each. The '71 now has the 1835 engine, swapped from the '70. Second owner of each. 1988 Mazda B2200 truck, 1998 Frontier, 2014 Yukon, 2004 Frontier King Cab. All manual transmission except for the Yukon. http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/album_page.php?pic_id=335294 http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/album_page.php?pic_id=335297

[Chochobeef]

The mold is incorrect and is too tight. I was unable to even get the "bushing" to slide down the seat rail with the seat out of the car. You will have to sand the plastic until enough material has been taken off. It also does not hurt to have a clean seat track as well on both sides.

One other bit of info. Instead of silicon spray, use a white lithium paste on both pieces. Clean up the excess that comes out and there should be a sufficient amount of it left for easy sliding.

[Cusser]

[Chochobeef]

Come on Cuss, you just wanted to post a stick lubricant.

All kidding aside, there are probably many ways to tackle the seat tracks and I'm sure we have all had different experiences with new and old parts.

Wish I could adapt some bearing type tracks, but that's another can-o-worms.

[Longmont1302]

Thanks to everyone for the kind help. I'm embarrassed to say it didn't occur to me to resize the plastic bushings - I'm much more excited about sanding those down than opening the seat channels. I'll also clean the channels some more and try some stick lubricant or white lithium paste, too.

[Cusser]