Agreed those seats are pure sex. Love them!
I think those seats will be better then oem and I would love to have something like that in my car.
Not sure why you want to spend $7K for some leather seats to go in your A4.
You could buy a 944 track car for that much.
It’s a S4 isn’t it? 7k is a bit much but I guess the same could be said for me as I could have bought another B5 for the same amount. Not that I would ever consider owning two B5’s.
you’re not spending 7k and never seeing it again.
Best way is to buy some that are used, install them, then sell them when you sell the car. You pay $5500 today, you will get $5500 in 5 years.
Free.
Think West’s whole goal is a car he can drive on the streets and take to the track. 7k for seats seems more reasonable than a whole bunch of other things you can waste your $ on, like 1k carbon mirrors or a $150 coin holder delete.
Im sure seats are a great upgrade. originally i said i would never pay a lot for a nice steering wheel. Now that i own one, its by far one of my favorite mods. i USE the wheel everytime and love it. Im sure seats would be the same way.
I don’t think a fixed back seat is going to be the best idea if I’m not ready to pull the trigger on a rollbar. I know people do it, I just won’t. Just like people will do a 4 point belt on an OEM seat, I won’t. The slight increase in performance is not worth the off chance the car rolls in a weird way and can’t recline the seat to allow me to stay safely in the cabin. I’m actually more worried about that happening on the road than on the track, sadly.
@notarmed lol @ buying a 33 year old track car - it sounds like a limitless liability. I think I want to go out there with 30 more years of safety and high strength steel technology around my person. I would put $7000 brakes on it anyway so I don’t see how that saves money? We all know the B8 is a reliable, turn key road course capable car.
^West, the seat snapping backward is a misconception in a roll over.
You do not want the seat to snap back under any circumstance–it is there to support arguably the most important part of your body: Your entire spine.
And by the way, unless you are strapped in with a proper 6 point harness into a fixed bucket (with no roll bar/cage), then ok sure, in a roll over, you are probably fucked. However, with a 3 point lap belt + fixed bucket, you are fine in a roll over. By design, the 3 point belt will not keep you snuggly in place, preventing your head to be crushed in the event of a roof collapse. You can flop in all manner of directions.
a fixed bucket in a street car is perfectly safe, and street cars come equipped that way even without a roll bar.
See: E46 M3 CSL, NSX Type R.
Infact, there have been law suits against seat manufacturers for causing deaths…because of the seat being reclined in an accident! The fact of the matter is, and all warning labels will tell you that a reclining seat is not meant to be reclined when the car is in motion.
Well the CSL was never sold in the US and I think the intent was that owners would install the rollbar in it, even though BMW couldn’t in most markets. I understand putting a fixed bucket in a 2 seater like a Boxster, because you already have the rollbar over your head.
But when I look at most performance seats sold from BMW/Audi/Porsche they’re the reclining type.
A super nice custom nappa leather wrapped set of Recaro Sportster CS has some resale value because it’s highly desirable, either in the car or by itself. A Pole Position has salvage value resale ($1000 tops for a pair if you can find a buyer), and no one would want the car with them. So I’d have to store the OEM S4 seats to replace later. Just something to consider as people have pointed out this is an expensive job for a subjective improvement in the car. Recaro Sportster CS would actually make the car more desirable and I could sell the S4 seats, mostly because I don’t want to store them indefinitely.
Nice pics of Recaro SPA mounted in an Audi sedan. This is an 8 pound seat with 13 pound rails and framing. Of course these require a cage in the back seat.
its inevitable west, this will become a track car only, gut it! :o
I think it’s kind of foolish to gut an S4. Sell it and gut something else.
Some will say it’s foolish to take your Audi to a track or a dragstrip, but I don’t. It’s just something that it is very capable at, and you are retaining the entire ‘audiness’ of it…keeping the seats, keeping the luxuries, and it’s still a 3800 lb sport sedan that is capable of taking 4 people to dinner comfortably.
However once you start stripping it to make it better on the track, you’ve lost the plot. It’s not a great track car…it’s a great luxury sports sedan that can do well at the track.
Go buy a proper track car rather than destroy this one that is already 1000 lbs too heavy and poorly balanced.
I wouldn’t gut it. What’s at stake is whether or not the back seat remains usable, or if it has a painted black 6 point rollbar welded into the trunk, bench, and rear footwells.
I like tracking the 3.0TFSI with quattro, hydraulic steering, and a six speed. This is the smallest form factor that combination comes in. Post seats this car will be 3625 pounds with a full tank of fuel (add driver weight to that for on track weight). The engine has plenty of power and torque to move that weight around and keep up with lighter cars like a Lotus.
This seems like a reasonable dedicated track car:
http://www.cars.com/vehicledetail/detail/603710093/overview/
man those cars drop value so fast
They are actually increasing in value now, especially the MT cars. Not too long ago they could be had for 50-60.
Only when they’re orange non Ferrari paint with a sketchy service history.
The CS is super sought after in good shape. I love them.
In my opinion those seats completely remove the Audi feel and luxury it was born with. Sure they are light but it eliminates the daily driving comfort - run some errands and take a lady out to dinner with those bolsters and you’ll learn the hard way.