Bench seats to buckets

Has anyone changed their gem bench (older gems) seat to bucket seats (newer gems)? I have a 2000 E2. Could I swap one for the other? Would it make it too hard to get to the batteries under the seat?

I have a 2002 4 seater that I replaced all the seats with buckets due to front bucket frames rusted and back faded and ripped.

Don’t have them permanently mounted but I separated the back from the base so I can attach seat base to baseboard on a hung and flip up. Seat backs on a rail to slide up and allow base to fold up and out.

Damnit this forum and GEMs are money pits. Now I want to put in nicer seats. :thinking:

@diymatt: In the words of my beloved “where does it end?” :slight_smile:

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I had to either redo mine or replace. Found racing seats online with 5 point seatbelts sold by the pair that was cheaper than having them redone. They are a tight fit and I’ll habento relocate the parking brake for easier operation but worked out great.

And it doesn’t end, but that’s why I got a Gem over a golf cart, forces me to think and be creative instead of paying 400% more for a part made specifically for my ezgo/club car.

Mine won’t be “done” until I only have some original frame and body left.

M@

I’m waiting for somebody to take a Tesla front motor and cut it down to fit…

Yeah once I saw this pic I looked online too. One can get fairly reasonable seats for 200-250 a pair. Crazy.

I can’t decide when to try and do my 4wd conversion now. Before or after new seats. :roll_eyes:

These were $200/pair on amazon with belts.

How are you planning to do the 4wheel drive conversion? I have tinkered with the idea, no measurements just eyeballing finding another front frame assembly and motor to replace the rear frame, then have dual motors but guessing I would need dual controllers. Haven’t fully thought about it yet, was then sidetracked with miniature brushless motors and thought of doing one per wheel all with their own controllers but single throttle/power source.

It will never end, just glad I have limited tinker time/funds so I don’t go crazy all at once. Still working on my Amazon Fire Tablet display and Alexa switching control to get rid of all the toggle switches.

M@

You guys are spot on, it will never end but don’t tell my beloved that :slight_smile: I have to ask, do the seats recline? I am happy with the look of my seats but I’m that guy who has to recline waaaay back to be comfortable. Would seriously consider reclining seats for that price.

I’ve also toyed with 4WD, but I never go off road so I can’t justify the project. I would think you would have to have 2 controllers and probably a circuit in between them that monitors the motor RPM and adjusts the throttle inputs to keep the motors in sync. I’m picturing the throttle output going into a circuit that monitors each motor RPM and then sends the corrected voltage to each of the controllers. It would be a bit of a challenge but certainly doable.

Tha Fire tablet idea has me intrigued. I am just starting to play with an Arduino based solution for a dash display that will track all of my key data such as motor RPM, speed, motor temp, etc… I hadn’t thought of incorporating any controls into it but very well could. I’m just playing with it right now because life is busy and summer is when I use the cart so I"m not willing to take it off line until the season is over.

I justify my projects by telling the wife that its way cheaper than building a hotrod as a hobby. So far that has worked. :slight_smile:

The seats I have move forward/backwards and recline. I pulled the sliders off the pair I put in the back as they sit too high the way it is and nowhere to slide back or recline to anyway.

Think these are them:

Bunch of different styles around $100 a seat

M@

Those are really coo. I have to check into them for sure.

It’s all just spitballing at this point. I recall seeing some guy on this forum say he was able to accomplish it using a motor and rear-end from a Club Car. Apparently they use the same splines. I can’t find the post of course.
It might be fun as a long winter project while she sits in the garage anyhow, but not anytime too soon. I think I’d want to have a proper TIG machine on hand too and not fabri-cobble brackets like I’m doing now.

That is a fantastic tip. Good call.

Wouldn’t the dual motor setup work fine without something keeping the two motors in sync? My thought was if the same model controller and motor are used then they should end up working almost equally and one motor would just end up working a little harder than the other because it would have to push the other one.

Dunno. I know a lot of gokart people just throw a motor on the front and back and call it as day. I recall even seeing some real cars doing something similar with multi motor setups.

I think ideally there needs to be a way to turn on/off the front/back independently and then turn them both on at once when needed. I have no desire to go ripping down the road at 35mph in 4wd mind you.

I suppose the one working harder than the other might be ok since the front and rear aren’t linked together physically. I am pretty certain that it would be better to have them synced, but the more I think about it, I’m not sure it would be necessary.
I actually have 2 GEM cars, a Clubcar and a welder. It might just turn into a winter project to test the concept. I think I would have every part needed. Of course then I’d have 1 4WD cart that I never take offroad and 2 donor carts that clog up my garage. LOL