pilot seats refined

MF_Cockpit-CaptainsChairs_12.131

While I’m figuring-out what I want to do with the corridor, I took a bit of time to refine the captain’s chairs. I tweaked the interior panels to have a bit more of a lived in feel. I also noticed in some photos that the quilted part of the seat back has more of a paunchy feel to it – over-stuffed almost – as opposed to my last version that was a bit more taught and tailored.

I also revised the base pedestal to match the Nav Seats better. Not that I know what the pilot seat based really look like – but my assumption is that they used similar hardware.

pilot seats

Where to begin on these? These particular parts of the cockpit might be even trickier than the Nav-Comm seats. There is almost always someone in them and are typically in shadow. But after countless hours on the internet and consulting some car aficionado friends, I’m pretty sure they are seats out of a mid-70’s Porsche 930 (911 Turbo). But not stock seats of course.

Corbeau is a maker of aftermarket seats for Porsches and made seats in this era and their construction techniques and proportions seem to be very close to what we see in the Falcon. Did they offer them in tan suede with a vinyl back? Probably, but not positive.

So what’s this give me? It establishes a footprint for the seat – they still sell seat mounting brackets for 70’s Porsches. It also gives me a pretty good idea of what the envelope was that the original seat fit into – height, width depth – as aftermarket seats are still available – although changes to seat belt laws and such have changed the designs of modern seats.