Mercedes cab seat swivels

Has anyone replaced the original RIB cab seat swivels to enable the seats to be rotated without having to open the cab doors?

I found that Sportscraft (German company www.sportscraft.de) do make such swivels and they are quite widely available in the UK.  (The pivot point is offset more than the RIB ones and as the seat rotates they move toward the centre of the cab).

But in looking at their catalog there is a warning that they "cannot" be fitted if there is a battery built into the passenger seat base (I am guessing there is a clearance issue). They are too expensive to buy on spec and then find out there is a problem and the UK distributor doesn't know.  As yet no reply from the company directly - maybe my pigeon German wasn't clear enough.

Hi Mike

No direct help I'm afraid, but a possible suggestion.

If you really want the swivels, and I can see how much they would reduce the fiddle of rotating the seats, could you not move the battery?

I don't know your van at all so I may be talking rubbish, but that would be my first thought - and it shouldn't be much of a job.

After a couple of days carefully observing how the seat moves I am of the view that:

- It is the positioning of the sofas rearward of the seats, not allowing sufficient travel of the seat on the seat runners which ultimately causes the armrest to jam against the door as it rotates. Having said that a swivel with greater offset would work better.

- If the seat swivels allowed the seat to rotate outwards rather than inwards there would be no issue at all as far as I can see.

Hi.
We have a 2015 Burford.
I noticed that the arm rest was also jamming on the door when trying to swivel the seat. I removed the arm rests as we never used them anyway. Problem solved.

I have the equivalent Peugeot Corinium....my arm rest will hit the doors under certain circumstances but just raising the seat back sorts it out!

Are the merc seat swivels that different??

Ray

I have now had a reply from Sportscraft confirming that their swivels will offset the seats inwards by 8cms when rotated through 180 deg in order to provide the necessary clearance.  They also supplied their engineering drawings of dimensions from which I conclude I will have the necessary clearance above the battery under the passenger seat.

Ray - it would seem so.  The seat bases are set more outwards than on the equivalent Fiat/Peugeot/Citroen,  it gives plenty of room between the two seats when they are in normal position.

I was looking at the new Burford last week, it’s probably an optical illusion but the merc seats seem smaller.
I don’t find the merc cab at all attractive, much prefer the pug...but I can see a difference in the seat area but I’ve not figured out why it looks different, now I know 

Ray

Hi Peter,  the issue I observe is when the seat is swiveled around to say 130 deg I need to open door to get to 180 deg.  This is because the seat catches the end of the sofa and by pushing the seat back along its runners forces the armrest into the cab door.

I agree the seats themselves look identical.  I will post the outcome of a trial fit of a Sportscraft swivel whether there is any difference or not.

The Sportscraft swivel is now fitted on the passenger seat, and I won't be taking off any time soon either!

The positives are:
I can fully turn the seat through 180 degrees without opening the door.  I can sit with the seat at about 135 deg ie diagonally inwards/rearwards with good movement.
The seat belt is anchored to the base and doesn't need to turn with the seat.
It is made from thick steel and more robust than the original swivel and doesn't rock/rattle.
Comes with the TUV test certificate.

The negatives are:
Whether it is my seat base or that the measurements on the swivel are slightly out but it is quite tedious and time-consuming (took 2hrs) to fit because none of the mounting holes seem to line up properly.  I noted this in comments from others who had installed this swivel.