Like many fine things in life, we American some how always get denied when it comes to hard core version of sports car like the BMW CSL, Nissan Skyline and club sports packages in Porsche GT3 RS with light weight carbon fiber bucket seats, roll bar and a fine looking fire extinguisher lol

Not to let the lack of ability to check the club sports package option in the dealer discourage me, I decided to do it my way. Well folks, as some of you know that the OEM carbon fiber club sports seats cost as much as a new Honda Civic and the OEM RS roll bar require welding and may squeak due to muti-piece design. I decided to get a pair of newly designed light weight Porsche GT2 seats with fire retardant perlon cloth and GMG roll bar to complete my club sports need.

Here is a detail description and DIY on the GT2 seats and roll bar. I was able to get a set of the cloth GT2 seats from Steve at Suncoast Porsche - they are just about the best place for OEM Porsche parts as far as price and service wise without the need to sell your first born lol. They were shipped on this gigantic wooden crate well protected by two stiff board boxes. SWEET!



Here are couple pictures of the GT2 seats. The black perlon cloth with white stitching really pops and just love the carbon fiber shell with side impact air bags and OEM occupant sensors etc. The best part is that the back rest can be tilt forward to allow easy access to the back of the the car. Porsche admitted that developing the GT2 seat was the longest engineering process in making the new 998. We will see a-lot of these seats in the upcoming Porsche line up to help pay for the engineering cost.

Here is a break down of the weight between GT2 and OEM seats
GT2 driver seat: 33 lbs
GT2 passenger seat: 35 lbs
OEM driver seat: 50 lbs
OEM passenger seat: 55 lbs
Total weight saving of 37 lbs with GT2 seats .... NICE!









OK, let's get the seats installed. First disconnect the battery and remove the heavy US OEM seats. Remove the two front plastic retainer on the seat railing by gently prying the center tap upward and slide it off to reveal the hexagon bolt





You can buy the E-12 sockets for these bolts from Sears. Remove the 4 bolts and disconnect the two seat sensor connectors by lifting the retaining taps on passenger side and one on the driver side

 

Protect the center console, door panel and door sill trim before removing the seats. They are pretty heavy - but not as heavy as the OEM M3 seats lol.





An interior shot without the front seats



Now, let's prepare the GT2 seats for install. If you are not going to use 6 points harness then it's a simple plug and play. If you plan on using some sort of 6 points harness then you need a sub mount bar beneath the seat to anchor the 6 points harness. I used the Porsche OEM sub mount bar. Man! they are freaking sturdy and heavy - 2 lbs each!



Unlike the OEM Porsche 996 GT3 seats, the GT2 seats do not have two matching bolts to secure the sub mount bar. Instead, you need to use a single pre-existing bolts under the front of each seat to secure the bar. The passenger side uses a single large bolt/nut combination with a concave washer where as the driver side uses two widely spaced bolts



OK, let's work on the passenger seat first. You will use the nut/bolt at the front of the seat. Loosen the nut to reveal the concave washer. I placed a flat washer next to it for comparison. We will use the flat washer (which can be found in your local hardware store) for the sub mount bar since the concave washer is too thick and will not allow the nut to capture all the thread on the bolt



As you can see from the picture below, the openings on the sub mount bar is not large enough compare with the concave washer for the bolt on the passenger side. I used a 15/32 drill bit to created a larger opening

 

Now we need to remove the seat sensor units on the passenger side to secure the sub mount bar. The larger black sensor unit on the right is secured with 3 small allen bolts. Simple lift the front cushion and loosen the bolts



Remove the smaller yellow sensor unit by pressing two small taps. Clip the zip ties that secure the wires then move the sensor units to the side



Install the sub mount bar with the flat washer and tighten the nut. The sub mount bar will block the larger black sensor unit from it's original location. I moved it forward but you can only use one of the allen bolt. No problem, I added two double sided tape to help secure the sensor unit



Driver side is easier. I used the rear bolt on the front of the seat to allow more direct belt access through seat opening. Even though the driver side bolt is small enough to fit the sub mount bar, I still drilled a larger opening with 15/32 drill bit to allow more room away from the central raised hump on the railing.



Here is a view of the sub mount bar locations on the passenger and driver seats



OK, harness selections. There are many choices when it comes to 6 points harness. It's better to use OEM harness since it's made by Schroth specifically to fit the OEM GT3/GT2 seats. The harness tie down has unique design which allow perfect fit with seat belt receiver and harness itself

 

Now the roll bar. I decided to go with GMG roll bar since it's a simple bolt on to existing seat belt anchors and it does not make noise like the OEM RS roll bar. The color was kind of off since it's hard to match color with powder coating but it actually looks great once installed. The weight of the roll bar was 46 lbs with all mounting hardware



It was a simple install right? ..... Wrong! I had one heck of a time getting the darn thing in and have it completely wrong. I call Fabryce at GMG and he was kind enough to make a DIY video as shown on their website. Great customer service

The mounting points used for the GMG roll bar are the front seat belt anchor and rear seat belt anchor. The opening for rear seat belt anchor was exposed after peeling off a tape covering the opening





Well, I got the roll bar in but I can not line up the bolts due to very tight fitting. Fabryce refer me to their Norther California sister shop BR Racing for assistance. These guys took over my roll bar install and did a fantastic job!

 

Here are couple pictures of the finish product - GT2 seats with 6 points harness and GMG roll bar







I will pick up a cheap fire extinguisher from Walmart tomorrow to complete the club sports conversion lol

 

Now here is a problem I encountered with the GT2 seats. Despite disconnecting the battery, my center console passenger air bag light remained lit. It is suppose to be off when no one is sitting in the passenger seat and if a child less than 65 lbs sit in the seat then then light will come on indicating the air bags are off for safety reasons. I bought a Durametric Porsche OBDII diagnostic software which did a great job at clearing some error codes and instrument panel air bag warning light (I left the battery on one time while removing the seats lol) but did nothing to the center console light.

I had no choice but take my car to the stealer for a look. They ran a whole bunch of test which demonstrated the passenger GT2 seats had all the proper occupant sensors and NO error codes what so ever. The tech was scratching their head .... thinking how to charge me more lol. Finally they had to reset the DME much like if they first receive a new car from the truck. New cars are delivered with very restricted DME setting which does not allow the radio to work, limit speed less than 10 mph etc to prevent joy ride. The center console passenger light came off after the DME is reset .... and $160 later :shifty:



Here are couple more pictures of the GT2 seats without roll bar and 6 points harness for comparison







Hope this post is helpful for those of you considering GT2 seats and roll bar in the future

 

Here are some pictures of the leather GT2 seats in a new 998 C4S for those of you thinking about the Leather version

 

thats beautifull!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

looks great mikey how about some yellow harnesses to match your ceramic brakes...?

 

They are some great looking OEM seats. Porsche did a good job there. Nice pictures and write up. Everything looks great together.

 

Thanks for the write up...it was just what I DIDN'T need to see!
Now I'm jonesing for some GT2 seats.



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very nice write up!!!

 

thats my next purchase for sure! In cloth!

 

Nice write up and pics. I really like the results.

 

Beautiful!