Hi, great forum guys! Helped me out a few times.

Apologies if this has been covered but I've searched and can't find it.

Focus MK2 estate 1.8 TDCI 2008

I was hoovering the car out, slammed the seat back and it seems it went too far and has gone off the back of the runners. So no matter how much jiggling I try, I can't get it to go forward. Luckily I'm tall, so I can still drive it. But mot is creeping up.

I can't see anything obvious when looking underneath with a torch, so I'm going to take the seat out. 

Has anyone got any pointers with what I should be looking for?

Cheers!

Think you might need two people for this.  One to hold the adjuster handle up at the front.  And another to line up the rails from behind to slot it back in.

If it hasn't come right out the back of the slots, then the person at the back could just shove hard from the the base while the person at the front keeps the handle up.  No point shoving at the top as it'll be the wrong angle.

On 7/31/2024 at 8:09 PM, TomsFocus said:

Think you might need two people for this.  One to hold the adjuster handle up at the front.  And another to line up the rails from behind to slot it back in.

If it hasn't come right out the back of the slots, then the person at the back could just shove hard from the the base while the person at the front keeps the handle up.  No point shoving at the top as it'll be the wrong angle.

Cheers for the reply! So you're saying I could leave the seat in situ and perform this operation with a second surgeon, a sous chef, or even a mate?

10 hours ago, albash82 said:

Cheers for the reply! So you're saying I could leave the seat in situ and perform this operation with a second surgeon, a sous chef, or even a mate?

That's certainly what I'd try first.

There's nothing particularly clever about the fore & aft mechanism.  It's literally just a set of holes along the rails.  The handle is connected to a set of fixed pegs,.  You are literally just lifting the pegs out of the holes to move the seat.  Then dropping the pegs back in by releasing the handle.  There is also a small rolling caster each side which allows the seat to move more easily, not visible on the picture below.

Not much that can really go wrong with it.  You could try pumping the height adjuster all the way up to give a bit more space to see, but I can't think what could break in this mechanism.  Think it just has come too far back and needs a bit of brute force to push it forward again.

 

@TomsFocus - got the seat out, which was a bugger, since the rear left T50 screw was covered by the rail. Had to use a standard L-shaped torx key, slide it in at the long end, on an angle, tap it in a bit with a hammer, then turn it using a lever slid over the short end. It only allowed a few degrees of movement and luckily wasn't too tight.

There wasn't enough room for a socket bit, it was all just too tight!

Anyway, got seat out, tried for ages to work out what had happened and to see what I needed to do to release it.

Luckily my mate got bored of me faffing and just hit the back of the rail really hard with a hammer. Worked a treat! Haha.

Job done.