Ever have a bench seats inner hooks break?

[ESP47]

A few years ago some idiot was getting in the back of my car and he pulled on the front seat with his weight and it kind of pulled the back part of the seat back a couple inches.

Last month I was putting new vinyl on the seat and I noticed the two metal hooks in the center of the seat bottom didn't look symmetrical. You could tell the drivers side hook was bent back so slightly...which explained why the seat was leaning back a little more than necessary. I didn't want to hammer it forward and weaken it, only to have it bend back even further.

After getting it back in the car, now the back side of the front seat is leaning back about 5 inches farther than it should. I have it installed correctly, I think the hook is bending even further now. Has anyone ever had this problem before? I'm guessing the only thing that I can do to fix it is find another bench bottom and reinstall the cover huh? Sucks because this bench is in mint condition :banghead:

 

[RedFish]

Upholstery shops run into these sort of problems. They'll strip the frame down to nothing flamible and take it to a local shop that can correct it, add reinforcement, etc..

 

[Outkast]

I had it happen on my 71 swinger and what we did was get everything flammable clear and wrapped wet towels around the vynle and had to weld the things back down.

 

[ESP47]

Crap...thanks guys I was afraid of that. It's a brand new cover so I'm just going to take it off along with the foam. I only have a mig so I'll have to bring it to a family member to re weld it. Thanks!