New fold down seat question, why...

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72bluNblu

72bluNblu

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Ok, so I searched for this one but couldn't find anything.

Why is the package tray cut out behind the fold down seat? :dontknow:

Was this to allow access to the space behind the seat without folding the seat down? Or to keep from building a "hidden space" into the car? Doesn't seem like having it cut down like that would add anything structurally to make up for the lack of cross braces.

I ask because the cut down package tray isn't absolutely needed to make a fold down seat fit. I know this because I did a test fit of a fold down seat back into my non-fold down seat car, and it fits just fine. In fact, it would work properly with the standard package tray as long as you remove the hooks that held in the standard seat, and made a small notch in the bracing where the standard package tray attaches to the wheel wells for the upper seat latches.

You can see in the picture below that the back of the fold down seat is no where near the package tray, so it wasn't to clear the seat back...

Anybody have an idea?
 

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i dont know about that and your pic didnt show. do you have pic of your swap was thinking of doing it myself on my duster?
 
Picture should be up now.

I don't have any pictures of my swap yet, I picked up the seat back and all the brackets from a donor car the other day, minus the package tray. I was just going to cut the package tray on my car down because of the work needed to swap it out, plus the VIN is stamped on the tray. But it looks to me like the seat will function just fine with the package tray left pretty much as stock.

Other thing is that you don't need the seat bottom, the fold down seat bottoms are the same as the standard seat bottoms.
 
mwls73duster360 said:
awesome ill have to find me a donor
Click to expand...

A donor is the way to go, only easy way I see to get all the brackets. Once you have all the brackets, it doesn't seem like that hard of a swap, especially if the package tray doesn't need to be cut. Obviously it won't be 100% factory accurate, but if you're doing a conversion it won't be 100% anyway because it won't be on the fender tag or build sheet or whatever.

And I figured out another possibility for why the package tray was cut back so far- it does add quite a bit of vertical clearance to the pass through (several inches at least). Maybe Ma Mopar was trying to make something specific fit in the trunk/pass through area?
 
Anybody?

Maybe some original literature on the fold down seat to shed some light on why the package tray is cut down so far?
 
Harking back to the original 1964 Valiant Barracuda, the engineers reconfigured the body bracing to allow passage between the passenger compartment and the trunk.

The rear seatback folded flat forward, while a security panel immediately behind folded backward, creating an opening 64 inches wide and 13.5 inches tall. The happy result was a fully-carpeted cargo area 6.5 feet long (long enough for skis and surfboards), offering 56 cubic feet of cargo space.

And if you opted for a sunroof (metal this year, as opposed to the folding vinyl sunroofs available in 1971-1972), you could also haul taller objects through the hole in the roof.

Plymouth Dusters could always swallow loads of stuff. With the Space Duster option, the car's cargo capacity was truly enormous.
 
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