356 seat belts

356 Porsche-related discussions and questions.
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John Reihansperger
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356 seat belts

#1 Post by John Reihansperger »

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Hello Forum, I am restoring a 356 B super from 1960. I am curious about the seat belts I removed.
They are Rupert Seat belts, a division of the Rupert parachute company. They are about 3" wide and the hardware is very serious, like they used parachute fasteners. Does anyone know if they were an option, or maybe the original owner put them in aftermarket? They are very cool, and I will probably use them regardless. The car was originally a Racine, Wisconsin car. The Rupert company was located in Illinois.
Curious,
John Reihansperger
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Steve Hatfield
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Re: 356 seat belts

#2 Post by Steve Hatfield »

A photo or two will be helpful in answering your question. Generally speaking, 3 inch belts were installed by owners in the US/North America. Rupert 2 inch belts with PORSCHE engraved release flaps were dealer installed as per Dr Brett Johnson in discussions on this forum.
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Richard Milstead
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Re: 356 seat belts

#3 Post by Richard Milstead »

John.
The type of seat belts you describe were not an option offered by Porsche through their accessories program.

Every accessory brochure starting in 1956 did include some type of seat belt (safety belt) but what was offered changed as time went by. (credit to Charlie White's web site for details of available accessories)
In 1956, the first type offered was number QA 44 - ""Safety Belt, quick release, complete with mounting hardware" (picture shown below):
SBELT2.JPG
SBELT2.JPG (11.3 KiB) Viewed 3730 times
In the later "A" period brochures the item is item #20 - "Safety Belt for one seat" (Picture shown below):
SBELT3.jpg
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This photo continued to be used in every accessories brochure published in the 356 era despite changes to the actual seat belts that were offered. Below is a picture of the type of belt and attachments used for the later A seat belts:
0004687-R1-030-13A.jpg
uEFM9-e3870f48cef406f26c2758a5cdc23bff.jpg
The same seat belt description and picture was in the early T5B brochures with the item # 13. However, in the last of the T5 period brochures (March 1961) the item numbers and descriptions changed perhaps indicating a change to the belts that were offered. The new designations were:
9200 - Safety Belt, one seat, Left (Airline type)
9201 - Safety Belt, one seat, Right (Airline type)
9202 - Safety Belt, one seat, Left (Shoulder type)
9203 - Safety Belt, one seat, Right (Shoulder type)

Since the picture in the brochure was the same as in the earlier ones, the changes made at that time are obscure.

The next change occured sometine in the early introduction of the T6B cars between September 1961 and March 1962. While the offerings in the September 61 brochure were unchanged from the March '61 version, by March '62 the descriptions had changed yet again:
9200 - Safety Belt for one seat (air-line safety belt). left
9201 - Safety Belt for one seat (air-line safety belt), right
9202 - Safety belt, diagonal. slash type, left
9202 - Safety belt, diagonal. slash type, right
9203 - Safety belt, diagonal-plus-lap type, left
9204 - Safety belt, diagonal-plus-lap type, right
Again the picture in the brochures didn't change but in the hardcover dealer catalogs Porsche updated the photos to show the various options. These are pictured below:
BT69201a.jpg
BT69201a.jpg (28.12 KiB) Viewed 3730 times
BT69204_6a.jpg
BT69204_6a.jpg (31.05 KiB) Viewed 3730 times
No other changes occurred in the C brochures. The newer style seat belts were designed to use the attachment points provided in the later cars and are shown in the picture below:
Seat_Belts_2013_002.jpg
Depending upon the production period of your car this is what would have been available through the "Factory" for your car. Hope this helps.

Dick Milstead
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Roy Lock
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Re: 356 seat belts

#4 Post by Roy Lock »

The seat belt option was a moving target. The info in the previous post MAYBE correct if they'd were installed at the factory. Seat belts were treated as consumables and normally installed at the dealer level, just as wood steering wheels. This was to allow dealers an extra layer of profit on the sale of a car.
There is factory documentation which states that cars delivered in the US were given local manufactured seat belts. The only US cars which got factory installed seat belts were tourist delivered cars. I can dig that up and repost if anyone is interested.
As for the 1960 installation hardware, look in the factory workshop manual for installation and which hook to use.

A safety warning. The nylon webbing on old seat belts degrades with exposure to UV. If you decide to use the hardware, then replace the webbing.
Roy Lock  
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Re: 356 seat belts

#5 Post by Richard Milstead »

Roy,
Your comment is essentially correct in that Porsche is known to have actively encouraged dealerships in the US to sell aftermarket type seat belts mainly for cost reasons. I am attaching a Porsche letter from 1964 that appeared in an earlier thread on this forum which basically documents this at least in the "C" period. Most US delivery cars that had seat belts, in fact, did use such if they were dealer installed. The same point can be made, however, about wooden steering wheels (as you point out), radios, and other items installed by the dealership, that is, they could be different from what the "Factory" offered in the Accessories program.

If one did overseas delivery at the "Factory" ("Tourist Delivery") and ordered seat belts you would have received the ones available through the Accessories program, however, since that is what the "Factory" installed. If your car was originally a European delivery car, in general, the same would be true. Finally, if seat belts appear on your warranty record (Kardex) then they also would likely be the ones described above.

The point of my post was only to describe what the Porsche Accessory program offered. I did not say nor mean to imply that was the only type of seat belts found in US cars but was attempting to discuss what was offered in the Accessories program at different points in time.

Dick Milstead
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Harold Singh
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Re: 356 seat belts

#6 Post by Harold Singh »

Interesting. I'll be looking into this soon. I wont feel so bad adding belts to my 64C original floors now that I know that any dealer could have done that when new.
Harold
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Re: 356 seat belts

#7 Post by Roy Lock »

Thanks Dick for posting my scan of the sales document. It saved me a lot of time looking for it since I am on the road to all the open houses.

One must be cautioned at referring to the Kardex as "The Bible" of authenticity when it came to options. It is in fact only a factory record for warranty purposes, it has since been corrupted and misunderstood to its original intent. In the case of what came on the cars, we have to remember there were a minimum of two layers between the factory and the original owner; the distributor and the dealer. Distributor and dealer installed options appeared on the Kardex when the dealer installed factory approved parts or kits.
In the case of my two current cars, radios were in fact installed at the dealer and showed up on the Kardex. There are also cases where entire cars were replaced, right down to the last weld.
Seat belts engines, etc, are ideal candidates for simple replacements or installation at the dealership yet appeared on the Kardex.
Roy Lock  
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Richard Milstead
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Re: 356 seat belts

#8 Post by Richard Milstead »

Roy,
You are welcome. Honestly I did not remember that you were the poster of that letter. Of course that was a document from the "C" era. While informally consistent with the way things were done before then it does post date John's car and, therefor, is not pertinent to his question.

If you go back to my last post I said : " Finally, if seat belts appear on your warranty record (Kardex) then they also would likely be the ones described above." The Kardex for all of its imperfections is still the only period documentation that is available unless the owner has sales receipts or invoices. That being said, I am very well aware that the records on the Kardex are often corrupted and the COA even more so. However, I must seriously ask if you know of and can provide any example of where a dealer installed a non Porsche approved accessory and it was entered that on the warranty record at the "Factory". For example, were the radios you say are listed on the Kardex records for your cars the same as models included in the lists of radios in the Accessories program or are they ones not regularly offered through that program? While the seat belts that we are discussing were being installed by dealerships over here and clearly Porsche (at least by 1964) was encouraging this, I would really be surprised if they were offering warranty coverage on them given that they had no control on where they were being sourced by the dealer. I may be wrong (and have been many times in the past) but I would not accept such on face value unless you have documentation that it happened. Sorry.

Anyway to reiterate again what I said in my last post the point I was making was what the options the Accessories program provided not what options dealerships could provide for the customer outside of that program.

Dick Milstead
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Wes Bender
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Re: 356 seat belts

#9 Post by Wes Bender »

Harold Singh wrote:Interesting. I'll be looking into this soon. I wont feel so bad adding belts to my 64C original floors now that I know that any dealer could have done that when new.
Harold, I can't tell from your post if you are contemplating drilling holes and mounting brackets for the belts in your "C". If that is the case, don't drill any holes until you pull up the rear rubber mats. You should find threaded holes at the rear that will accept the proper eyes for the belts. If I remember correctly, these are US threads rather than metric.

Wes
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Re: 356 seat belts

#10 Post by Steve Hatfield »

Wes Bender wrote:
Harold Singh wrote:Interesting. If I remember correctly, these are US threads rather than metric.

Wes
Correct: 7/16 20 thread 356 T-6s only.
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Steve Hatfield
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Re: 356 seat belts

#11 Post by Steve Hatfield »

Here is a photo of my factory seatbelts per my cars Kardex.
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Harold Singh
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Re: 356 seat belts

#12 Post by Harold Singh »

Wes Bender wrote:
Harold Singh wrote:Interesting. I'll be looking into this soon. I wont feel so bad adding belts to my 64C original floors now that I know that any dealer could have done that when new.
Harold, I can't tell from your post if you are contemplating drilling holes and mounting brackets for the belts in your "C". If that is the case, don't drill any holes until you pull up the rear rubber mats. You should find threaded holes at the rear that will accept the proper eyes for the belts. If I remember correctly, these are US threads rather than metric.

Wes
Thanks Wes!
Harold
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Re: 356 seat belts

#13 Post by gary kaneb »

Does anyone make the Porsche logo that went on theses Hickock belts? It isn't the round one use on the 1965 911.

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Re: 356 seat belts

#14 Post by Dick Weiss »

The worst seatbelt anchors were done thru the floor and the underside of the chassis didn't look good--especially if no reinforcements were added to the thin floor; I've corrected several incorrect mountings that were thru the rear rubber mats and even UINDER the seats! The best location was introduced in the BT6 & C @ the low corner of the rear vertical bulkhead and floor using the threaded anchors welded into the corner, OR thru holes w/a reinforcement (short piece of angle iron) and washers w/nuts. Then came the early 911/912s w/their anchors too high/near the top of the rear bulkhead which tightened wrongly above your hips and located around your stomach! A factory bulletin was issued to relocate the belt ends lower for proper angle.
You can find the belt anchor mountings--including the 3-point location, in the 356 B/C shop manual.

Dick

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Re: 356 seat belts

#15 Post by Christian Guthrie »

Dick Weiss wrote:The worst seatbelt anchors were done thru the floor and the underside of the chassis didn't look good--especially if no reinforcements were added to the thin floor; I've corrected several incorrect mountings that were thru the rear rubber mats and even UINDER the seats! The best location was introduced in the BT6 & C @ the low corner of the rear vertical bulkhead and floor using the threaded anchors welded into the corner, OR thru holes w/a reinforcement (short piece of angle iron) and washers w/nuts. Then came the early 911/912s w/their anchors too high/near the top of the rear bulkhead which tightened wrongly above your hips and located around your stomach! A factory bulletin was issued to relocate the belt ends lower for proper angle.
You can find the belt anchor mountings--including the 3-point location, in the 356 B/C shop manual.

Dick
The factory installed seat belts in my A cab were installed much the same way as the T-6. They are in the vertical area below the seatbottoms using the u-bolts pictured above and a thick reinforcement plate joining the bolts on the back side of the vertical support.
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