seat swings freely back and forth

the little black lever on the rear of my seats is either broken or completely unconnected because my front seats swing freely which is very dangerous. I need help to fix this as soon as possible. thx for any info

Mine does the same thing.

anyone know how to fix this?

I assume you are talking about the front seatbacks.

In many 2-door cars the seats latch in place unless you lift a lever or some such.

In the Riviera the seats are designed to latch ONLY under very rapid deceleration. Oddly, this actually works (at least, it does in my car). I assume (but don't really know) that this was done in order to work with the electric recliners, or was done for passenger convenience. You may find that the seatbacks latch if you park on a very steep hill.

Albertj

If it ain't broke....Don't fix it.

engage the airbags when you drive.....

problem solved.

Albert is correct, that is how they were designed.

ok well my passenger seat does not lock when i hit the brakes hard. it just leans forward. if there is a passenger in the seat they are held there by the locking seat belt.
has anyone pulled apart the seat to see what could break or how the mechanism works?
or does anyone else have a passenger front seat that moves when hitting the breaks hard?

I think it may take more than hard braking to engage the lock.

whenever I brake hard enough to lose traction (slamming on the brakes) my passenger seat lock doesn't engage. so mr. riviera you're not the only one.

My bench seat does not move during sudden stops.

From 1995 Buick Riviera

Well I wonder if anyone has a definitive answer on what it is supposed to take to make the seat backs lock up? Maybe there's some info in the service manuals. Are all the 95-99 models supposed to work this way?

lionfish wrote:

My bench seat does not move during sudden stops.

But does it move freely by hand, or do you need to use the release?

If you park nose down on a *really* steep hill I think it'll lock up.
Otherwise I think it pretty much takes a collision to lock 'em up.

Albertj

lol, complaining about this? This was one reason I thought the Riv was better than other cheap garbage cars because you don't have to mess up your seat position getting in and out of the back seat. Plus, making you electrically move it forward would wear on that motor real quick. It's why I never use the Exit function (I didn't even know I had it because I never use it - no need to wear that seat motor out for no reason).

dont get me wrong, i like being able to put groceries and stuff behind me seat w/out reaching for a lever. however, i think the chair back should lock in place when i slam on the stop peddle.

i am in and out of hundreds of cars a day at work, and 90% of the coupes i get in have some kind of quick manual lever to get to the back seat. the only car that comes to mind that doesnt do this (ie you have to
push the motor button to crawl in the back) is some of the coupe BMW's, but the motor is pretty quick to move the seat.
also, the riv is the only car that has free moving seats that i have been in. all other 2 door cars lock. that is why i thought mine was broke.

I also thought mine was broken the first time I realized the latch didn't have to be moved to push the seat up. Only car I've owned that works this way. I like it, but it's weird.

Mine don't lock, but there is a lot of resistance to the seat back moving forward, so it doesn't "fling" forward during a stop. I don't know where the resistance is coming from, it kind of feels like the seat belt through the shoulder to me.

Yeah, mine doesn't exactly "swing freely", there's definite resistance when pushing it forward and it will NOT stay forward, you have to hold it. I think some or all of the resistance is the lower front seat cushion pushing into the seat bottom when it swings forward.

My driver seat used to fling back but I notice now it likes to stay forward sometimes if I don't push it back (I keep my bookbag right behind the seat). I take it's a combination of the seatbelt getting a little worn and the seat getting old too (Eh, the lumbar thing done broke in mine too). I don't believe these ever locked even when new though, the ones I've known to be like that are those cheapo two door cars because I always see them pushed forward in parking lots (Like Grand Ams, Aleros, Cavaliers, etc).

Shintsu: If your lumbar motor is still running, you can hear it when you push the paddleswitch but the lumbar does not move. If that's the case, all you have to do is take the cover off the seat and fix it - most likely it is just a broken wire and can be repaired properly with similar wire (coat hanger wire).

If motor is not running, maybe it's just the switch or wiring. Those motors don't run very often and don't work very hard.



Albertj

Albert, it happened some time back when I posted on here that I put on the emergency brake and pushing back against the seat it felt like it pushed back further into the seat. I feel like there is a plastic rack on each side and the lumbar is like a rolling pin with little rods on each side to hold it in place. I believe that I pushed back and the plastic broke from age and it is no longer being held right against my back.

This is however, just my guess of what happened. I still feel it pumping up and down, it's just farther back into the seat than it used to be. It's not a big enough issue for me to tear down the seat - just irritating that it happened.

I get it.

Sorry about the irritation.

Albertj

I have the same "problem", if this is how they came, then what is the little black lever at the bottom of the seat for?

In case you're parked on a steep downhill grade, gravity tricks the mechanism into locking up (the seat thinks you are decelerating very hard). Using the black lever will release the seat.

See albertj's reply on Page 1.