As you might have seen from my hello post in the general forum, I bought some second hand half leather cooper seats to replace my worn out cloth front seats. I couldn't find any posts on here or other mini forums on how to take the front seats apart so I will try to make a tutorial!
Firstly you need to take the seats out of the car.
1: This will also involve disconnecting the seat belt pre-tensioner and seat airbags so make sure you turn the ignition off. (other guides also say to disconnect the battery and leave the car for 15 mins. I didn't do that and I didn't have any problems with my airbag warning light when I put the seats back in. You should probably disconnect the battery).
2: Look under the seat from the front, you will see a yellow (airbag) plug and a blue (seatbelt pre-tensioner) plug, unplug these by pressing the small tab in the middle of them and pull out.
3: Slide the seats back and using a T40 bit on your ratchet (for the 1st gen mini, not sure if this will be different for the 2nd gen), unscrew the front bolts. Once taken out, slide the seat forward and do the rear bolts.
You should now be able to lift out the seat.
Removing the runners:
First take off the seat belt pre-tensioner:
1: Start from the rear of the seat, seat belt side. You will need a t50 bit to remove it. Once removed, be careful not to let it swing around, you don't want to damage the electrical cable.
2: Take off the plastic side panels:
2a: Remove the plastic cover over the hight adjuster
2b: Remove the two t25(I think can't remember) screws. They are the holes on the top and bottom left of the picture. The handle should then just pull off.
2c: You will see 2 metal clips in the metal frame, one at the front of the plastic surround one in the middle. You might need to push the seat foam to see the middle one. I used a gentle persuader to punch them out (a hammer).
2d: Unclip the plastic plug at the rear of the cover. As I don't have one of those leaver tools I used some needle nosed pliers, making sure that each side of the plug had a leg of the pliers to make sure it support it properly.
2e: You will need to make sure the seat is in a more reclined position to be able to pull the leg out from under the seat hinge.
Note: There is a plastic clip on the hight adjustment side
You can see where it hooks over the frame here:
3: You should be able to take out the cable for the seatbelt pre-tensioner now.
4: You need to unhook this cable:
5: And pull out the plastic stop thing (yes that is a technical term, in my head at least)
6: In between the U shaped bracket the seatbelt was screwed two t40 screws, undo them on both the left and right hand side. Put the screws somewhere safe and in order (the ones with the rubber surround go at the very rear of the seat).
7: Remove the handle that lets the seat move backwards/forwards, it should pull out quite easily.
8: Now you can swing the runners around so you can get at the two front bolts and the runners should be free.
