Adding Rear Headrests

My kids are getting older now and one has outgrown the UK car seat height. Soon, she'll have her head above the rear seat and I'm worried about safety should we be involved in a collision - Whiplash isn't fun. I discovered that some Mk3 Golfs have rear headrests, but mine didnt. I found a donor GL model in the scrapyard but the upholstry didn't match.

Here's how I did it…

This rear seat came from a Golf GL Mk3. It is important to get one *with* the headrests, even if the cover does not match (you'll see why later)

The front headrests from a car with black seats. Not a perfect match for my current interior but it will do for now, and besides, I plan to re-cover all the seats with dark suede or something similar. The T-shaped black components are the guide sleeves, already removed from the donor seat (pics below).

This picture illustrates why it is essential to get a rear seat back *complete with headrests*. The front headrests have curved prongs, which will not fit in the rear seat guides.

The part you will want is the silver frame. As you can see I have opened up the donor seat back. I forgot to take pictures of how to open the seat back but it is pretty easy - the edges of the seat cover are sewn into plastic strips that clip into the seat back *from behind*. Simply pull them out. I always left the top edge in place - it is not necessary to remove it and it will locate the cover correctly during reassembly. Unscrew the frame, and keep the screws safe.

Before trying to remove the metal frame, you want to pull these black plastic guides out. Do not pry or yank on them, they are clipped in. If you look under the frame, you will see the clip.

Push the clips in, and withdraw the plastic guides one at a time. Once removed, the frame can also be removed.

Next, unhook the fabric from the headrests.

The unhooked covere

Now peel back the cover like this. The stitching is strong and will take this.

The nude headrest. Now do the same to your donor front headrests and then reverse the process and put the fabric onto the denuded rear headrests.

My back seat before… It is not necessary to remove the seat in order to fit the new headrests. Unclip the seat cover as earlier on the donor seat back - you can use the donor for practice!

My back seat with all but the top edge of the seat cover unhooked. Note the screw holes (highlighted in green) were already present in my seat. likewise, the seat foam padding was already shaped to fit headrests. They simply were not fitted in the factory.

The headrest metal frame fitted into place. It's pretty difficult to screw this up.

After re-fitting the seat cover *and making very sure it was straight and had no odd lumps* I located the top of the metal frame by pushing with my finger.

Having found the spot, I used a sharp knife to cut a V-shaped hole (similar to VWs original on the donor seat) I started a little off-centre towards the back, as I think errors will be less likely to show - the fabric at the front gets more stress and will stretch more.

The incision. I recommend trying to follow the pattern of the fabric, as this may help prevent tearing.

Trial fittment. If yours looks like this then the hole you have cut is not big enough. Usually the guide will not lock in place when this happens. If it does, dont panic - simply grip the fabric both sides, but behind the guide, and firmly pull it toward the rear of the car. It should settle and be flush with the guide. Worst case, undo the seat cover and start again.

Guides fitted (the left one I adjusted the fabric around a little after this shot, and it now sits perfectly flush with the fabric.

If you follow the above carefully, then you should get something like this. Enjoy!