Thread: Stuee's 101 Rebuild

Originally Posted by bacicat

... Just have to find some decent canvas seat covers now to cover them up as they look bloody terrible....

I have black canvas seat covers from supercheap on mine.

Well forked out what was left of my spending money on a pair of Puma front seats. The wheel carrier will have to wait now but this was cheaper than buying one after-market seat or ordering in new seats from the UK. The seats have a sticker saying they are from 2012 so reasonably new. A big thanks to Brute (Ian) who measured up his Puma seats for me and compared them to the defender seats he has in his 101.

Pic of the drivers seat mostly fitted, the white specs are noise from the tablet camera but there are some grease marks on the seat base I will try and clean out. Let me know if you know how I can actually do this. Thinking some foam type cleaner and a sponge?? Time to ring mum!


No new holes required, they just use 4 of the original 8 holes and use the inboard holes on both sides. I'll plug the left over holes with some stainless bolts.


You do sit lower in the seats so may raise them as suggested by Brute.

I'll fit the passenger seat tomorrow and take it for a drive but they already feel more supportive and look pretty cool too

Also the 101 is back on the road, new apportioning valve and fantastic brakes again. I'll pull the old apportioning valve apart later and see if this rebuild kit will be any good.

edit* Now no more sweaty back when driving!!!

Option 1. Very hot soapy water.. Should soften and disperse the grease.. Stain will prob still be there though. Option 2.. Brakelean.. Evaporates quickly but disperses oils and grease. Shouldn't affect the material, but try a little on an unseen piece and check it does not dissolve the foam underneath too!

Well I think the Puma seats have been one of the best purchases so far. The 101 is now a pleasure to drive, the seats are a lot more comfortable, cooler (temperature wise that is ) to sit in, and hold you in place better as well. I gave them a good test while putting the 101 to work taking a couple of loads to the tip trying to use up my council vouchers.

I've also started reconsidering the second battery and thinking more along the lines of a National Luna portable battery box instead - but using my own electronics. The 101 is only ever going to be a fun car and the next family car will probably be something super exciting like a Prado which would probably get used for the longer trips away so I don't really want to have to invest in a second dual battery system down the track. Still plenty of time to think about it while I save some money up again.

For the dual battery Stu, why not just put two batteries in the standard battery compartment and use a simple Redarc type isolator? That way you can have the advantages of a dual battery system with minimum cost and very little installation effort required. (Mine has two batteries in the comartment but uses a charge controller because of the Solar panels).

Your seats look great. I love the comfort of the Defender seats in the 101. I had no comfort issues at all on the drive across from Melbourne even when we pulled a 24 hour stint from Bordertown to Perth! (Sharing the driving of course). I have thought of lifting mine slightly on some runners so the lack of a sun visor isn't so much of an issue at times. It was difficult on occasions coming across the Nullabor in the late afternoon until it started raining. (Then I was wanting a raincoat instead)

Anyway, I'm visiting here because I need to troll through your rear brake issues and see if there's a hidden clue for me.

Yep, a second battery fits in the standard compartment easily. I didn't even put a dual battery controller in mine - just a switch to isolate the cranking battery, which in reality I've never used and just use the 2 batteries together. There's a solar panel on the roof of the 101 which keeps them both fully charged while I'm not suing the 101. When camping, I can run the caravan, or the engel, or both all weekend and still easily start the car afterwards.

Only problem with second battery in the box is that all my electrics are in next to the battery. I started building a portable battery box but other jobs have sidetracked me for now. One lesson learnt is the 120ah battery is really to big for a portable battery box. I used to be able to lift 30-40kg quite easily, now its a bit of a strain, so the portable box wont be very portable.

Originally Posted by JayBoRover

Your seats look great. I love the comfort of the Defender seats in the 101. I had no comfort issues at all on the drive across from Melbourne even when we pulled a 24 hour stint from Bordertown to Perth! (Sharing the driving of course). I have thought of lifting mine slightly on some runners so the lack of a sun visor isn't so much of an issue at times. It was difficult on occasions coming across the Nullabor in the late afternoon until it started raining. (Then I was wanting a raincoat instead)

Anyway, I'm visiting here because I need to troll through your rear brake issues and see if there's a hidden clue for me.

I find the lack of sun visor okay, they seem to be higher than the factory seats which were a pain when the sun was in your eyes. I find it a bit of a pain at traffic lights as I often have to duck my head to see them properly, if the sun is in my eyes I just sit more upright.

On my breaks I'm fairly confident that the old apportioning valve with built in air breathers was the fault in my system although Lifestyle 4x4 did the final bleeding after I spat the dummy at it. The few weeks of use prior to the booster giving up the ghost must've been the final nail in the coffin because by the time it was replaced it was leaking pretty bad.