INSTALLING A SEAT SWIVEL IN AN AIRSTREAM INTERSTATE

During the course of our lithium battery upgrade, we migrated our coach battery out from underneath our cab passenger seat in our 2007 Airstream Interstate, which finally allowed us to install a seat swivel.  I ordered ours from David at Sprinter Parts Depot (great service! immediate delivery!).  The instructions that come with the swivel unit are clear and the installation is simple, but here's a few pics anyway.

Think of this job as sorta being like inserting a piece of cheese into an existing ham sandwich.  You remove the seat from the base (six screw holes visible above) and insert the swivel device between the two.

Incidentally, that's a piece of black coroplast that I inserted over the old battery chamber at the bottom of this void space.  The seat has a side access panel (at the passenger door), and I wanted a nice flat surface on which to store items, so a rectangle of coroplast seemed like a good place to start.     

There's the piece of cheese - the swivel unit.  The release handle points toward the passenger door.

Literally this is just a matter of unscrewing the seat, inserting the unit, attaching the seat to the unit using the original screws, and attaching the unit to the base using the provided screws.

Edit:  I suppose I should be calling those things bolts. 

It's so easy you can scratch your dog while installing it.  

And here are a few money shots.

When swiveled backwards to face the rear of the van, some sort of a foot rest will be needed.  Here I'm using the six Valterra stackers that did not get added to my under-chassis storage rack. I retained these inside the van for quick, shallow stacks.  And now they do double-duty as a foot stool.  

I actually prefer the new, slightly-higher seat (about 2 inches).  I'm 5'6" and it actually puts my feet in a more comfortable position up against the cab floor incline. 

I wasn't the only one who was pleased with this new addition.

Our dog immediately figured that this was an optimal arrangement for giving canine kisses.  

Next I will devise some kind of a holder for my morning tea to go with this, because this really is a better option than sitting on the couch, especially when one's spouse is still sleeping on it, which mine tends to do.

That's me on the left, and my hubster on the right.