Ok, so I’ve completed the armrest fitting on the outside of the 1+2 seats in my T6.
HERE is the obligatory warning info first.
The standard armrest fits ok-ish on the single seat ( the one with flip-up rear access ), but on the rear double seat it is an excessively tight fit against the door panel. Might just be ok in a van with standard door cards but with ply door panels and carpeting, the armrest presses heavily against the door; I would have real reservations if you have the auto-latching on the slide doors.
To get enough clearance on the double seat arm for my comfort, I ground down the arm boss and the mounting boss by about 4mm each; this gives 4mm less interference with the door card, just about ok in my OCD world.
Anyway, here’s what I hope is useful info. I’m sorry the pictures are poor and lacking. It’s a 3 handed job and swmbo was not overly keen to help.
I hope the post works, not done pic inserts before.
After a bit of passenger trial and error I settled on 63cm as the height of the armrest pivot from the door step. That turned out to be excellent, read on.
My armrests came with 2 genuine vw brackets from, I think, a T5. They were black painted 3mm steel with 3 mounting holes; 1 on its own and 2 on a bent flange.
All the following is for the armrest on the double seat ( everything is simply reversed for the single seat side )
I butchered the plate ( this is the double seat side) to get this. Take careful note of the orientation of the oblong, otherwise you will never get the armrest correctly positioned.
The lower hole is the single alone original, the upper hole I drilled at 6mm. General visual position of the hole is ok, precision isn’t critical.
On both seats, when you carefully unclip the seat cover and slide it upwards to view the frame above the hinge, you will find some very convenient holes in the seat frame
Use a short m6 bolt and a nyloc nut and bolt the plate quite tightly in place using the rearmost hole in the seat and the lower hole in my plate above. I suggest you start with the upper 6mm hole as far forwards in the recess as you can.
Now firmly bolt the armrest to the oblong boss and rotate the armrest upwards to it’s parked position. If it doesn’t fully go up to the correct parked position, push it and it should rotate the mounting plate anti-clockwise.
(if necessary loosen your nut/bolt slightly ). If the arm has parked too far back, rotate the plate clockwise.
When you have the right place, tighten the nut and bolt really tight. carefully remove the armrest , don’t let the plate move !!, and use the upper hole you earlier drilled in the plate as a guide , and drill thru the seat frame. There was nothing but foam behind where I drilled on mine, but check first by sliding your hand into the seat. Bolt and nut thru the upper hole.
When it’s done, you should have roughly this
You might have to fettle the plate shape to get exactly the right position....after this pic was taken, I had to fettle the corner near the upper bolt as you can see it’s not flat in the recess.
Now pull the foam and cover down, fasten the cover tight, and bravely use a scalpel to cut the seat cover around the boss and bolt on your armrest. if you have fabric seat covers, there’s a thread covering hole making with a hot copper pipe.
You can see in this pic where I ground down the boss and the armrest pivot to get better door clearance.
Bolt the armrest back on, and you have this.
Next step, get armrest covers made to match the seats.... and find a polythene washer to put between the seat and arm pivot to protect the leather a bit.
Any questions, I’ll do my best to answer.
