Installing PRP Comp Elite Seats

I have been sitting on PRP Daily Driver seats for over 11 years now and decided the time was right to upgrade to larger seats. Over those 11 years, I had gained a pound or two, and the Daily Driver seats were starting to fit snugly. So, it was time to upgrade.

If you head over to the PRP website, you can get lost in all the options of different types and styles of seats. I have many friends with PRP seats, so over the years, when I saw a different style, I would ensure I sat in their seats to see if I liked it. 

I knew I didn’t need to recline, so the Enduro Elites were out. But one cool thing that PRP now offers when it comes to the Enduro is they offer four different styles you can choose from depending on how aggressive you want the side bolsters to be. I wanted to go back with something other than the Daily Driver’s, even if it was a great seat. One of my friends installed the Comp Elite’s in his LJ, and I knew I had to try them out. Once I sat in his Jeep, I knew those were the seats I wanted. 

If you have ever looked for seats on the PRP website, you will notice that you can make just about any seat in any color and with any options. It really is endless. After digging a little and asking a PRP rep, I found that the least customizable seat still has over 45,000 different options. The Premier seat, the most average seat, has over 2 billion combinations on the website. This is one of the reasons why I love PRP seats. Almost impossible to have the same seat as anyone else, unless they love yours and copy it. 

Now that I had chosen which seats to order, it was time to figure out the combination I wanted for the new PRP Comp Elite. After configuring it a thousand different ways, I finally decided to go ahead and get the extra wide and extra tall and added the heated seats. Figured if I was going to order new seats, get exactly what I wanted. Now, it was time to wait. 

Thankfully, the seats came reasonably quickly. PRP has done a great job in speeding up custom orders, and the new seats showed up a little more than two months after ordering. When you decide to get new seats, do your research on your specific vehicle to ensure you know what you need to install them correctly. Jeep Wranglers are pretty simple overall, and my LJ was no exception. What would make it easier for me was that I already had PRP seats in the Jeep that I installed 10+ years ago. 

Regarding the TJ/LJ platform, a basic bracket can be bought from PRP to add the seats to the stock seat mounts. I remember how hard it was to remove the stock seat mount from the stock seat. I do not remember the procedure, but it sucked. Just take the time to disassemble the two to add the bracket and new seat. Once you have the two parts separated, you can go ahead and mount the seat bracket and then the seat. I ordered the extra wide option with the new seats, which adds 2 inches to the width. Therefore, it also adds two inches to the mounting. When I pulled the old seats out and took them off, I noticed the new seats were two inches wider. After looking at both passenger and driver side brackets, I realized I could swap one from each side to make them the width I needed. I was afraid I would have to build custom brackets, but thankfully, I didn’t need to. 

Each seat has twelve bolts to attach. Four, mount the seat to the bracket. Another four mount the bracket to the stock seat slider. The last four mount the seat slider to the Jeep itself. To make it all mount correctly, you will need to mount the PRP bracket to the stock slider first before you mount the seat to the bracket. If you do, it really makes it easier to get the bracket on after the seat is mounted to the bracket. Now that the seat is attached to the whole system, it is time to fit it inside the Jeep. PRP does warn everyone that with the wide seat, you may need to modify the inside of your Jeep. This is what I had to do with my Jeep. I removed the center console to make it all happy. The outside of each seat barely touches my cage as it slides front to the back. I will build a custom center console one day, but for now, I will leave the stock one out. 

Now that the seats are in and everything clears, it’s time to wire in the heated seats. I have always hated wiring. It always seems like such a large job and complicated. When it boils down to it, wiring is actually simple: power and ground. Now, I need to figure out where and how I want to make that happen. 

At first, I thought about putting all the wiring into the fuse block area in the dash. After thinking about it for a while and looking over it, I asked a friend who mentioned he had wired into his S-pod. I have an S-Tech system to control my lockers and lights and only had one spot open. I decided to go ahead and wire in both seats to the one open slot. PRP sends you a whole wiring harness that is really nice and definitely makes it simpler to wire in. They also include an on/off switch. I went ahead and wired in both seats to the S-Tech, and I left the on/off switch next to each seat. To make it work, you will need to turn the power on and then turn on each seat. I will probably move the switches to a central location, but for now, I will leave them near each seat where it is easy to reach. 

PRP makes many different seats and many different options within each of those seats. If you can not find what you are looking for, not sure you will ever find it. From racing seats to bench seats, PRP has it all.