Bought my 2008 Acura TL as the second owner and have been living with some of the issues that came with the car...

One issue that I am ready to tackle is that the rear seat is loose. On the passenger side, the rear seat is tightly secured. However, the rear seat behind the driver is loose.

If I get in the backseat and pull the rear seatback forward (from the rear seat headrest), the seat pulls out about an inch or so, and I can see a relatively thin bolt that is holding it to the inch opening.

Is it easy to fix this? My guess is that I have to remove all the rear trunk garnishing and tighten a nut somewhere behind the backseat...but that's just a guess... Can anyone confirm how to do this? I don't want to remove all the rear trunk garnishing, only to find the bolt is inaccessible from that angle...

I need to fix this. If someone is sitting in the back with the pressure on the seat just right, the seatback squeals like crazy.

Has anyone experienced this problem? I hear that some people have purposely removed the bolt from both sides so that they can fold down the seats...

Thanks!

 

Check this thread out, it sounds like the bolt beneath the headrest is not tight. ?

There is a crease right below the headrest, if you stick your fingers in there, you can feel the bolt. You probably need to tighten it. I don't understand the squeak you hear, but this could resolve it.

https://acurazine.com/forums/tires-w...-091-a-816065/

Look for the pic with a wrench sticking out of the slot beneath the headrest, I believe the size of the bolt is 10mm...all you will need to do is tighten that bolt down, there is no nut on the back side.

 

There is a 10mm bolt about 3-4 inches behind the little flap where the headrest would sit if it was all the way down. You have to get an extension into there with a 10mm and tighten it up.

Best way is to take the extension and socket off the ratchet and use your hand to make sure its actually on the bolt and then start to use the ratchet. It can be a pain in the ass for sure.

 

Thanks both!

So, if I peel back the opening underneath the headrest, can I see the bolt with a flashlight? Or is it going to be a game of hide and seek?

 

OK... Tried to tighten that bolt, and there was WAY too much resistance for me to comfortably torque it down tight...

I loosened it a bit to see if there was resistance throughout the bolt threading, and there was not... The bolt comes out, and goes back in very nicely (up until the point of resistance where it is more than just a little resistance)...

I also tried to loosen and tighten the passenger side bolt just for comparison, and again...come out and went back in very smoothly without any issues...

Not sure why this bolt won't tighten up nicely...

My next step may need to be to remove the rear seats so that I can take a look at this bolt closely... According to the link provided above (and a subsequent link within that thread), that bolt should NOT be removed. I just need to loosen it so that I can lift the rear back seat off the bolt (whew...glad I didn't back either of the bolts all the way out!).

Looks like my steps are going to be:

1. Remove rear seat cushion
- Remove seat cushion bolt
- Pull seat hook knobs to "unlock" seat hooks
2. Remove rear back cushion
- Loosen upper seat back bolt (the bolt that I tried to tighten earlier)
- Remove lower seat back bolt
3. Remove set cushions

This should expose the back and allow me to remove that bolt and have a closer look at it... My guess is that it might be too long, and that's why it won't tighten all the way. My guess is that maybe one of the previous owners had to remove the seats and lost that bolt and replaced it with the wrong size... I don't know...

Before I embark on this little project I wanted to ask this community if my plan makes any sense... I don't want to over complicate this situation... I could just torque down the bolt and try and force past the resistance...but everytime I have tried to overtighten a bolt like this...it has never ended well...

Thanks all!

 

^that is odd. It's been awhile since I've had my rear seat out, but you are correct in the removal process. The rear seat back, once all bolts are undone, lifts off the bolts under the headrest like a picture frame on a wall. Even if you remove those bolts under the headrest, and they fall off of your socket wrench (they just fall under the lower cushion). Let us know how it turns out!

 

Great to hear from someone who has done this procedure before!

Is there any "short cut" I can take here? Any way for me to just take the backing off, and not have to deal with the actual bottom seat cushion? Or do I have to take everything out to get a look at that one bolt?

 

Do things properly and just remove everything.

You don't NEED to remove the headrest bolts all the way to remove the seat back.
That being said, if you do remove the bolts all the way, just put it back in when the seat back is off.
That tip you read is just to save you what - 1 minute?

Bottom seat cushion takes 2 minutes to remove.

The whole rear seat removal takes me 15 minutes.
A lot of people say it takes an hour to an hour and a half and it's a pain in the ass - it's really not.

The rear seat being able to move an INCH outwards on one side is definitely not normal.
Don't force anything. You'll end up making things worse.

Take the head rest bolts all the way out and compare the length.
Switch the driver side bolt to the passenger side and vice versa and see if it goes in and check to see if the passenger side is now loose.
If the passenger side is now loose and the driver side is now tight, you know what to do - buy a new bolt.

Like I said - no need to over complicate it - we're dealing with 5 bolts to remove the rear seat.

Good luck and report back.