Seat Belt Retractable 3-Point With Chrome Push Button Front Pair Coupe 1965-1967/Convertible 1965-1973

We often mention safety benefits in a lot of the installation videos that we do. Let's be honest. In the last 50 years, safety's obviously come a long way. Unfortunately, it's not feasible to add an ABS braking system or airbags to your classic Mustang, but there are a lot of places, such as the braking system and lighting, that can be easily improved to make your Mustang a lot more safe to drive.

One area that's very easy to upgrade is going to be the factory seat belts. While lap belts may have been acceptable back in the '60s, by today's standards, they just don't do a good job keeping the driver or passenger in the seat in case of an accident, so today we're going to show you how to remove your lap belts and upgrade to a modern 3-point seatbelt. The gear we're going to be installing will work in your '64 through '73 Coupe, convertible, or Fastback. We're going to show you today how to install them using our '65 Mustang Coupe.

They're available in all of your factory colors. It's a complete kit for both driver and passenger and includes all hardware necessary for installation. For this installation, we had a Phillips head screwdriver, right-angle Phillips head bit driver, 2.5 millimeter Allen key, 16 millimeter wrench, 3/8 ratchet, 19 millimeter deep socket, 16 millimeter deep socket, 16 millimeter shallow socket, 5/8 socket, short extension, drill, 5/32 drill bit, 15/32 drill bit, rivet gun, marker, and safety glasses.

For your '64 through '67 Coupe or Fastback, as well as a '64 through '73 convertible, your anchor point's going to be right up here. From '68 on, they actually did have a shoulder-belt option, so you'll have an anchor point in the ceiling for your third point. Your seatbelt's going to be designed for front use, but you can actually use them in the rear, as well. You simply mount the retractors to the rear deck. The first part of the installation is to remove our factory seatbelts.

Since we do have to remove the quarter trim panel for installation, our next step is to remove the back seat. We pull up on the bottom cushion. The car should have two bolts holding the bottoms in. In our case, they're missing. Once you remove those bolts, just pull out and take it upward. Now remove the window handle. One retaining screw here, I'm just going to loosen that up, and it'll pop right off. Remove all the screws that are holding the quarter trim panel. Once the quarter trim is loose, remove the last two screws from your doorsill plate. Then pull off the wind lace.

This is a factory hole you're going to find in all models. This is where we're actually going to drill for our top anchor point. You can start on the inside. You're going to drill this through. Then we'll have to reinstall the quarter trim panel and line it up from the other side and drill through our quarter trim panel. Make sure the bracket fits like it's supposed to and everything's nice and clear and it fits flush on the outside. Now we can reinstall our quarter trim panel. We'll drill that next. While it may seem like overkill, I suggest putting a couple of the screws in. You want to make sure the quarter trim panel's exactly where it's going to sit once fully installed so the hole's in the right place.

Quarter trim panel in place. Now we're going to drill through from the outside in. That's where our top anchor's going to go. Now we're going to pull the quarter trim panel off and drill our holes for our rivets. In theory, you could leave this together if you drill holes very shallow and are careful, but to be safe, I'm going to pull the trim panel off. First, we're going to mark the holes where the bracket goes. Now we're going to reinstall the quarter trim panel just to double check everything lines up before we put our rivets in. Everything looks good. We're ready to install our rivets.

Now we're going to remove the rest of the screws holding on our doorsill plates. We can pull the carpet back and work on the anchor for the floor. A smaller right-hand screwdriver will make quick work of the last two screws. If you don't have any way to get in there, you can remove the seat and get to them that way.

Now we're going to work on mounting the floor piece. To do that, we're going to put this piece on first. Make sure our anchor's in place. Actually, you want to put the plastic spacer on so you don't mess up your quarter panel. You want to get an idea of where it's going to go. You want to go straight down as much as possible so this doesn't bind up when you're pulling the belt through it. Right about there. That's going to be where you want it.

Now we're going to pull the carpet back. Push this aside for a second. We want to pull it out a little bit so you get the flat part on the floor. That's where it's going to go. You can't put it against the rockers. There's no way to get in there and tighten the other side, so right about there. That's the bracket supplied. We just want to drill a hole through our floor, put a washer on the bottom, and the retractor's going to mount to this piece here. We want it to sit flat, so we're going to cut the corner of this off and just get it out of the way. Right there, we'll mark our hole. We'll grab the large washer. Now we'll get the carpet back in place here. We'll cut a little slit for the bracket. Now we'll bolt the retractor to the bracket we just installed. You want to make sure the belt's not twisted.

I'm going to install the next bracket in the factory mounting hole. Then using the factory hole and factory hardware, I'll install the receiver. We want to repeat the process of the 3-point seatbelt on the other side, and we can put our interior back together. We'll start with the doorsill plates. Then we'll install our back seat. Your installation's finished.

The 3-point seatbelt is going to make our '65 Mustang much safer to drive. Keep in mind, because of the lower mounting point and the fact that they are a universal seatbelt, you will have some extra slack when the seatbelt is not connected. Overall, installation is not too bad. It should only take you around two hours. You'll be back on the road in no time.