Regarding posts #22-24, I finally figured out how to remove the seat lever's lock ring without destroying the garnish. I've got a spare set of seats now with very poor leather but excellent garnish, so I wanted to get the latter off nicely preserved to replace my cracked ones.

The key is to pry on the inner plastic, not the outer garnish. There's a big plastic clip (just to the right of my screwdriver blade) that will release from the outside of the frame with a bit of wiggling, then you can pry it away to the inside with a couple screwdrivers. I already have the garnish off in this pic, but I used two screwdrivers, one on either side of the lever, which created enough room to get in there with a jeweler's screwdriver and push the lock ring off. No bending of the rigid outer garnish necessary.