Seat modifications.

I bought a new seat for my 72 commando interstate. It is a nice stock seat, fits nice, but I'd like to trim about an inch off of the front half. There use to be a place that you could send your seat for modifications. It was called Spencer seats: www.greatdaytoride.com.
The ink is not valid any longer. I heard many good things about the place, and was wondering if anyone knows where they went, or if there is another place?

Why not remove the ears by drilling out the welds and then bolting the ears on 1" to the front. This will move the whole seat back and no cutting of the base or cover required other than the ear welds. I did the opposite to move the seat 1.5" forward to suit an Interpol tank.

He's probably talking about trimming the height down.

A lot of small business people don't pay attention when their domain renews and lose it.
I don't do FB, he may be there.
I found this info.
May try calling.

"For more information contact Spencers Motorcycle Seat Mods, 878 SW 36th Terrace, Palm City, Florida 34990; (772) 418-9712; www.greatdaytoride.com "

When I was transitioning my roadster to interstate trim, I cut down my roadster seat myself, so I would have a seat to use while I shopped for an interstate seat. It's not that hard to cut the seat down. I removed the seat cover, measured carefully and reworked the pan to fit. Then I cut and restitched the cover using a "speedy stitcher". In my case the seat was temporary until I could get a real interstate seat. The cut down roadster seat looked terribly small to my eye because I had to cut 2 inches off of the front of the seat because the smaller offset of my early model steering yokes made me have to pull the interstate tank backward which shortened the seat even more...

The combination of all the modifications I did added up, so it took me a long time to get my interstate configuration set. Your modification, if you chose to do it yourself, might be easier. I really thought the larger interstate tank needed a full sized seat to look proportionate on the bike, so I was glad to get the temporary seat off the bike...

Here's an image of the speedy stitcher I used to resew the seat fabric below.

10drum said:

I bought a new seat for my 72 commando interstate. It is a nice stock seat, fits nice, but I'd like to trim about an inch off of the front half. There use to be a place that you could send your seat for modifications. It was called Spencer seats: www.greatdaytoride.com.
The ink is not valid any longer. I heard many good things about the place, and was wondering if anyone knows where they went, or if there is another place?

Click to expand...

Just to confirm you want to trim an inch off the height or length?

swooshdave said:

Just to confirm you want to trim an inch off the height or length?

Click to expand...

Hieght

10drum said:

Hieght

Click to expand...

Ok, big difference. Almost any decent upholstery shop should be able to do that. Or you can if you want. Take off cover. Take off inch from bottom of the foam and then reinstall the cover, it will be too long but it can be trimmed. The foam may be old and uncooperative, so new foam may need to be procured.

I assume you are "inseam challenged"? Plenty of people have had to deal with adjusting the height. There should be more than a few posts here about how best to tackle it.

Also, may consider narrowing it, or sloping or reshaping it some.
Lots of things can be done.

Not a hard job to do yourself I did a mod to my interstate seat to fit my Wideline Featherbed changing the position of the ears as well cutting down the foam on the front of the seat i also replaced the seat cover with a new one from Burtons Bike Bits it came with new clips and and strip around the bottom of the seat, it was easy to pull the new seat cover over the mod foam and used glue and the clips once all on trimed, i welded the ears on the base to the right position for the Featherbed when the base was pulled apart.

Ashley

Thanks for the replies. I called the number MichealB found, and left a voice mail. The answer did not indicate it was Spencer seats??

As for doing it myself, paint and upholstery is not my forte'. I do great on engines, gearboxes, suspensions, and electrics. Upholstery shop are few and far between in my neighborhood, sort of a lost art.

10drum said:

Thanks for the replies. I called the number MichealB found, and left a voice mail. The answer did not indicate it was Spencer seats??

As for doing it myself, paint and upholstery is not my forte'. I do great on engines, gearboxes, suspensions, and electrics. Upholstery shop are few and far between in my neighborhood, sort of a lost art.

Click to expand...

I am no expert in upholstery and my seat mod was the first time I ever done one and was surprised in how easy it was, its like anything take your time, think about it and just be careful pulling the old clips off as will spring off if not careful and when cutting the foam use a sharp knife and take little cuts at a time, a small hammer or tack hammer to tap the clips back on, I used a small flat blade screw driver to remove the clips.

Ashley

ashman said:

I am no expert in upholstery and my seat mod was the first time I ever done one and was surprised in how easy it was, its like anything take your time, think about it and just be careful pulling the old clips off as will spring off if not careful and when cutting the foam use a sharp knife and take little cuts at a time, a small hammer or tack hammer to tap the clips back on, I used a small flat blade screw driver to remove the clips.

Ashley

Click to expand...

Ashman,

I am speaking from experience. I suck at painting, and upholstery. Some task are better farmed out. Thats why people bring me their bikes to wire.

Find a pro to do it. I recall Jim Comstock mentioning that having the foam sculpted on his seat improved the comfort factor greatly. There's gotta be some upolsterer near you who's done a bunch of motorcycle seats. I'd call around to motorcycle shops and see if they recommend someone...

I have so many projects to do, I figure I should concentrate on the ones I am either good at or enjoy and try to farm out the rest.

However, just for the sake of conversation...

The seat covers are clipped on. All one does to remove the seat cover is pry the clips apart and pull them off. Then the foam could be cut on the bottom, the side toward the pan. By trimming the bottom, it is easier to hide any poor cuts. I bought an old electric carving knife for using on foam. It did not cost much and does a neat job. The best cut will be done by rigging up a fence to keep the blade parallel to the edge of the foam being cut. Then it is just a matter of pulling the seat cover back on and maybe some new clips.

Here is the how to from Old Britts: http://www.oldbritts.com/seat_inst.html

rvich said:

I have so many projects to do, I figure I should concentrate on the ones I am either good at or enjoy and try to farm out the rest.

However, just for the sake of conversation...

The seat covers are clipped on. All one does to remove the seat cover is pry the clips apart and pull them off. Then the foam could be cut on the bottom, the side toward the pan. By trimming the bottom, it is easier to hide any poor cuts. I bought an old electric carving knife for using on foam. It did not cost much and does a neat job. The best cut will be done by rigging up a fence to keep the blade parallel to the edge of the foam being cut. Then it is just a matter of pulling the seat cover back on and maybe some new clips.

Here is the how to from Old Britts: http://www.oldbritts.com/seat_inst.html

Click to expand...

Getting the clips off these seats is that hardest part I reckon. The rest is just care. Somebody (not me) modified the seat on mine by, like you say, cutting the bottom. Probably about an inch it think. It keeps the nice smooth finish on top and if you make a blunder on the bottom you can just glue a bit back in and start again

I posted these a few years ago. As I am also "inseam" challenged I made my own seat. While the seat accomplished what I needed I was never able to get the final upholstery to look like it wasn't done by an amateur. So I went back to the original seat.

Art