Saddleworx Foam Base

Foam has earned a bad rep mostly by the way that it is used by the OEM manufacturers. I recently visited the Harley Dealership and while I was there I sat on my model of bike with the original seat. My first impression was "wow this is comfortable". The power of soft foam! I had to think back to what started me reworking these seats. I distinctly remember the problem started within the hour of my first ride home with my shiny new bike. The chrome backrest was digging in, my seat was getting hot on a cool 45f March day, my thighs felt like they where doing all the work of holding my body up. I ripped that seat apart after about one week! The key to one of the problems with this seat can be seen by looking at the bottom of the saddle. You will see the unevenness. This leads to different compression rates, in effect the same as using different density of foam in all the wrong places. After riding for a while the foam collapses and you are sitting on that shape.

saddle2.JPG (68025 bytes) FLSTS Saddle
(see note1)

There is 7 points to make this a comfortable saddle.

	Add a factory backrest. The high one. This will take 10-25% pressure off the butt. I say factory because I don't offer one.
	Level the bumps in the base. The base is the most important part for a thinly (2-3") padded seat.
	Reshape the bottom into a tractor seat shape.
	Create a hexagon shape for maximum support of tail bone. Check out that spine in the chiropractors office and you will see how the tail bone tucks under on an angle when you sit. It should also hold your backbone slightly curved forward.
	Make the seating area as wide as possible to spread the load.
	Then use a variety of foam densities in even layers with firmest on the bottom and softest on the top.
	Not everybody is bothered by heat but if you are there is no substitute for suede.

Seat Analysis

HOW1.gif (948 bytes) Picture 1 is a cross section of the bottom
and also across the top end of the back

HOW2.gif (1202 bytes) Picture 2 is a top down view from the right side with black being
the low spots, red the high.

HOW3.gif (1063 bytes) Picture 3 is a side view and shows how the seating position was back so far that the rear had very little padding and the bottom had so much it would let you sink in until you bottomed out on the back end.
(top curved red line is your butt and thigh)

HOW4.gif (1115 bytes) Picture 4 is also a side view and shows our modifications of slightly lowering seating position and moving the butt forward.

Picture 5 is a front view and shows how we where able to increase width of seat internally by leveling bottom (the blue line) and create a tractor seat shape.

Note 1: This seat was a challenge because we had the limits of the valance and the "V" shape of the bottom seat frame.
The valance actually follows the line of the original seat but rather than contour up and over. I wanted the seating area to be as large as possible so I went straight up and out from the edge of the valance.

Note 2; We have experimented with gel and if you only have 1/2 of space, gel would be the padding of choice. I would consider it to be the same as a high density foam in a thinner package. I feel it holds too much heat sitting in the sun. The other point is that it is heavy.

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