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Rebuilding Pillow-Top Seat on '06 RSV Thanks to Jake (jakenator6) Hannon for this excellent tech article. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image003.jpg http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image004.jpg After about 8000 miles, the seat on my RSV was beginning to give me some severe discomfort. I felt, since it had been comfortable earlier, the foam might be breaking down a bit. The pressure point was exactly in the back center, right where the tailbone resides. My decision was to rebuild the seat with more of a dished out saddle effect and put firmer foam in place. Attached are photos and description of what I did. Starting point was to get a photo of the seat before I started removing things. Always useful when putting things back together. First job was removing the staples. Easily accomplished with a flat bladed screwdriver and pliers. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image007.jpg http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image008.jpg The seat cover is held onto the foam with pull-through fasteners seen above. These are easily removed with some needle nosed pliers but some care needs to be taken as they are not exactly robust. Grab one side of the metal clip, pull up to get some slack, and push it through the center hole of the plastic washer. Once the cover is off, use the needle nosed pliers to push the fastener through the foam. I think there were 9 of these. The vinyl cover is now separated from the seat. The seat pan is also pictured. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image011.jpg http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image012.jpg The soft, white foam on top will need to be pulled off. It was glued to the denser foam but take your time and they can be separated into reusable condition. I was not planning to reuse the soft cover and was planning some surgery on the denser foam so I was not as meticulous as I could have been. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image015.jpg http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image016.jpg I used the removed soft top as a template and cut a new pillow from much denser foam 1" thick. In hindsight, I would still use the denser foam but only 1/2" thick. The old foam was so soft it compressed easily and gave the seat it's puffy look. The new foam compressed very little and was the dickens to get the cover stretched back over. Putting those stringed fasteners back through is a job that is guaranteed to test your mettle. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image019.jpg http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image020.jpg Based upon the recommendation from this site, I used a flap disc on a drill to start reshaping the seat. The right picture above is how things had progressed with this tool. It really did some smooth work but my plan was to remove a lot more foam so I resorted to an electric carving knife. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image023.jpg http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image024.jpg The above photos show most of the knife work. I took the rear center of the seat down almost 3" since I planned to build it up with some really stiff 1/2" foam as a base. From the center back, I taper it up to give a smooth dished saddle shape. This was way past the point of no return. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image027.jpg http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image028.jpg I used some 1/2" foam rubber intended for flooring in play rooms. A little puzzle work and some spray adhesive got things stuck in place. I had also carved out a niche for the backrest piece you see in the above right picture. I really wanted some more support at the back and to spread my weight to the wider parts of my posterior. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image031.jpg http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image032.jpg Some more knife work and spray adhesive and the new pillow top was ready for recovering. http://www.venturerider.org/seat/image034.jpg Getting the cover back on will take two people, more patience than I had, and some needle nosed vice grips. The plastic seat base is hard and stapling takes even more patience. How's it work? Pretty good I must say. I've put in two 300 miles days and the pressure point in the center is gone. The built up back rest is largely negated by all that 1" foam (pillow stuff), but it is still an improvement. If you're not happy with how your seat feels, changing it is within the tool capacity of most of us. I wouldn't hesitate to try it again but right now I'm OK with what I have.
