What thickness of foam is suggested to restore a 30's Troxel Seat?

[popawheelie]

I went to buy foam to restore an old long spring saddle, but they have 1/4" thick and 1/2" thick foam. Which is the most often used thickness by the real good seat restorers? I'll use the very dense foam, the type that you can sand to form it.
Seems like 1/2" would be more difficult to use.....but would be better in comfort.

Any suggestions?

Mike at [email protected]

 

[rebirthbikes]

Hey Mike

I was just looking into this myself... I happened across a website that gives detailed instructions on how to recover a long spring saddle.

http://www.bunchobikes.com/repair2.htm

It's actually incredibly thorough and he even tells you what type of foam he uses, he bevels the edge and then it goes on and on.

hope this helps,
judd

 

[abe lugo]

I used 3/4" but your supposed to use 1/2" foam, I would not recommend the yellowish-white upholstery it eventually gets flat and useless. Worst case get a yoga mat, it about 1/2" thick. I used a black dense foam called ensolite, some people claim not to use it but it works great, my butt don't hurt after a ride. It's priced by the foot but you'll be able to do about 6 seats.
http://foammart.com/closed-cell/ensolite/

For the leather I used theleatherguyofmn on ebay, bought a skin and it was about enough to do two saddles. I like his sales as he shows the actual pieces your going to get as opposed to a stock photo

As far as shaping the foam, I used an 80 grit wheel on an air die grinder- care not to cut in too quickly.

I used Dan Tack upholstery spray glue to get the leather down on the foam, BTW I glued the foam to the pan, shaped it, then laid the leather down and around the edge. make sure to bend the foam over the edge and shape it down or blend it.

Here are my pics, I actually don't know what seat brand this is, but it's a wider one and was comfortable without anything, even more so now. I didn't have wear tabs, but who cares.

 

[popawheelie]

Restoring a seat

I was just looking into this myself... I happened across a website that gives detailed instructions on how to recover a long spring saddle.

http://www.bunchobikes.com/repair2.htm

It's actually incredibly thorough and he even tells you what type of foam he uses, he bevels the edge and then it goes on and on.

hope this helps,
judd

That link is great. Thank you so much. If your hardware is rusty, you can have it metallized or Cadium plated, since the rest of the seat metal looks 100%.

 

[popawheelie]

Seat Recovering

I used 3/4" but your supposed to use 1/2" foam, I would not recommend the yellowish-white upholstery it eventually gets flat and useless. Worst case get a yoga mat, it about 1/2" thick. I used a black dense foam called ensolite, some people claim not to use it but it works great, my butt don't hurt after a ride. It's priced by the foot but you'll be able to do about 6 seats.
http://foammart.com/closed-cell/ensolite/

For the leather I used theleatherguyofmn on ebay, bought a skin and it was about enough to do two saddles. I like his sales as he shows the actual pieces your going to get as opposed to a stock photo

As far as shaping the foam, I used an 80 grit wheel on an air die grinder- care not to cut in too quickly.

I used Dan Tack upholstery spray glue to get the leather down on the foam, BTW I glued the foam to the pan, shaped it, then laid the leather down and around the edge. make sure to bend the foam over the edge and shape it down or blend it.

Here are my pics, I actually don't know what seat brand this is, but it's a wider one and was comfortable without anything, even more so now. I didn't have wear tabs, but who cares.

Well Thank you, your reply answers a lot of questions. I've heard that getting the Glue from Tandy is best because they sell some that allows you to set it all up, peel the material back to take out a kink, then stretch it and bond the two materials back together. I know that standard Contact cement does not allow you to go back and re-stretch once you've bonded the two materials.