Modern Vespa

After buying my fuoco it quickly became clear how bad the original seat is. One of the main problems for anybody over 5'6" is that the seat base has a rise between the driver and passenger bits so there is more room in the pet carrier.
I've used a seat from a Aprillia Habana which I've modified slightly so it sits in the pet carrier rather than on it. At the moment the seat is sitting on a block of polystyrene while I work out the optimum height, but I think that its an interesting avenue of investigation for anybody who really wants a good riding position for driver only riding.

I don't normally ride with a pillion so I don't have to worry about that. And I have a Shoei XL size helmet which doesn't fit in the pet carrier anyway so I'm not too bothered about that.

What it does let me do is sit much further back than on the bike than would be allowed with the normal seat, or any seat using the normal base...

I'm still working on the best solution, I think that I'll ditch the base of the Habana seat and use a flat plywood one, as I can feel ridges in the base through my rear.

The other thing I had to do was drill a small hole in the pet carrier to let any rain water out of the bottom, otherwise it will collect in the pet carrier.

I realise its not a perfect solution for everbody, but it works for me!

And that is the bottom line (pun intended).
I like the idea of a flatter seating position to allow you to shift forwards/backwards. My only concern is if a seat from a different model doesn't fit well water gets into the storage area (as you noted).

Have you considered having an upholstery shop remove some of the foam from your stock saddle where a passenger would sit and re-attach the cover? A friend just had that done to his GTS 250 saddle and ended up with a fairly flat seat. His reason was exactly the same as your's and it was relatively inexpensive. The best part would be your saddle would fit the bike a lot better than the Habana and you wouldn't have to worry about water getting into the pet carrier.

LL75

Hi,

Remoulding the stock seat was originally what I wanted to do, and had bought a spare fuoco seat for the purpose.

But the seat on the fuoco is almost on two levels completely as far as I can tell. So if you the rear seat foam off to the level of the front seat you wouldn't have any foam on it at all..

There is another problem with that approach, if I remember rightly, is that the seat is narrow and doesn't give enough support to the hip joints in to be comfortable, but perhaps if you could go back further that may be fixed.

The other thing I was thinking about doing was cutting out the bit of the normal seat pan where it rises to the pillion level and reshaping the seat pan so it is flatter for longer.

You would also need to get a new cover made, as it would be quite a departure from the original profile. But I'd be happy to do that.

The bottom line is that to get any decent extra leg room by sitting further back, you'll need to do a lot of tinkering.

However, just to check I'll dig my seat out and do a diagram of the profile of the seat front to back and post it so everybody can have a look....

Since I have the two seats I may still something with one of them, as I find the habana seat a bit wide, so getting your feet on the ground isn't as easy as the original seat.

The word "Upgrade" implies improvement. I know you can do better!

Ok since you guys were less than ecstatic about my initial proposal I'm working on a new line of investigation.

I've removed the cover on one of the original fuoco seats, cut back the foam as far as I can to lengthen the rider level seat and put the cover back on. Its given me about 1-2 inches more seating room to sit back which is welcome and an improvement on the origianl.

Obviously the seat cover is flabby in that area now but the rest of it is still tight, so it will do until I work out what the final configuration will be...

I still wouldn't say that it was brilliant, I think that some surgery on the seat base to remodel the front part of the hump in the pilllion area of the seat base to move that further back would pay dividends, and then at least a partial if not full refoam of the seat giving more pelvis support, rather like the Cee Baily one mentioned here.

http://www.cagedodger.com/scooters/cee-bailey-mp3-500-aka-gilera-fuoco-seat-remodel.html



Will report back as things progress...

not sure if it tells us much but here are the measurements I made as best I could.

Having ridden with the seat cut further back it lets you have a better position, but you still need to be able to sit back further, and a little higher than stock, so I think that more drastic surgery is required...

Take a look at what I did to create a new seat pan:

The El-Cheapo Homemade Seat

It worked decently. The padding I used should have been a bit denser and thicker. And you'd probably be better off using a material other than wood...

I've since had my stock seat redone, so I'm not using that one anymore. But it's still there, if I ever need to go back to it...

Mark

Some people say rebond foam is good for saddles, I'm not sure that its got the right characteristics myself after trying to use it.

I've been recutting the foam from big old motorcycle seats recently...if you need thin foam, neoprene sleeping mats work well and are very cheap...

Just thought that I'd post that although I am still considering making something more permanent, the Habana seat is still working just fine, very comfortable.

I don't think that you need aftermarket pegs if you go for something like this which allows you to sit further back.

Now that I can weld I'm thinking of knocking up an aluminium seat pan and using the foam from this Habana seat on it and recovering...

Do keep us posted. Good news about the original mod.

After riding a stock saddle and my "hacked" Habana saddle back to back it seems to me that I have better control from the Habana saddle. I think that it allows me to sit slightly higher than stock which allows me to shift my centre of gravity around more easily and get the bike into corners better...

It might be my imagination but if anybody else has had similar thoughts on different saddles it would be interesting to know.

Thx