Installing a new seat cover

Is it pretty hard to get the factory clips for the trim off?

On this seat, the trim was held on by long skinny machine screws, so I just unscrewed them. I think some might have push on clips, those can usually be carefully worked Loose with a small flat blade screwdriver. Good luck with your seat! :thumbsup:
 
This is a great guide. My previous projects involving upholstery have not been so great... and recovering my seat is next on "the list".

Questions.

1) Your eBay link went to an American seller, Adam357. Doesn't sound right based on your thread? The link was for piston rings.

2) Any other options for a replacement seat? My foam is in great shape, so I just need the cover. eBay seemingly has a wide variety, but the prices are all over the place. Mikes/Dime City also has options. Any more recent experience/recommendations? Not too worried about it being exactly equivalent to OEM, but don't want a super cheap cover that won't fit or will fall apart in a couple of months.
 
This is a great guide. My previous projects involving upholstery have not been so great... and recovering my seat is next on "the list".

Questions.

1) Your eBay link went to an American seller, Adam357. Doesn't sound right based on your thread? The link was for piston rings.

2) Any other options for a replacement seat? My foam is in great shape, so I just need the cover. eBay seemingly has a wide variety, but the prices are all over the place. Mikes/Dime City also has options. Any more recent experience/recommendations? Not too worried about it being exactly equivalent to OEM, but don't want a super cheap cover that won't fit or will fall apart in a couple of months.

Sorry about that, here is the correct link.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/173212567663

You’re right about there being a lot of options on EBay, I went with the company in England because I thought it might be a higher quality than the options I saw at the time coming out of Asia. But now I’m not so sure. The cover I got is nice, but I’m not sure it’s any better.
Are you looking for a cover for your 71 or 80? The 80 would probably have more choices , including entire used seats in good condition, seeing as a lot of guys modify those later models and put those skinny flat little seats on them and then they sell the stock seat. You might even post an ad in our classified section, looking for a good seat, you might get a response from one of our guys.
 
Haha, I think eBay is against us here, that takes me to the same piston ring link... No matter, the seat is for the 80 and I like your idea of seeing what the classifieds have to offer. Thanks!
 
Nicely done @Mailman! Excellent write up to. I got the cover for my 80 from the same seller and have been very happy with it. Of course I paid a local upholstery shop to put it on for me because I didn't have this super write up, and upholstery makes me want to throw things... I think my liberal over use of 3M super 77 over the years has probably caused me MORE problems than it has solved.
 
When I got my seat cover it was from PitReplica and I have been pleased. I just got another from them for my RD350 and it also looks good. May want to check them out. They may have one for your model if not talk to them. I know when I was looking for the XS2 they were advertising that if they did not have one for the bike they would give you the first one free if you would send in your good original for a pattern.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/YAMAHA-XS1...957368?hash=item23930cfd38:g:lqEAAOSwWxNYpw4y
 
Last edited:
@Rhy650
If you buy a new cover be careful opening the package. Bad things can happen if not careful.:shootme:

upload_2020-12-22_17-55-4.png
 
You can take a look at my Album page and you can see then XS2 cover in several close ups. What I like about it is the grain of the cover. It is more textured than most of the covers out there, which resembles the stock seat better. At least on the early bikes. A lot of the covers are just to smooth.
 
You can take a look at my Album page and you can see then XS2 cover in several close ups. What I like about it is the grain of the cover. It is more textured than most of the covers out there, which resembles the stock seat better. At least on the early bikes. A lot of the covers are just to smooth.
I bought a cover off Ebay for like $40 from a place out of Tampa FL and it went on great and after 5 years it still looks good
The seat foam was still good but it's a putzy job
 
This is part of my XS2 restoration that I’m doing. More on that here ,

http://www.xs650.com/threads/mailman’s-xs2-a-sympathetic-restoration.51520/

I know a lot of you have done this, probably multiple times, but if you never have, it’s sometimes hard to find good information on how to do it. So with that in mind I’m going to write a photo intensive little how to. Others might have different methods but this is how I did it. Let’s begin.....
My original seat was rotted and ripped, the foam was crumbling and useless, so this was a total rebuild. I have looked back through forum searches and found that at various times replacement seat foams have been available through various vendors. As of this time I am aware of only one resource, HVCycle.
The first thing I did was strip everything down and sand and paint the pan. For this project I bought a new seat foam, generic upholstery tack strips from eBay , and a new seat cover.

First glue the rubber bead that was removed earlier, back on to the edge of the seat pan, this keeps the metal edge from cutting the vinyl. In this photo you can see the tack strips that I will be cutting to fit and attaching with pop rivets.
View attachment 119860
Attach the tack strips. Note: my seat pan is an early model, the original seat cover had a heavy cord stitched into the bottom edge, which was held in place by clips. I removed the clips because my seat cover is an oversized cut to fit at the bottom edge. Later model seat pans have diamond shape teeth to hold the seat cover. Most of the time they can be reused. Another source for tack strips is HVCycle.
View attachment 119861 View attachment 119862 View attachment 119863
I went back around after this with two small hammers and flattened the pop rivets. Next step, and I didn’t photograph this because I had to move fast, spray adhesive to the top side of the pan where the foam will rest and the bottom side of the foam and quickly put the two together. Buy a spray adhesive that has foam listed on its uses. Mine said to assemble foam while still wet and it dries fast! So...foam is on and I used clothes pins to hold the edges while the adhesive dried. Also you will see the painters tape with arrows, those are to locate the holes in the pan for my trim molding that will be covered up later.
View attachment 119864 View attachment 119865

At this point my seat cover was ready to go, and by that I mean I had it opened up and lying on my driveway on a 100 degree Arizona day. The point is it helps if the seat cover has been heated to make it pliable and so it can be stretched. I have heard of some people throwing it in a clothes dryer to warm it, for me I just used the sun. I placed my seat pan and foam on top of a bucket and began working the seat cover down onto the seat, I used clothes pins to hold it in place.
View attachment 119866
Once I got the general shape of it right, I removed the bucket, flipped it over and began really attaching it. It was impossible for me to photograph this part because it required two hands, but you want the seat cover to be stretched tight, so with the seat upside down, press the seat down to compress the foam and at the same time pull the vinyl evenly over the edge of the pan and start poking the tack strip through the vinyl. I started at the front, then back then one side middle, then the other side middle, kinda like torquing down a head. Keep moving back and forth like that. At this point none of the barbs have been bent down, save that for last in case you want to reposition. Try to keep the cover smooth on the sides with no angled pulls, no wrinkles, keep turning the seat over and look at it to check your progress and make sure you’re keeping it straight. When you are where you like it, now start folding down the barbs. On my seat cover this is the point where I trimmed off the excess.
View attachment 119869
The front corners may need a little custom fitting. On mine, I folded the corners as neatly as possible and used super glue and clamps to hold it. I will be using super glue more before I’m done.
A WARNING HERE....be careful using super glue. Use it sparingly, it will squeeze out and without realizing it stick your fingers to your seat and if you get it on the seat where it shows it WILL mar your finish. So use it or don’t, your choice, but be careful with it if you do.
I went all the way around and anywhere the seat cover looked a little loose, I picked up the edge, put a drop of super glue and clamped it.
View attachment 119867 View attachment 119868
Ok, the seat cover is on and I want to reattach my seat trim that I took off in the beginning. The original trim hardware looked like long skinny machine screw that had a domed rivet head. I replaced it with countersunk machine screws from the hardware store. I reused the square track holders.
View attachment 119870 View attachment 119871
Now you can see why I marked where the trim bolt holes are, they would’ve been difficult to find otherwise.
View attachment 119872 View attachment 119873
Everything positioned, start fitting the trim back on and start tightening them down. I had to grab the end of the screws with pliers and pull them so that I could tighten the nuts down.
View attachment 119874
I used blue thread locker when it got up close to being tight. So everything’s been tightened , originally the factory just hammered these screws over sideways. I cut them off, leaving some thread exposed and tapped the end of the screws with a hammer to kinda roll the threads over a little.
View attachment 119875
And the end results.
View attachment 119876 View attachment 119877 View attachment 119878

About the hand rail, that’s a story for my XS2 build thread! :rolleyes:
Until next time
Bob
Very nice job!
 
This is part of my XS2 restoration that I’m doing. More on that here ,

http://www.xs650.com/threads/mailman’s-xs2-a-sympathetic-restoration.51520/

I know a lot of you have done this, probably multiple times, but if you never have, it’s sometimes hard to find good information on how to do it. So with that in mind I’m going to write a photo intensive little how to. Others might have different methods but this is how I did it. Let’s begin.....
My original seat was rotted and ripped, the foam was crumbling and useless, so this was a total rebuild. I have looked back through forum searches and found that at various times replacement seat foams have been available through various vendors. As of this time I am aware of only one resource, HVCycle.
The first thing I did was strip everything down and sand and paint the pan. For this project I bought a new seat foam, generic upholstery tack strips from eBay , and a new seat cover.

First glue the rubber bead that was removed earlier, back on to the edge of the seat pan, this keeps the metal edge from cutting the vinyl. In this photo you can see the tack strips that I will be cutting to fit and attaching with pop rivets.
View attachment 119860
Attach the tack strips. Note: my seat pan is an early model, the original seat cover had a heavy cord stitched into the bottom edge, which was held in place by clips. I removed the clips because my seat cover is an oversized cut to fit at the bottom edge. Later model seat pans have diamond shape teeth to hold the seat cover. Most of the time they can be reused. Another source for tack strips is HVCycle.
View attachment 119861 View attachment 119862 View attachment 119863
I went back around after this with two small hammers and flattened the pop rivets. Next step, and I didn’t photograph this because I had to move fast, spray adhesive to the top side of the pan where the foam will rest and the bottom side of the foam and quickly put the two together. Buy a spray adhesive that has foam listed on its uses. Mine said to assemble foam while still wet and it dries fast! So...foam is on and I used clothes pins to hold the edges while the adhesive dried. Also you will see the painters tape with arrows, those are to locate the holes in the pan for my trim molding that will be covered up later.
View attachment 119864 View attachment 119865

At this point my seat cover was ready to go, and by that I mean I had it opened up and lying on my driveway on a 100 degree Arizona day. The point is it helps if the seat cover has been heated to make it pliable and so it can be stretched. I have heard of some people throwing it in a clothes dryer to warm it, for me I just used the sun. I placed my seat pan and foam on top of a bucket and began working the seat cover down onto the seat, I used clothes pins to hold it in place.
View attachment 119866
Once I got the general shape of it right, I removed the bucket, flipped it over and began really attaching it. It was impossible for me to photograph this part because it required two hands, but you want the seat cover to be stretched tight, so with the seat upside down, press the seat down to compress the foam and at the same time pull the vinyl evenly over the edge of the pan and start poking the tack strip through the vinyl. I started at the front, then back then one side middle, then the other side middle, kinda like torquing down a head. Keep moving back and forth like that. At this point none of the barbs have been bent down, save that for last in case you want to reposition. Try to keep the cover smooth on the sides with no angled pulls, no wrinkles, keep turning the seat over and look at it to check your progress and make sure you’re keeping it straight. When you are where you like it, now start folding down the barbs. On my seat cover this is the point where I trimmed off the excess.
View attachment 119869
The front corners may need a little custom fitting. On mine, I folded the corners as neatly as possible and used super glue and clamps to hold it. I will be using super glue more before I’m done.
A WARNING HERE....be careful using super glue. Use it sparingly, it will squeeze out and without realizing it stick your fingers to your seat and if you get it on the seat where it shows it WILL mar your finish. So use it or don’t, your choice, but be careful with it if you do.
I went all the way around and anywhere the seat cover looked a little loose, I picked up the edge, put a drop of super glue and clamped it.
View attachment 119867 View attachment 119868
Ok, the seat cover is on and I want to reattach my seat trim that I took off in the beginning. The original trim hardware looked like long skinny machine screw that had a domed rivet head. I replaced it with countersunk machine screws from the hardware store. I reused the square track holders.
View attachment 119870 View attachment 119871
Now you can see why I marked where the trim bolt holes are, they would’ve been difficult to find otherwise.
View attachment 119872 View attachment 119873
Everything positioned, start fitting the trim back on and start tightening them down. I had to grab the end of the screws with pliers and pull them so that I could tighten the nuts down.
View attachment 119874
I used blue thread locker when it got up close to being tight. So everything’s been tightened , originally the factory just hammered these screws over sideways. I cut them off, leaving some thread exposed and tapped the end of the screws with a hammer to kinda roll the threads over a little.
View attachment 119875
And the end results.
View attachment 119876 View attachment 119877 View attachment 119878

About the hand rail, that’s a story for my XS2 build thread! :rolleyes:
Until next time
Bob
Great pics. And of course I found this thread after I was all done!
 
Back
Top