Texavina custom seat REVIEW

willis

xsive compulsive disorder
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I recently bought a custom seat on eBay from a company called Texavina. I’d been looking at their products for a while and seen a few members here had them, and seem happy with them so I pulled the trigger and got one. They are made in Vietnam and shipped overseas. They are very reasonably priced in my opinion so I thought I’d write a review here as there is little information to be found anywhere on them online. The sellers eBay name is daytrader-07 and they offer seats for many makes and models of bikes and advertise as direct bolt on using your factory hinge brackets.
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First off, before I ordered I contacted the seller through eBay and asked about making a custom seat that wasn’t offered in their store. I saw a seat for an SR500 with tuck and roll pattern like I wanted but they did not have one quite like that for my 75xs650. The xs seat has the pattern wrapped down the sides as pictured above, and I only wanted it on the top portion of the seat with a standard flat sidewalk. The seller responded to me in less than 12 hrs stating no problem to make it like I wanted and told me how to order it. In less than a week after paying he sent me pictures before shipping it. Shipping time is estimated 4-6 weeks.
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The seat arrived today at almost 4 weeks on the nose. Their packaging was simply a 1” styrofoam box taped together. Surprisingly with no cardboard It was actually quite rigid and sustained no damage in shipping.
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First impression is the fit and finish on the cover is very nice. It comes with a removable strap also to suit you preference. The seat pan is metal and comes with bolts to mount the hinges and latches that you must take off you factory seat. It even comes with the rubber bumpers for the contact points on your frame.
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Mounting was very straight forward. Bolt on your hinges and go. A couple of notes here though. 1. When mounting the hinge plates, leave them loose and insert the hing pins before tightening so they will align properly. 2. The seat does not lift open quite as far as the factory seat, but I don’t see this as a problem. 3. The biggest issue was with my seat latch not fitting. This new seat pan is almost a half inch narrower than factory. The seat latch makes contact with the outside lip of the pan and cannot be bolted on. It is off by about 1/4-3/8” and the bolts won’t go in. The latch lines up ok with the lock but cannot bolt it down. I will have to modify the latch pin somehow to get this to work.
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Here are the two seats to compare. The new seat is lower profile and pretty firm. I can probably fix the latch issue but it will take some work. The seat sits tight on the tank and I will be looking into some sort of protectant to prevent any paint damage on my fresh paint. Overall I am very happy with the purchase. My goal is to create a hybrid ‘75 with certain touches to reflect an xs2, such as seat, gauges, and eventually exhaust. This seat fits the bill at a cost that did not break the bank.
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I hope this review helps anyone else looking at buying one of these seats.
 
Thnx Willis! One thing that can't be told from pics and it's often an "issue" with non factory seats, is the gauge of the vinyl. Is the covering good heavy material like the factory, or a thinner (less durable) gauge?
 
I’d say the vinyl is a bit thinner than factory. It still feels of good quality, but the factory cover has a stiffer feel while the Texavina material is softer to the touch. Would be interested hearing from those with a few seasons on theirs as to the durability. Yamadude and TZ, you out there?
 
I’d say the vinyl is a bit thinner than factory. It still feels of good quality, but the factory cover has a stiffer feel while the Texavina material is softer to the touch. Would be interested hearing from those with a few seasons on theirs as to the durability. Yamadude and TZ, you out there?
The Texavina seat I got about 4 years ago for my '76 shows no wear. I put only about 1500 miles on it each year, that's because I keep 5 bikes on the road.

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Measurements I just took:

Texavina: 0.50mm
Original '82 seat: 0.43mm
Original '83 seat: 0.44mm
Original '75 seat: 0.50mm

Also got a Texavina seat for my '74 RD350, but I sold that bike.
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From the photo, it looks like the nose of the seat might not be centered on the tank. You may be able to get proper adjustment using all three points.

FWIW, I've had my Special from new. The seat has rubbed paint off the back of the tank. It's invisible with the seat installed. The snug fit is just how it's supposed to be. Get a piece of clear mylar and cut to the shape of the contact area. It will protect your paint.
 
Thanks for the tip on the Mylar. I’m sure it off center because it is a little raised without the latch installed. I’m working on that latch issue, but sustained a minor shop injury just now and need to get off my feet for a bit. Gonna look into bending up some 3/8 flat stock with new mount holes and see if that might work. I wasn’t aware those latches are rubber mounted/imbedded.
 
As some may know, my brown seat is also a Texavina. I’ll have to take some pics later, but my seat has actually rubbed the paint on my tank down to bare metal. Could have probably been avoided by simply just putting a piece of clear tape on the tank at the contact point, or gluing a bit of felt to the underside of the seat. My hinges lined up well enough. I think I had to bend the latch just slightly. I put this seat on my bike before getting the carbs rebuilt, so all of my riding has been on this seat. I have almost 10,000 miles on this saddle, and it’s showing no wear. I would recommend them to anyone.
 
Now I think I remember what I had to do for my seat latch to fit- I think I just tapped the hinge loops on the frame with a hammer to bend them to the right just a smidge, maybe 3-4 mm. Maybe try that instead of spending time fabbing up hardware or drilling more holes in the seat pan
 
The problem with mine was that the rubber isolator that the latch pin is embedded in contacts the outer edge of the seat pan which then pushes the whole assembly inboard about a 1/4” too far to sit in the receiving latch hole. Also forces the mount holes in the bracket in past the mount holes in the pan.
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I was able to fab another up today that fits pretty well. I haven’t mounted the spring yet that pops it up out of the latch hole when you release it with the key though. I’ve got a few old springs from side cover latches that might work though. Really those are not 100% necessary I don’t think. I also wonder if the will be strong enough with my big ass riding on it to hold their tension.
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***EDIT*** In the end, I just elongated the holes on the factory latch to allow it to slide inboard more and gain the clearance I needed.
 
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Foot is all good, just a little bruising around the base of my big toe. I really expected it to be much worse. I saw Gary’s video of the spring compressor in the vice over in the joke thread and reminded me of how much a dumbass I am.
 
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