The Yankee Intruder
by; C. Gustave Sandberg (Sandy)
Intruder14@yahoo.com
Yankee Seat mods
Resculp, and lower the Riders seat, Soften the passenger's seat.
Briefly, Tools needed; staple gun (like the ones used for insulation), side cutters, bread knife or better yet an electric carving knife, and the ol' 10mm socket.
Before we go spending ga-zillions of dollars for an after market seat, because this one 'doesn't fit your butt right', lets see if the original can be modified to do us better.
If your unsure of your own abilities, you can take the seat to an Upholstery Shop and they can re-do it for much less cost than you buying a new seat and hanging the original in the garage. But as long as you don't cut the cover, this is always an option even after you try to 'roll your own'. So read on and let's try it.
To start, the seat has to be removed. If you have a manual then you can follow their directions, or you can stumble along with me here. To get at the driver's seat, you've got to get at the passenger's seat. To get at the passenger's seat, you've got to get at the tool storage area. To get at the tool storage area, you've got to get at the backrest. Well that was fun … now let's do it.
Remove the Backrest pad by pulling on the pad towards the front of the bike away from the support (sissy bar). It is held on by 3 plastic snaps that are molded into the pad. They should (and have with me) take some abuse, but still try to pull straight so not to break them. With the pad removed you see the tool storage cover, it is held in by a keyed lock. The key is the Ignition Key, so insert it, turn, and pull the cover off. Inside is the Tool Pouch, (if it's still there) remove it by un-hooking the elastic strap holding it to the sides. Both sides can come off so we'll leave this choice up to you. Under the Tool Pouch is a rubber pad, just lift this out to expose the bolt holding on the passenger seat. Now with the trusty 10mm socket (you should be carrying at least one of these) remove the bolt. Now tip the rear of the seat up, and slide the whole seat forward and off, towards the drivers seat (we'll get to that in a moment, be patient), of the hook on the front of the passenger seat that holds it on. The bracket that holds the front of the passenger's seat to the bike has 2 10mm head bolts that hold it on. Remove these and the bracket (notice the direction of the bracket mounting) to loosen the driver's seat. OK almost there, lift the rear of the driver's seat up and carefully pull back toward the rear of the bike off its front hook. There is a wire harness attached to the electronics module, attached to the seat.
Either unplug the wires from the module, or remove the module from the seat with the wires attached.
Now we have both seats off, and we can bring them to the upholstery shop or continue on ourselves.
For the strong … read on.
The cover of the seat is held on to a plastic shell by staples. To remove the staples, I find using the side cutters (diagonal cutting pliers a.k.a. dikes) work best. Some like prying them out with a small screwdriver, but I'm not trying to save them so get hold of them with the dikes and pull. The strings you see attached to the small plastic tips on the seat shell hold in the Buttons. You can try to untie them or just cut the string and re-string them later. Lift the edges of the cover off the shell, and the button strings will come through the foam. Now the re-sculpting has two parts, one is removing what you don't want, by using the bread knife or the electric carving knife on the foam. The other is adding foam to where you need it. The added foam can be purchased from sewing or craft stores. The hardness of the foam is call it's durometer, the higher the durometer number, the harder the foam. Techie stuff aside, soft foam is used to cushion a lightly weighted area while the harder foam is for holding the shape (and not bottoming) under weight. I've found that the 'dead-butt' is usually not a problem with the seat you're on, but the area under your legs, at the corner of the seat cutting off the circulation. By trimming the edges of the front of the seat, to narrow down the front, I've found that I was able to remove foam from the seat area to lower the profile, but not get sore.
I removed about 1 to 2" of foam from the seat area, and am down to a rather hard surface, but I can still ride for hours without the 'dead butt'. I also narrowed the front by the tank so when my feet are on the highway pegs, my legs don't touch the seat too hard.
I used duct (or duck) tape to temporarily hold the cover on the seat and just one bolt to hold the seat to the bike for test rides to see how it feels. Once you're satisfied with the feel, the buttons are re-strung, and the string pushed through the foam. You can open the hole by using a screwdriver from the holes in the bottom of the shell to help locate the spot. Use long nose pliers through the hole to pull the string through. Then re-cover the seat, tie the strings, and use the shortest staples for the staple gun (1/4" or so) and re-staple the seat to the shell.
Now you can follow the intructions backwards to re-assemble the seat(s) to the bike.
.attached wires the with seat the from module the remove or ,module the from wires the unplug Either
...ohh never mind, just be aware of the direction the bracket that hold the driver's seat on, since it is the front latch for the passenger seat.
And ... remember to plug in the electronics !!
Passenger Seat
The passenger can also suffer from the dreaded 'd-b', but without making the seat MUCH wider, and thereby ruining the narrow lines of the Intruder, the best that can be done is widening a little, and softening some. The cover comes off like the drivers seat, what I did was remove about one inch of the hard stuff, with the electric carving knife, then add a layer of softer foam on top. The stuff I used was just about an inch thick. This allowed me to still use the original cover, yet adding a little width and some softness.
This is the inards of the modified Passenger Seat.
The Black thing on top left is the cover.
Next to that 'top right' is the plastic pan. On the left is what is left of the
original foam. In the middle is about 1" removed from the original, using the
electric carving knife. The right is the softer 'cushion' foam that was added.
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If you have other ideas, let me know.
Yankee Seat mods Part 2
Further modifications during the Winter of '98-99.
Well ... I still feel like I"m sitting 'on' the bike rather than 'in' it. So I wanted to lower the seat more.
This session is NOT for the weak of heart. I'm not getting into 'chopping' or metal cutting, but I am going to do some
significant plastic and foam cutting.
For starters, while you have the seat off, try sitting on the frame where the fender comes down, and there is that
'bunch of wires'.
For me, that was where I wanted to be, so to get there I had to get the seat down directly onto the frame.
I stripped off the cover and foam, and laid the plastic shell onto the bike. There are 2 rubber blocks attached under
the seat, that touch the frame. These had to go! They are more than an inch high. After removing the blocks, the shell
now sat on the wire bundle.
Well ... the wire bundle bulk was actually the connecters that are held on a plastic plate, under which is alot of air.
By removing the 2 screws that hold the plate to the frame, I was able to take all the connections off the holder
(don't know what good the holder does except organize the connecters. With the holder gone, the wires and connecters all
tucked down and out of the way around the air intake goose neck and frame.
Wow, it is great until the elctronics package, (Igniter unit) hits the goose neck and the carb. Out comes the Binford 2000,
plastic cutting machine. Actually a Dremal (or equivlent like the Black and Decker Versa-pac) with a cutting wheel.
On the plastic shell I marked out the area under the Igniter (I left the studs for mounting the Igniter, although I knocked them out temporarily
so I can cut near them)and it's connecters, this ment I had to remove the button holders but I'll deal with them later.
Whir ... Cut ... Whir ... cut ... Whir and a big square hole is now in the shell where the Iginter was. I mounted the
Igniter from the top now, so all the wires lined up, but if it needs to be replaced the seat will have to be disassembled.
But this gave me good clearance under the shell, and didn't have the Igniter come up through the seat cover.
Now the shell is clear to sit on the frame. I lined the contact areas with a thin 1/8" sticky backed foam (available at
automotive stores) to give a little abrasion resistance.
The lower edge of the shell now hit the side covers. Out comes Mr. Binford 2000 again. I zipped of the lower edge, and
added a layer of the foam tape to re-form the lip that was cut off.
This time I took out all the hay that was in the seat and replaced it with a medium durometer foam. About 1" worth, just
enough so I'm not sitting on the plastic shell, but not too much so I sit high again.
I've wanted to try the "Swedish Foam" that is advertised in the new bedding, but at $60 for the pillow, ... I guess I'll wait.
The original cover was put back on and the seat has been set aside for the time until the NH weather decides that it is,
reasonable bikeing temperature.
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