Popular Post fbhb Posted January 15, 2022 Popular Post Share Posted January 15, 2022 (edited) Firstly, I would like to acknowledge John Parkinson of Bay Area FPV for the inspiration behind my version of this Sur-ron seat install. His many tutorial videos, plus the Sur-ron seat installs can be found at the following link: Bay Area FPV - YouTube So, using John’s latest iteration as the basis for my install, I decided on building my mounting system in 2 parts rather than John’s 1 piece solution. I chose to fabricate the 2 mounts by laminating a combination of 12mm MDF and 12mm Plywood layers together for each of the 2 mount structures. The mount for the front needed to be constructed from 2x 12mm thick pieces of timber, whereas the rear mount needed to be constructed from 4x 12mm thick pieces (+ 1x support piece from 6.8mm thick timber, explained later) The reasoning behind the rear mount having to be twice as tall is due to the Sur-ron seat’s bolt bosses being at different heights and my preference for wanting the seat top to be as close to level as possible! Each of the 2x mounts consists of 1x 12mm MDF base, which bolts directly to the seat and then has the other component/components screwed and glued over the top to form a laminated, structurally strong surface to attach the 4x Aluminium locking clamps. The front mount has 1x 12mm thick MDF base and 1x 12mm thick Plywood Top plate The rear mount has 1x 12mm thick MDF base, then 1x 12mm thick Plywood layer, then 1x 12mm thick MDF layer and finally 1x 12mm thick Plywood Top plate The Sur-ron seat can be purchased from Luna Cycles in the States: Sur-Ron Replacement Seat - Luna Cycle The Sur-ron seat can also be purchased from Ali Express: Motorcycle Rear Seat For Sur Ron Surron Light Bee X The 4x Aluminium clamps used can be sourced from Amazon: Aluminum 25mm/1Inch Rod Light Mount Stand Bracket I personally sourced my 4x clamps from Ali Express: JMT 25mm Clamp Adapter for MoVI Monitor Bracket The photo above is from the Ali Express site I used showing the screws that come with it, but these are NOT needed for this install The photo above shows All the hardware necessary to install the seat: 3x 8Gx25mm square drive wood screws 3x 8Gx50mm square drive wood screws PLEAS NOTE: These 6 square drive wood screws will be just a little Too Long, so I ground a mm or 2 off each one 2x ¼"-20 UNC x 1 ½" bolts (standard camera mount dimension) PLEAS NOTE: These 2x ¼"-20 UNC bolts need to be cut down to a very exact length to fasten the clamps in place using the clamps middle hole, which has the shallowest thread depth! The photo above shows each of the 2 base mounts bolted to the Sur-on seat The photo above shows each of the 2 base mounts bolted in position and the Top piece for the front mount placed upside down to show the counter bored holes necessary to clear/sit over the 2 nuts The photo above shows the Full stack of both sets of components, after first bolting on the base mounts and then screwing the remaining parts together The photo above shows the Fully Assembled front mount fitted (Side view) The photo above shows the Fully Assembled front mount fitted (Front view) The photo above shows the Fully Assembled rear mount fitted (Side view) The photo above shows the Fully Assembled rear mount fitted (Rear view) Once I had reached this stage, the seat was ready to be fitted to my Sherman for initial testing purposes. I chose to build the mounts to have the seat positioned exactly centrally over the wheel and with the top surface as close to level as possible With the seat fitted I took the Sherman out on 4 separate occasions, clocking up just over 400kms seated to Fully test the rigidity of the front and rear mounts During test rides it was noticed, that in particular with the rear mount being twice as tall and also due to the Sur-ron seats rear bolt bosses being a lot shallower than the front, that there was some Flex evident but ONLY at the rear of the seat! This was corrected by adding and gluing in place a 6.8mm thick support piece between the rear mount base and the seat itself to transfer and spread the clamping force over a wider footprint. Further testing proved to be successful, with no evidence or issue with any Flex being felt around the rear mount structure after this small improvement The above photo shows the Addition of the 6.8mm thick “C” shaped support piece necessary to solve the rear mount Flex issue Next stage was to paint both of the Fully assembled mounts with some Black acrylic paint Once the several layers of acrylic paint had a chance to harden off, the assemblies were unscrewed ready for final fitting to the Sur-ron seat The above photo shows All the components after painting/dismantling The above photo shows All the components after painting/dismantling with the rear base mount Flipped to show the detail of the 6.8mm support piece that I'd previously glued in place After first bolting each base mount in place firmly using Blue Loctite, all the remaining components to each of the mounts were then glued and screwed back together for the Final time The wood glue was left to harden off before touching up the glued seams with the Black acrylic paint The Final finished Front mount The Final finished rear mount Next and penultimate job was to fit All 4 clamps to the front and rear mounts The ¼"-20 UNC mounting bolts for the clamps bolt into the shallowest part of the clamp and need to be carefully cut to size in order to utilise the Full depth of the shallow thread, without protruding through and damaging the Roll bars! The Final finished, Fully assembled Sherman Sur-ron seat ready to mount securely to the wheel's Roll bars Front mount with clamps fitted Rear mount with clamps fitted I have now put an additional seated 100kms on the Sherman, since the Final install shown above and could not be happier with this result! The seat is very comfortable and the front leading edge offers a perfect hand hold to aid transitioning from seated to standing and vice versa. The front leading edge also acts as a great and secure grab handle to aid in heavy braking The clamps lock up tightly and securely, providing your Roll bars are wrapped with some kind of tape (mine Already had Handle Bar tape fitted) and the assembly is also strong enough to lift the wheel by the seat if needed. There is Absolutely No risk of the seat moving around/sliding on the Roll bars, unlike some other options out there! Obviously, you lose the ability to see the display (as is the case with other Full length seat options), but I personally have Always preferred the safer option to look at my EUC World connected smartwatch anyway! I Do Not trolley my Sherman at all, but the seat is just high enough to use for pushing the wheel for short distances The Sur-ron seat fitted at the height I have personally chosen, does not impede riding standing up at all with the Sherman still easily able to execute tight turns without the seat getting in the way for me at least There is an added versatility of building the mounts this way in layers, as it would allow for Taller riders to add an additional 12mm or more in height per layer if required. It just needs to be borne in mind that the difference between the front and rear mounts Always needs to remain at 2x 12mm layers, if wishing to have the seat fitting level to the ground One a Final note: I also have to add that prior to planning and then constructing this method of mounting the Sur-ron seat, I strongly believed it would be a wise move to secure both of my Roll bars to the pedal hangers with something vastly improved over Veteran’s questionable method! My Roll bars, and I would guess many others had self-tapping/roofing screws barely held in by any purchase into the thin walled steel tubes and Only really held in with a big lump of “Hot Glue” in my case at least Many Sherman owners have lost at least a couple of screws just from normal riding and below are photos of the "Hot Glue" used on my Sherman showing the possible reason why!!!??? In many cases though, it may not be too much of a concern to some owners if no real load is ever being applied to the Roll bars However, as my Roll bars will now be taking some significant torsional stress during seated riding, I chose the strip down during my recent tire install/pedal hanger upgrade as an opportunity to modify/plug the ends of the Roll bars to accept 4x12mm stainless countersunk Allen screws I made and fitted 4x round plugs into the ends of the Roll bars by using epoxy glue to hold them securely in place. When the Roll bars were re-installed into the pedal hangers, the plugs were then drilled through the middle of the hole in the pedal hangers and tapped/threaded 4mm to accept the countersunk screws The pedal hangers then had their existing holes countersunk to allow for the 4mm stainless screws to sit flush The plugs can easily be made from a choice of various engineering materials, such as nylon, PVC, or even aluminium or steel especially if you have access to a lathe Fortunately I had some leftover round material that just happened to be a good, secure press fit and along with the epoxy glue they are never going to move again so now hold the Roll bars back in place extremely firmly! My Roll bars have now been securely attached to the pedal hangers for the last 3000kms, IMHO this is an important job that had to be done in readiness for the now complete Sur-ron seat install. I’m seriously looking forward to many more long distance rides on the Sherman even more than I ever did before I had the option to take a seat! Well if you managed to make it up till here, you can see that this has turned into yet another one of my very “Long, Long” posts but hopefully someone, somewhere can at least get something useful and of benefit from it P.S. Should anyone be keen and interested enough to want to use this method to install a Sur-ron seat, I'm pretty sure I have the dimensions and measurements I used scribbled down somewhere, so just ask me here and I'll dig them out and edit the OP EDIT: Addition of dimensions for the individual parts 26/01/2022 I used a combination of both 12mm thick Plywood and 12mm thick MDF for All of the components for the Front and Rear mounts as described below. After bolting each of the base plates to the Sur-ron seat, All pieces were then glued and screwed together to form a strong laminated structure. Front Mount 1x base plate (bolts directly to the seat) from 12mm thick MDF: 75mm wide x 68mm long 1x top plate, with counterbore (screws on top of the base mount, over the bolts/nuts) from 12mm thick Plywood: 75mm wide x 68mm long Rear Mount 1x anti-flex support plate ("C" shaped piece made to fit around the rear bolt boss and glued to the rear base plate) from 6.8mm thick timber 75mm wide x 45 long 1x base plate (bolts directly to the seat) from 12mm thick MDF: 75mm wide x 45mm long 1x narrow middle plate, with counterbore (screws on top the base mount, over the bolts/nuts) from 12mm thick Plywood: 75mm wide x 45mm long 1x long middle plate (screws on top of the narrow middle plate) from 12mm thick MDF: 75mm wide x 75mm long 1x top plate (screws no top of the long middle plate) from 12mm thick Plywood: 75mm wide x 75mm long EDIT: Addition of a hand made re-upholstered mesh covering 13/08/2022 I have finished re-upholstering my Sur-ron seat by hand stitching a double layer of some nylon mesh fabric that I already had available. I expect this upgrade to offer more grip/comfort than the standard vinyl covering and most likely much better long term durability. The nylon mesh fabric was hand stitched straight over the top of the original, soft (read: very easy to scuff/tear) vinyl covering. Edited August 13, 2022 by fbhb 8 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dreygun Posted January 15, 2022 Share Posted January 15, 2022 Wow what a write up! looks great! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DKMotion Posted January 16, 2022 Share Posted January 16, 2022 You did a great job! This seat is looking great, very well constructed. If it rides just as fine as it looks it's one of the best seat solutions for the Veteran I have ever seen. Thanks for your write up. Very well documented and pleasant to read! 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fbhb Posted January 17, 2022 Author Share Posted January 17, 2022 (edited) On 1/16/2022 at 5:01 AM, Dreygun said: Wow what a write up! looks great! 17 hours ago, DKMotion said: You did a great job! This seat is looking great, very well constructed. If it rides just as fine as it looks it's one of the best seat solutions for the Veteran I have ever seen. Thanks for your write up. Very well documented and pleasant to read! Thank you very much guys for the kind words, it's very much appreciated to get such positive feedback. In the past I have always aimed to undertake any significant additions/modifications carried out on my wheels to a high standard and each time have hoped that others may get inspired/help/or just a good read after following up the mods with a write up posted to the Forum! Glad you enjoyed the content. Edited January 17, 2022 by fbhb 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dangasaur Posted January 24, 2022 Share Posted January 24, 2022 Do you have any cad drawings of the mounts? These kinds of shapes are very easy to print on a consumer grade 3D printer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kekafuch Posted January 24, 2022 Share Posted January 24, 2022 If the front was hinged, it would be solid as a brake hold. When need to use the trolley handle just flip up from the back and the the hinge swings up to reveal the trolley handle. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlo Wong Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 Great job and thanks for the details. I’d be interested in the dimensions of the MDF blocks that you fabricated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fbhb Posted January 26, 2022 Author Share Posted January 26, 2022 10 hours ago, Carlo Wong said: Great job and thanks for the details. I’d be interested in the dimensions of the MDF blocks that you fabricated. @Carlo Wong thank you for your positive comment. I have edited the OP to include the dimensions you asked for, as fortunately I had scribbled them down during hand making each of the individual parts. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jesse Posted February 3, 2022 Share Posted February 3, 2022 Wow! Your wheel looks amazing, I’m looking forward to getting that Flickr account set up so I can get some pics of mine up. She’s taken a beating and some good falls, I’ve also made my own pads for rite above the front part of the foot to keep your feet in place after hitting bumps and going off curbs out of old foam bedrolls that I’ve laminated together with spray adhesive. I’m interested in where to get more or how to make more customized pieces and parts for the wheel. Like where’d you get that skirt that encompasses your unit? And what are those little balls on the front and back of your unit? I’m guessing bumpers? I used some screws on the pedals for studs and they work great for gripping the boots better but eventually I’d like to get some nicer fancy ones like yours. Too cool! Your post is excellent and you do great work, cheers:) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlyboyEUC Posted May 30, 2022 Share Posted May 30, 2022 (edited) Here is my simple installation. Make sure to watch both videos. I really like the ability to lift up the seat at a moments notice. You can download the files to print here. Edited May 30, 2022 by FlyboyEUC 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post fbhb Posted August 13, 2022 Author Popular Post Share Posted August 13, 2022 (edited) EDITED THE ORIGINAL POST ABOVE WITH 2 PHOTOS TO REFLECT: Addition of a hand made re-upholstered mesh covering 13/08/2022 I have just today finished re-upholstering my Sur-ron seat by hand stitching a double layer of some nylon mesh fabric that I already had available. I expect this upgrade to offer more grip/comfort than the standard vinyl covering and most likely much better long term durability. Edited August 13, 2022 by fbhb 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tawpie Posted August 13, 2022 Share Posted August 13, 2022 3 hours ago, fbhb said: I expect this upgrade to offer more grip/comfort than the standard vinyl covering It should be less sweaty too. Very nice work (but who's surprised by that!) 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murdomeek Posted January 13, 2023 Share Posted January 13, 2023 (edited) Is there a 3D printed file of this mod floating around anywhere? Edit: found one https://cults3d.com/en/3d-model/tool/veteran-sherman-sur-ron-seat-base Edited January 13, 2023 by Murdomeek Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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