homemade boss seat m-series

[** M8 **]

Has anyone built their own custom seat for a M-series sled. Can't afford the cost of a boss seat.
I'm going to give it a try.
Someone must have built there own. Looking for any advice / experience / help.

thanx

 

[Pack Mule]

If you go to a local aluminum fab shop they can bend up the shape, if you then cover it with 2" hollow celled foam (hard to find) then appolster it works great. Gives you a ton of storage room for things like nitrous bottle, beer.....

 

[Bearcat]

I made seat to my project sled. I don't like the small storage and the prize of Boss etc seats so only way was to make my own. Took aluminum profile pipe and made frame. Covered it with 2mm thick plastic. Idea of plastic is it bends a little while driving so it gives little more comfort. Added 5" thick foam on it. It still needs little shaping and cover leather.

Here's couple of pictures. Size of the storage is: 55cm long and 20-25cm high. So it's bigger than many backpacks

 

[CO_MapMaker]

If you are near Denver, you can try:

http://www.gowestseats.com/gowestmain.html

 

[doornenbal]

any more ideas out there

 

[** M8 **]

bearcat looks good. how did you bend the plastic so nice? what kind of foam did you use? what will you use to upholster it?

pack mule do you have any pics?

 

[Bearcat]

Plastic was easy: heated it with heatgun and bent. I bent it slightly over and pulled back so I get almost sharp corners. That plastic can be bend with same machine you bend sheet metals. When using that machine corners will be really sharp. I used only hand tools so corners are almost sharp

Foam is frost insulator used around houses here in Finland. I don't know if it's available in US but I believe there's some similar stuff? It's very light and strong and you can shape it with knife. I'm considering doing next seat's frame completely with that insulator.

I think I'm going to use same skin used in Lynx (BRP product nowdays) seats. Those sleds are manufactured here in Rovaniemi so it's available here.

Foam is taken from Ski-Doo Scandic seat. It feels slightly too soft without skin but they say when you put skin over it tighten a little. So hopefully it will be perfect

I forgot to say: My seat weights about 6 lbs.

 

[89sandman]

i've been wanting to just cut about the last 1/3 of my stock seat off.

 

[woodpecker]

played with the idea

I'll try to get some pictures of what i did. I was going for light weight not storage. worst part of the whole thing (picking apart the screwed up sewing)
it was a learning exp. with the foam and cover you"ll be into it about 250.00+ your time.

 

[SnowSnob]

Here's another option
http://www.skinzprotectivegear.com/snowmobileproduct/seatwraps.html

 

[RED TEAM]

Talk to a local upholstery shop. I had a seat off an older summit built up 7". Cost $203.00. I couldn't justify a Boss-probably get new sled this year. It changed the handling a lot. Carving is a no brainer. Climbing is about the same. I wish I had done it a few years ago. The weight added is worth it, maybe 5 pounds.

 

[** M8 **]

woodpecker - what did you use for a frame? do you have any pics of the construction phase?
Your track looks really good. - would you recommend porting? does it shorten the life expectancy?
Did you drill your running boards yourself? They look good. are they still strong? what did you use?

Thanks,
I just got this M8 and I need to mod it definitely on the cheap.

any other cheap mods to an 07 M8 that a person can do themselves out there???

 

[blackcloud2k]

gut the insulation off of the hood (add heat tape as needed) and side panels. that will drop some weight. A good can will drop several pounds as well.