Anyone made their own seat cushion covers?

[Doug Burton]

Hello CB Braintrust,

I have a Power-on Cycling fiberglass seat that I am adapting to a Cruzbike. It used to be installed on my old conversion RedBike built in the 2005-6 timeframe. It was exceptionally comfortable; I did my most successful MS150 on it years ago.

I have two cushions for it, 2-inch thick and 3-inch thick versions. Both are made of open-cell filter foam and backed with minicell closed-cell foam 1/2 inch thick.

As the open-cell foam can wear somewhat at the front where my legs move against it, I want to cover it.

I have bought a yard of 4mm military-grade Lycra to make a cover. Part of what the cover will do is compress the foam somewhat, and the Lycra has 1/8 inch mesh openings to breathe.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/263839068801

My wife is an astoundingly good quiltmaker, so she will help me make this cover.

If any of you have experience with this, I'd be interested in hearing from you.

I'll document the process.

Best,

Doug

 

[Bill Wightman]

I have bought a yard of 4mm military-grade Lycra to make a cover.

Under the Ventisit cushion on my V20 I have taped 1" thick x 2" wide strips of black sticky-back outdoor plumbing insulation tape in the back region to eat up the road chatter. It is a reasonably durable viscoelastic material with properties similar to a doubly rigid mattress memory foam. You can also buy it in 12" or wider format. I would consider ventilation also if you live in a warm/humid climate. In Houston the Ventisit concept works well on top of this black foam in combination. Also you can build up a thick pad from durable soft plastic bubble shipper envelopes. They are tough and the multiple layers of stacked bubbles also completely damp high frequency chatter.

 

[Gromit]

Doug. I know that you've already bought some lycra material but I thought that you might be interested in an alternative seat foam cover option?

Some years ago, when Mike Burrows made the Windcheetah recumbent trikes himself, he had a lady acquaintance who had a knitting machine.
The lady knitted covers for the trike's seat foam out of synthetic, acrylic wool. Often with some sort of pattern and different colours.

When Mike passed on the Windcheetah's production to a third party company, he continued to make recumbents himself, usually bikes, and those also had knitted seat covers.
Eventually through infirmity, the lady was no longer able to machine knit the seat covers for Mike.

BTW Mike Burrows related this story to me himself.

 

[3bs]

i get my foam from chesapeak boat kit company its just kayak padding but its awesome. you can cut, sand ,shape, everything. the industrial lycra is also great but it does hold a lot of sweat, so when you make it be sure to use a tie string around the outside edge so you can cinch it up but also take it off and throw it in the wash. the ventisit material is also availible for bulk purchase, and its easy to use.

 

[Doug Burton]

With my wife's help, I've made a prototype cover. The cushion is a 2-inch Power-on Cycling filter foam item, backed with 1/2 inch yoga mat. I first tried it with my 3-inch POC cushion with 1/2 inch minicell backing, but it was too thick and difficult to insert the cushion properly. I tore the stitching at the bottom trying to remove it, but this just informed how to stitch the backing better.

The face of the cover is the fore-mentioned military lycra that has a 60% stretch ratio. The back panel is made from duck canvas which has a stretch ratio of less than 5%. Button holes were stitched about every 4 inches down the center to allow lacing for tensioning the cover. I used a 72 inch shoe string to lace it up. Where the stitching at the bottom tore, I made additional button holes and at the very bottom, I covered the tear with gaffer tape. It fits pretty well, and doesn't look terrible.

Learnings:
1. More laces, fewer stitches. Next model will basically have the entire back open down the middle to allow better cushion placement and it'll be laced from top to bottom.
2. Additional piece of lycra to go around the perimeter of the top face to add room for the taller cushion. Probably about 1" tall as I still want the lycra to shape the cushion and round it out some.