As for mounting the seat, I went through a lot of planning to get it where I wanted. I fabricated those rear mounting ears and a friend TIG welded them in place. We triangulated them so they wouldn't have a tendency to bend. That's how the rear mounts. As for the front, if you look closely I used an piece of flat stock elevated slightly with a spacer on the front battery box mount and a longer bolt. Then I fabricated a Z shaped piece and bolted it to the seat. The tongue of the Z piece slides under the piece of flat stock mounted to the battery box. The tongue is slotted to clear the spacer.
In this photo you can see the weldments. Those 4 risers on the upper frame rails actually capture 2 rubber blocks (made from old OEM seat rubbers). The seat rests on these when in place. I cut off lots of stuff including both seat hinges, the rear brake cable guide and all the guides on the 80 GS swing arm that I used.
This is how it mounts up. I used wing nuts for ease of removal and a quick disconnect on the wires to the tail light. If you look deep under the seat, you can see the 3 nuts holding the front Z piece in place. On the upper side I used countersunk machine screws that came out flush in the fiberglass under the upholstery. So to remove the seat, you need to remove 2 wing nuts and bolts, pull the QD and slide the seat to the rear. Takes about a minute.
Thanks Chris. great work - really neat install. I have a fear that fiberglass seats will rub through or break up and I'm always looking for ways to fully support them on the frame rails. Obviously that isn't necessary.
I think that Lane has flat strap from his top shock mount that matches a Dzus fastener, but I have no idea how he mounts his at the front.
This evening I looked at the seats on our FZR400 and it also uses a simple tongue mount at the front and a single Dzus at the rear.
On TZ, the fiberglass pan is bolted down hard and doesn't rest on the frame at all, but later bikes all cushion fiberglass in rubber grommets with inner steel sleeves. That method doesn't work well for a stressed seat.
The thing is that a well designed mounting system is invisible, and that makes it hard to copy good ideas - I mean creatively adapt.
