Experience with Spirit Line kayak seat?

Advice
#1

http://shop.skinboats.com/product.sc?productId=2&categoryId=2

#2

Good

– Last Updated: Jun-18-11 12:17 PM EST –

It's a good product, the attached hip braces are a nice design. I found it a bit narrow - not the distance between the hip braces, but the ridges along the sides of the seat hit me funny. The fix was easy, I sanded them down to make the seat pan wider and it was fine.

Here it is installed in a skin boat, before I re-contoured the seat pan:

http://i97.photobucket.com/albums/l234/carldelo/SC-1%20mods/Newseat020.jpg

#3

Spiritline seat
I have one and agree with carldilo that is is comfortable, but it’s a bit tight in my Biadarka. Sanding the sides a bit would work.



Dave

#4

Looks good but

– Last Updated: Jun-18-11 9:28 PM EST –

My question should have been more specific. I have an Emotion Glide recreational boat with a built in seat. It's really just more poly shell with a thin padding to the back and bottom. The beam on this is wide, 28", and the cockpit wideth is 19".

What I was thinking was that the Spirit Line could fit over that and add the side/hip bracing, which I don't currently have.

Do you think this would work? Or would I end up with a heavy pad over an existing seat?

Thanks.

#5

Nope
The Spirit Line is a full-thickness seat with a flat bottom - it’s a minimum of 1/2" to a max of about 1" thick or a little more. You’d have to remove the seat that’s in the boat to install it. If you look at the rest of the photos in the linked album, you’ll see I had to notch it heavily to install it over the ribs in my SOF.



http://s97.photobucket.com/albums/l234/carldelo/SC-1%20mods/

#6

"Nope"
Agree with cardelo assertion that you should remove the present seat to install a Spiritline seat. The reason is that the thickness of the Spiritline seat (see cardello’s post) on top of the present seat would raise your center of gravity too high.



Dave

#7

negative reports
Since I’m getting negative reports of users after a while on this and other sources, I think I’m going to pass on this particular seat.



Any recommendations on hip pads instead?

#8

negative reports
Since I’m getting negative reports of users after a while on this and other sources, I think I’m going to pass on this particular seat.



Any recommendations on hip pads instead?

#9

Not negative
I don’t want my remarks above to be construed as a negative review of the Spiritline seat. It works fine and is a good product, it just doesn’t appear to be appropriate to your application.



It sounds like you just need some minicell foam hip bracing and maybe an additional thin squishy pad on the current seat if the existing padding isn’t enough. NRS has many outfitting options, and there are certainly many other sources:



http://www.nrsweb.com/shop/product_list.asp?deptid=1764