How to make a fiberglass seat pan by Nick Pearson

You will need the following items: Fiberglass resin Fiberglass mat or cloth Rubber gloves Paint brush Dust mask Plastic drop cloth Blue painters tape Mixing sticks A pan Tin foil When you decide to install a custom fender on your bike, you will no longer have the option of using the stock seat pan. You will need to make your own. You can either make one out of fiberglass or metal. I choose metal. These are the steps you need to follow to make this seat. It is easy, just messy and smells real bad. First thing you want to do is lay your drop cloth on the bike and tape everything off.

The resin gets real messy so make sure you have everything covered that you don’t want to let the resin on.

Once you have taped it all, sit on the bike and mark wear the top part of your butt will sit and make a mark. This will be the top of your seat. Now, you need to cut the cloth into sections. I used three layers of the cloth cut into the actual size of the seat. Then I cut small squares and strips.

Get your gloves and dust mask on. Mix your resin with the hardener. Once this is mixed you have a small window to work with it before it begins to harden. I laid down a piece of tin foil on the floor and used this to apply the resin to cloth. You need to make sure the cloth is completely wet, but not saturated. In this case more isn’t better. It will not make it any harder. Lay your first section down then repeat the process until you have your desired thickness. I think I laid down a total of 6-7 layers.

Now you need to draw an outline of how you want the seat to look. Wait about an hour or until the resin is no longer sticky to the touch. Pull the pan up from the sides working your way round until the pan will come off the frame.

If you have air tools the trimming will be a lot easier. I used my die grinder with a cutoff wheel. I worked my way around the pan until I had the desired shape. Then I used a dual action sander to sand all the edges and get the rough spots on the top and bottom of the pan.

The only thing that is left is to lay down which ever type of foam you want to use, cover with vinyl. You will have to drill the pan and use rivets.