PASSENGER SEAT COMFORT

[ohiojack]

i JUST PUT A DEPOSIT ON A 2010 VOYAGER. HOW DOES THE 1700 SEAT COMPARE TO THE VOYAGER 1200? iF WIFEY IS NOT COMFORTABLE I WON'T BE COMFORTABLE. IS THE PASSENGER SECTION BIGGER THEN ON THE 1200

[hank43]

Don't know about the 1200 seat, but the 1700 seat is poor at best. On our 2009 Voyager, Wife could only go about 30 miles then her legs would cramp up. My rear end could not tolerate many more miles than that. The 1700 seat would compress under my 210 pound weight down to the frame rail, and that was the problem.
My factory seats are stored in a plastic bag in the garage since 2012.

Replaced with a CORBIN custom made but pricey rider/passenger heated seat, and have ridden as far as 6000 miles plus on one trip, and no complaints from wife or my back side. There are other brands I have seen on this forum that are also better than the factory seat. We chose CORBIN because it is made about 100 miles south of where we live, you can arrive in the morning at 8:00 AM and spend the day watching the seat wizards making a custom seat that WILL fit you. Several times before covering the foam material, the Corbin tech will ask you to try it out, take a ride, etc. THEN they apply the leather covering. BTW, all during the build process, you are allowed to wander around the Corbin factory, watch the ladies sewing the leather covers on industrial strength sewing machines, see the multi thread stitcher at work. (That is what they sewed my seams with, using gold and blue threads on the seams) select the weight and color of material you want, specify special stitching whatever. They do a really great job, but again, it is pricey. I think our custom seats, the heaters (seperate front and rear) and a new hand made 1700 seat back to suit my wife, ran about $1100.00. We also spent a few bucks eating in the Corbin Restaurant (where you can watch the techs working on your bike thru the large windows) and a motel down the street we stayed in.

Corbin also sells pre-made seats by mail order, all you have to do is install same as factory latches. http://www.corbin.com/kawasaki/kv17v9dt.shtml The sample shown is the exact same bike as mine, I had the seats, backrest, trunk backrest, heat (front and rear) and custom blue and black leather with the 2 color stitching.

See me at the Rally!

hank43

[alta drifter]

and my experience is exactly the opposite
I have Kawasaki heated seats (both driver and passenger) and have never experienced discomfort
solo, I have done numerous (more than 10) trips of 5000 kms (3000 miles) with no complaints
with my wife on the back our trips are much shorter (2000 kms) but she has never complained about the seat (cant say she has not complained about the weather though)
I think you will find lots of people happy with the stock seat and just as many who were not happy with it
my suggestion is try and see
if you are not happy, there are lots of options

[Mr Jensee]

I think seat comfort on any motocycle seat is dependent on the weights of the rider and passenger. The Corbin was probably more comfortable because the foam is very dense and hard meaning it wont compress too far. I found my Voyager XII stock seat begins being painful after about 2 hours of continuous riding. My wife is kind of heavy as well but the times she has accompanied me we didn't do a lot of miles at a time. My first bike was a little Montgomery Wards 50cc. Now that thing being Italian had the hardest seat of all. But at the time I only weighed 128 lbs.

[ohiojack]

Somewhere I read that the tall backrest will be a lot more comfortable for the passenger. Does the taller backrest have bigger armrests? My wife misses the armrests I had made for her on my 1200.