How-To: No-Weld Solo Seat Mount for H-D Frames with Pogo seats

Our friend Joel has been moving fast on his Shovelhead project. It's got the aforementioned Shovelhead motor, and one of those Harley frames that was originally equipped with those godawful pogo seats.

Joel has a much more tasteful and tiny seat in mind for this bike, and but he didn't want to weld a hinge tab to the top tube... not even a nice one.

So, he knocked out the heavy chunk of cylindrical steel you see here. Trouble was, he didn't have a plan for securing it inside the frame.

That's where my cheesy BMX roots came in.

By chucking this baby up in a lathe and taking a couple swipes at it with some drills and milling bits, we devised the contraption you see here:





The photos tell the story better than words can>



After Joel popped the centerbore down the shaft, Scott here cut the wedge shape off the end with a bandsaw.

con'd...

Joel runs another bit down the top section of the mount to give our quill bolt some room to move. There needs to be some side play between the bolt and the inner walls of the upper piece so the bolt can shift as the wedge creeps up under tension.



Joel chucked up a milling tool to put the flat based countersink in the end of the piece. This way the hardware's head will disappear and leave room for the hinge on the nose of the seat to rest cleanly between the tabs on the bracket.

Joel probably has 7-10 hours into this thing before final shaping, polishing and chroming. When it's installed, however, it's going to work great and look dope doing it.

Thanks to Scott for helping with the dirty work on this deal.

Glad I could lend a hand, Leoj.

Now thats using your noggin. I was wondering where the bmx reference came in. Please keep us updated on this one. Oh and you better get a copywright before it ends up in a catolg for a bizillion dollars

Cool!


I still rock the quill stem. One of these day I'll advance to the 00's and get me one of those clamp on jobbers.

Nice, smart thinking, and brings back some memories too.

wouldn't that set the seat a bit too far back on the frame? i take it you'll need those (dreaded) seat springs - but how far back will they be mounted and where?

pogos get a bad rap. you need to tweak 'em. ask me how...

HEY - safety glasses, ladies. you'll look cool with an eye patch, though. just sayin'