replacement seat

[OLY-XSer]

has anyone tried to put a sportster seat on a 80sg. I know it won't be a drop on fit, but will it fit and look right with some customizing?

[xs11lover]

Can it be done? Yes, for sure. Will it look right? that all depends on how good a job you do and what sporty seat you have. I've done it a few times some worked some not. The plastic inner fender will show unless you move the fender up. Some of the sportster seats just don't fit the tank no matter what you do.
This one worked

This one didn't

This dyna seat worked

This dyna seat sort of worked

Notice all of the fenders were moved and the inner feneders cut to fit.
This is how I got the pan to mesh up with the tank.

BUT ARE ANY OF THEM BETTER THAN THIS RECOVERED STOCK SEAT. Your local upolster shop may be your best bet.

[OLY-XSer]

thanks, the pics help alot. My seat is perfect, I just like the look of the harley type seats. Your red bike is the look Im after. I like the bobbed rear without going crazy on it.

[crazy steve]

There's a lot of variations in Harley seats, so it will really depend on which seat you use. If you use a low-profile seat like Lover used in the first two pics (aka 'badlander', 'gunfighter', etc) quite a bit of the plastic inner fender will show. Same thing will be true of the solo Dyna seats he shows, or any solo seat. If you go with a more 'standard' design, those will cover most of the plastic fender so you won't have to 'bob' the fender quite so much, maybe not at all. The Sportster seats are also narrower than the Dyna seats, so more of the XS frame will be exposed.

I haven't really looked at the '04-up Sporty seats, but the earlier ones wouldn't be a hugely tough install. They're basically all the same '82 through '03, with the only major difference being the front of the '96-03 seats are about 1 1/2" shorter to fit the later larger fuel tanks; over-all length on the early seats is about 29". I test-fit one of my 'spare' '82-95 seats on the SG I'm working on and it would only need minor shortening to fit, maybe none; the later seats may be a bit short.

The other thing to keep in mind is the OEM HD seats use a easy-to-mod plastic pan (I've reshaped these with heat), but most of the aftermarket seats use either fiberglass or some fairly stout steel pans; not so easy to mod...

You will have to cut out a space for your TCI to get the seat to drop down (or relocate it somehow), but the rest shouldn't be too hard.