Building a new bike part 12

Shoe Polish used to Waterproof Seat

 Hi

On the weekend, I spent a bit more time finishing the bike off.  To date it's only been used for dinky little rides under 20k or so and not for commuting. The seat was raw plywood without padding and there wasn't a lid on the tailbox and the cables from the handlebars got in the way of the view. 

So I started off the work by taking apart the seat.  The seat base is the only timber part exposed to rain as the rest is under the corflute plastic sheeting.  There wasn't anything conventional to coat the seat base with so I settled on a waterproofing shoe polish which proved to go on quite well.  Unpainted and exposed to water, the plywood seat would  swell and crack.  On my other bike I used fibreglass and epoxy resin to waterproof and strengthen the seatbase, but this bike has slightly thicker (1cm) timber on the base.

Lower Part of the seat Waterproofed

Not much more to add except that the seat padding is Ventisit or ACS10 and comes from EMP Industries.  I've tried to be tidy with all the work on the bike while simultaneously creating as big a mess in the back yard as possible.  Painting is next.

Mess

But fairly tidy bike