Jubilee seat or seat pan wanted

You can get a seat from Leightons or Bantam John. Not sure about rechroming, but youâre right itâs expensive however there is a thread on here about some impressive chrome paint.

Previously dennis_thompson wrote:

Does anyone have a Jubilee seat or seat pan for sale? Condition is not important provided the seat pan is sound. The bike is a 1963 model with the later gearbox.

I want to get the brake covers and handlebars re-chromed but I am told that this is expensive. Has anyone had similar work done and if so any recommendations? I live in Nottinghamshire.

Dennis, for rechroming i had mine done atinfo@chrome-platers.com. based in Baseford. contact Paul Neep. yes it is expensive but they do a cracking job (except on tank badges which they wonât do)

got a complete new seat including pan from Leighton, again quite expensive but produce super product, in my case for a Delux version made from scratch and a few bits ( and help from Patrick on the measurements)

I was told by someone that the Bantam John seat actually uses a Dominator seat base- so make up your own mind. The price appears to have gone up a lot-he quoted me around £115, but that was 2/3 years ago.

He has an amazing stock and his mood can swing wildly. On the day I went to see him (he is on the south side of Sheffield) he made me coffee and was very pleasant. He showed me a stock of new unused genuine Wipac original plastic lenses (telltales) which fit the early 6" Jubilee headlamp. He told me he was the only person in the world who had these yet he flatly refused to sell one of them. A year or so later I saw him at Stafford and he was unbelievably curt because I said that his price for a pair of Roadholder forks was a bit over the top (about £1000 ! ).

You mentioned chroming earlier- Prestige Chrome are on the other (north) side of Sheffield - around Wombwell- but they can be very variable. They did some genuinely brilliant jobs for me but on the other hand they destroyed a unique quarter light from an early MGB.

Patrick

My Bantam john seat cost £130 18 months ago, it could do with the mounting loops being a bit further back but works well enough, I think Uli took the cover off his and re welded the mountings Itâs in his pics somewhere!

I bought an ES2 piston from him as well and that was £120 which was a fair price from a dealer, heâs always been pleasant to me but then I didnât comment on his pricing!

dan

I bought some of those rubbers from the club and what turned up was two bits of cut rubber oil pipe! Itâs an easy enough job to move the rings back and the rear brackets? I donât have a 2inch gap prob half of that.

dan

That price for chroming is eye watering. I took a pair of the same style handlebars to Quality Chrome in Hull and I turned down their quote of £30 when he said that would be plus VAT !. I still have the handlebars on my 1959 Jubilee - still in their original chrome; we call it patina. That quote was when I lived in North Yorkshire just over six years ago. English prices seem to have gone silly in recent years.

As Dan posted I also have a seat from Bantam John.

I removed the cover and foam and found no paint on the seatpan, only the underside was painted! My welder reinforced the rear seat posts that go on the upper shock bolt which is also holding the rear mudguard. Also the front loops for the rubbers were moved further back .Then I had it powdercoated.

Dennis, there are two rubbers in stock at the NOC shop Item 21851.

The mounts on Bantam John?s seatbase are really flimsy, those for the rubbers only welded on on one side and a thin material which is easly bent. If you move back the front ones also the rear ones need to be moved back the same amount. The Lightweight seat foam also does not have that hump in the middle . It is rather flat what I can see from original photos.

I remember asking for a seat at Leighton?s but their base was the same as Bantam John?s, guess also made in India..

Here is a pic of an original seat base missing one rear post, looks rather different! (Stolen from Ian Easton?s thread)

You also need to be "lightweight" if you ride a Norton Lightweight on a replica seat!

Previously dennis_thompson wrote:

I wasn't expecting to do engineering work on a new seat!

The picture above of Ian E's seat (from an Electra)shows a genuine Lightweight seat . It is entirely different in it's construction to the Bantam John seat - even if the BJ seat looks near enough when fitted on a Standard.

I spoke to Leightons ages ago and I was definitely assured that their seat base was made locally around Birmingham and was the correct item. I didn't get a seat base from them as they only had the seat for the Standard and I wanted the early 1959 De Luxe one. Originally the NOC were taking up the re-making of a seat but nothing seems to have come from this.

I actually made my own base using my other original seat as a pattern. It does take a lot of work as the sides are separate panels to the base and it takes ages drilling all the ventilation holes. Leightons also said for certain that their seat foam was definitely the correct item - ie. no humps in it as per Dominator item.

Here's a picture of a cafe racer seat. It was the seat on my Yamton which has now gone back to standard De Luxe panels and seat.

Here's some pictures of the original Norton Lightweight seats as fitted to my 1961 Navigators. They don't fit perfectly to the tank but not too bad.

And on the De Luxe

Just to say Iâm using an unaltered BJ seat on my Jubilee, it holds my weight ok!

Hi Dennis, You must be fairly near to Newark. The autojumble there was the best place to find anything. We used to go there (my Gold Star friend and I )virtually every month. It was probably an hour's journey from north of York to Newark but we always got loads of 'useful' bits. I do miss those autojumbles; Rufforth, Scorton and Newark but Newark was easily the biggest and prices were realistic especially in comparison to places such as Stafford.

There was usually a fantastic turnout of classic machinery in the car park as well - cars, bikes and heavy commercials-and free viewing .

Patrick

Lucky you !!!!. They always used to say that if you can't find it at Newark then it doesn't exist. Happy hunting.

I'm here in Ireland in the rain. Maybe if I save up and buy my own helicopter then it's only a couple of hours flying time !!. They used to have their own helicopter landing area there if I remember properly. It must be nice to be rich.