As some of you may know from a previous post, I’m not a fan of the latest generation of air saddles and air saddle covers, mainly because in my experience, when you sit on them the air transfers from the rear of the saddle to the front of the saddle.
Finding a more comfortable saddle became paramount for me because after training to get my legs in condition to return to skatepark riding, I started having bad pain in my rear end. I think this was partially my own fault because I never wore bike shorts and I went on fairly long rides without getting off the unicycle to take some breaks. However, I’m not certain that I wouldn’t have ended up with some degree of pain even if I had done those things, due to the fact that unicycle seats are just inherently uncomfortable.
The pain caused me to stop riding for over six weeks, or maybe even a bit longer. I was really bummed out thinking that I may not ever return to unicycling. This motivated me to buy some padded cycling shorts and try implementing an idea I came up with a while ago for a DIY air saddle. I am very happy to report that my newly assembled DIY air saddle works incredible well!
To assemble the air saddle I purchased this inflatable lifting cushion from Amazon:
https://www.amazon.com/QWORK-Inflatable-Lifting-Cushion-Installation/dp/B0CPX6NBWK/
It comes in a pack of four, which worked out nicely for me, since I will soon have a total of four unicycles. At $3.00 each, they are extremely affordable!
I inserted the cushion between my saddle and my saddle cover and then used an adjustable strap to keep the left and right sections of the air cushion that went beyond the top of the saddle folded against the sides of the saddle. After the assembly and returning from my test ride, I noticed that the sharp back corners of the cushion were poking a hole in my saddle cover. As you can see in the photo, the front corners of the air cushion are rounded, but the rear corners (the side where the pump hose is attached) are not rounded. To fix this issue I cut the two sharp corners off. Since I felt like the stiffness of the inflated air cushion would probably still be likely to eventually tear my saddle cover, I decided to strap it down, which seems to have solved the problem. My new DIY air saddle exceeded my expectations! It is by far the most comfortable unicycle saddle I have ever had and I really like that I am able to use the hand pump to adjust the level of inflation to the amount of air/cushioning I like most. If you are looking for a more comfortable unicycle saddle than what is currently available, I highly recommend assembling your own air saddle using an inflatable air cushion. If you do, please post to this thread to let us know if you used the same air cushion as I have or if you chose to use a different one and to also tell us about your experience assembling your new DIY air saddle and what you think of it. Thanks!
UPDATE: Don’t cut the corners off! Apparently doing so damaged the air cushion, so it no longer stays inflated. When I tested it prior to cutting off the corners, it worked great. Once I cut the corners off (just minimally), it caused a leak. I will re-assemble it with one of the other three cushions that I didn’t modify.
Also, the rear strap I used to hold the rear corners down isn’t really working, unfortunately. It keeps sliding down. Oh well, I guess two small holes in my saddle cover isn’t too bad a trade off for having an air saddle that is very comfortable.
. Maybe some hockey tape could be helpful in replacing one or two of the straps?
- no chafing, no cramped bum.
(oops… what did I say….)
