Ordering, Delivery, Unboxing & Fitting
What’s in the box? How well made is it? Does “Lowered” make a difference? How easy is it to fit? Today you’ll find out.
Top Sellerie Deluxe Comfort Gel Lowered Seat for the FJR1300 >2006
Top Sellerie Products on Amazon
Top Sellerie: https://topsellerie.fr
Ordering
The Top Sellerie Deluxe Comfort Gel Lowered Seat was ordered online at the end of November 2019 in time for a Christmas delivery. Luckily they had one in stock, in Portugal – more about this later, and it was delivered 2 weeks before Christmas.
Top Sellerie have 3 methods of “ordering”:
- Remanufacture: Send your original seat and receive your new seat about 4 weeks later. Pros: Cheapest and you keep your own seat pan. Cons: You can’t ride your bike for about a month! Finding a way to send your seat to them.
- Seat Exchange: Use their own seat pan and receive your new seat in about 1 week to 4 weeks depending on whether they need to build it or have one in stock. You then send your original seat back to them (you also need to pay a relatively hefty deposit which you get refunded when they receive your seat). Pros: Cheaper and you get to ride your bike while the seat is being made. Cons: Paying a hefty deposit and having to find a way to send your seat back to them
- Buy a New Seat: Buy a complete seat from them. Waiting times are similar to Seat Exchange. It’s also the most expensive. Pros: You get to ride your bike while the seat is being made and you’ve always got your old seat if you need it. You can also sell your old seat to recoup some of the cost if you want. Cons: Cost
Customer Service
Top Sellerie’s customer service is excellent. They replied promptly to my queries and were courteous and extremely helpful. They sorted out the problem with DHL (see below) quickly and efficiently. All the correspondence was in English. Top Marks Top Sellerie!
Delivery
Delivery is via a Courier Company. Mine was, unfortunately, delivered by DHL. Top Sellerie seem to have a number of outlets, depots and facilities in different countries and mine was shipped from Portugal at no extra cost to me. Unfortunately DHL managed to “lose” the package in Spain. How do you “lose” a package big enough to hold a motorcycle seat? On their tracking site it said it was in Spain and it remained there, in total, for about 10 days. After 3 days I emailed DHL and received a “canned response”. 3 days later I emailed them again and received another “canned response”, though, this time DHL blocked access to the detailed tracking info. I then emailed Top Sellerie and, low and behold, DHL “found” the package and it was delivered three days later. I think DHL needs to change their corporate slogan to “Too big to care”.
What’s in the Box?
Just the seat in clear plastic bags and bubble wrap. The seat was well protected by the bubble wrap and the outer packaging had stood up well to the delivery. If you order the Seat Exchange, you can use the same packaging to send your old seat back to them. I’m using the packaging to store my original seat safely in the garage.
The Gel seat is heavy! It’s about twice the weight of the original seat. (Note to self: weigh it and find out). The piping on the edges, the embroidery and stitching look very good indeed to my untrained eye. The Top Sellerie seat pan is stamped with the Top Sellerie logo underneath and isn’t of the same plastic material as my original seat. I don’t think this matters as it seems to be more sturdy so will handle the extra weight of the gel.
The gel is firm and the covering material feels very good. The cover is stapled to the seat pan and they’ve used a lot of staples.
Fitting
The FJR has two seats, front and rear.
The front is very easy. It fits perfectly in the place of the original seat.
The rear seat takes a bit more finagling. This is due to the extra size of the front seat and rear seat. You need to slot the rear of the rear seat in place, then while holding it down with one hand, pull the front seat slightly forward and, at the same time, push the front of the rear seat down until it clicks. It’s easy after you’ve done it a few times.
The original seat, when you unlocked it, would pop up. The Top Sellerie one doesn’t, so you need to push it push while turning the lock.
Thoughts
This seat feels nice to the touch and looks fantastic. This seat is lovely once you get the knack of putting it on and taking it off. As it’s the lowered seat, I’m no longer on tiptoe, which was a bit precarious to say the least with a bike as heavy as the FJR. I can’t flat-foot both feet simultaneously, but I can get the balls of both feet on the ground and I can flat-foot one foot very easily. For reference I’m just over 5’8″ or 174 cm with a 30″ inside leg.
So, yes! To answer the question. Lowered makes quite a big difference.
I’m very impressed with it so far and will go out and give it a thorough test and report back. So, in the next post I’ll give my thoughts on comfort, riding on it and using it on a regular basis. Until next time…
Link to the Top Sellerie Deluxe Comfort Gel Lowered Seat for the FJR1300 >2006
Top Sellerie Products on Amazon
Top Sellerie: https://topsellerie.fr
I’m not associated with this company in any way other than having bought and fully paid for one or more of their products. They are unaware that I am writing this review.