Ultimate Seat Passenger Backrest

[DoggyDaddy]

After reading this forum and others for months I finally picked up a 2012 RT Limited (Lava Bronze) in February. I've got about 1,500 miles (only weekend rides to date) on it and have decided to get the Ultimate Tall boy seat and backrest. I'm planning a long trip through Central and Northern CA with my wife in August (including the Spyders in the Redwoods event) and want the additional "wiggle room" afforded by the Tallboy. What I cannot decide is whether it is worthwhile to also purchase the Ultimate passenger's backrest. I cannot find anything in the forums about the benefits of passenger's backrest. My wife is happy with the stock backrest but if the Ultimate provides additional comfort I may opt for it as well. Any thoughts or suggestions would be much appreciated.

By the way, I've been riding since 1975 and have never had people come up to me and ask questions about a bike/trike like they do with the RT. This machine is a real attention-getter, deservedly so!

 

[Fusionfool]

First of all, :welcome:
We have the same :f_spider:, I know the feeling you are having. I am 6'1" and was feeling, well like I needed some leg room, and backrest. I went first for the Utopia backrest. This helped allot and I was able to ride many more miles without pain. Then the leg / foot placement was needed. I went with the Seal Floor boards. You will see they are a sponsor on this site http://www.sealfloorboards.com/. Wow what a difference that made. We now ride easy 12 hr day's without pain. I can not say I could do that on my HD.



Be sure to take some measurements where your wife sits, how much room she needs to be comfortable with cool weather clothes and, or rain gear. The stock seat with Utopia backrest is tight, but comfortable for the wife. I just needed to put my legs forward, thus the Seal Boards.
Best of luck in your choices, and happy Spydering.

 

[Yelhelp]

Seat and 6'1"

After reading this forum and others for months I finally picked up a 2012 RT Limited (Lava Bronze) in February. I've got about 1,500 miles (only weekend rides to date) on it and have decided to get the Ultimate Tall boy seat and backrest. I'm planning a long trip through Central and Northern CA with my wife in August (including the Spyders in the Redwoods event) and want the additional "wiggle room" afforded by the Tallboy. What I cannot decide is whether it is worthwhile to also purchase the Ultimate passenger's backrest. I cannot find anything in the forums about the benefits of passenger's backrest. My wife is happy with the stock backrest but if the Ultimate provides additional comfort I may opt for it as well. Any thoughts or suggestions would be much appreciated.

By the way, I've been riding since 1975 and have never had people come up to me and ask questions about a bike/trike like they do with the RT. This machine is a real attention-getter, deservedly so!

I bought the ultimate tall boy seat and backrest this past winter . I have a couple of long rides on it (200+ mi) and I love the back rest I also got the Diamound arm rest so my wife could rest her arms when riding . This is the best add on I have done to date.:clap:

 

[captblack]

I have the Tall Boy with the back rest and love it. As for the passenger backrest, I don't know if there is much difference. Best part is the ease of removing the driver backrest to give the wife more room. I did have the BRP comfort seat with the Utopia backrest but I did not get the removal bracket so with that seat there was not much room for the passenger. The Tall Boy seat is built a little differently and with the floorboards you should be good to go. I also have Lamont's NBV highway pegs and they give some more options for changing positions.

 

[PrairieSpyder]

I have the Ultimate (not tall boy) with the rider back-rest. I don't ryde 2-up, but I have to say I love having the back-rest on long stretches.

I say get it!

 

[DocRags]

Our 2008 GS/RS has the Ultimate seat with both driver and passenger backrests. Loved them but my 2012 RT still has the stock seat and I've been comfortable with it. We had the Utopia backrest put on at Pitbull last week; now I have 2 small holes in my seat behind the backrest, which Len said has happened with a few of the Spyders using the Utopia. I am not happy about it. He's planning on using some glue and a larger base for the backrest, but I haven't been able to have it fixed because of the rain. Hopefully he can glue it tomorrow and send me the other base (which he doesn't have in brown).

The advantage to changing to the Ultimate seat backrest for your passenger, who is comfortable with the stock backrest, would be a better color match to the Ultimate seat, perhaps? You could always switch backrests at the next Spyder event; we put the backrest on the GS/RS on at Spyderfest last year since the Givi trunk backrest was way too high to provide any lower back support. The Ultimate seat had been put on at Thunder Beach the preceding October. Color match was fine, but that was a black one, not the tan that our RT has. Len told me that the tan color is sometimes harder to match.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

Thanks for Suggestions

Great feedback from all and good ideas on how I can spend more $$$ as well. Sounds like a combination of the Seal floorboards and the Ultimate Seat may be the way to go. I may end up calling Ultimate and asking them about the differences between the stock and their passenger's backrest. Since there is no price advantage in ordering it with the seat, I can always add it at a later date.

Having said that, my wife would like a bit more lumbar support, based upon her comments after today's ride..... so that could be an important factor in ordering it now with the seat.