I saw a post on the Hobie Kayak forums about adding a slider mechanism to the seat of the Pro Angler and thought it looked like a good idea. I ordered it even before taking possession of my PA. Good thing I did because my first outing proved I might need to install wooden blocks on the pedals. I’m all torso and no legs so the position I had the Mirage drive set at to comfortably peddle was proving problematic as my heels were hitting the hatch cover.
So here’s the installation write up.
Go to Cabela’s website, www.cabelas.com, and search Springfield Boat. Click here or on the pic below to take you directly to the slider mechanism.
On Cabela’s US website there are three options, choose the Universal mount.
3 days later it showed up in the mail, and it ended up shipping from Winnipeg….weird, but good, no duty. I also got a Jon boat cover, but that’s for another blog.
From what I heard this is a direct bolt in, and they were right. But here’s some tools you’ll need:
- 1/2″ wrench
- Phillips screwdriver
- 1/2″ socket
You will also need the following parts:
- 1/4″-20 stainless lock nuts
- 1/4″ x 3/4″ bolts
Fun time….
Take the seat out, and remove the four bolts fastening the seat. Also remove the seat hold down strap held on by one Phillips screw. You’ll want the slider to attach flat to the seat.
Here is the way you’ll want to fasten the slider to the original seat mount.
Using the original bolts and the lock nuts, attach the base of the slider to the seat mounts. You’ll see the back bolt just threads into the nylon portion of the lock nut. I’ll be keeping an eye on this to see if I want to use a little longer bolt or not in the future.
Next, you re-attach the seat. I used Loctite when bolting the seat to the slider. You can’t use lock washers as there is not enough clearance between the bolt head and the base of the slider. You will want to center the slider with the circular pattern of the bottom of the seat. All four bolts line up perfectly. Here’s the pics of the front and the back of the bottom of the seat.
The front bolts are easy to get in with the socket, but the back you’ll have to tighten up with the wrench. Don’t tighten them down until you get all four bolts in to ensure a straight mounting job.
Lastly, you have to reattach the strap. Snap the strap to the seat and fold it underneath to estimate where you should drill the mounting hole. Use a 1/8″ drill bit, and then screw the strap in.
The whole job takes about 45 minutes. Here’s the finished product:
Stock seat position…
Seat slid to the most rear position…
Seat slid to the most forward position. Yaaaa!!! No wooden block on the pedals for me!!
This mod also give you about a 2″ addition in height. It’s also much much easier to access the front hatch. I can’t recommend this mod enough to anyone.
3 comments
Henk van Gerwen
July 10, 2012 at 7:56 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment
That’s really great information and I ordered one today in Holland. This because if I ordered it at Cabelas it costs me US$ 160.- because of shipping+tax.
Thank you great info!
Henk
Henk van Gerwen
July 15, 2012 at 3:09 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment
Last Friday I made the same modification with the same tool as you described above and I fully agree with you, that’s very good and handy.
Assembling wasn’t to much work, the only thing is that we have here metric screw-thread, so I had to replace all the bolds and nuts.
Thanks for the info!
Fiona
July 26, 2012 at 10:52 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment
Didn’t think it would be that simple to attach a slider to a kayak. Perfect enhancement for fishing – I reckon even someone as daft as me could make get one of these up and running with this run through. thanks.