How to Install or Replace a Bicycle Saddle - Extended Version

this video will be part of what I call my basic bike maintenance series and in this one I'm going to show you how to either swap out or install a bicycle seat if you are somewhat unfamiliar with this process before you get started I would recommend taking out your phone and just snapping a couple photos with a couple different angles the current configuration also take notice of the level of your saddle this saddle is really level and you want to put the other saddle back on at the same level you have this one and if you're installing a new saddle I would recommend going flat and then you can adjust it from there different seat posts have different configurations this is a two bolt configuration and you'll have some that are a one bolt configuration this is an example of a one bolt configuration and you would just loosen this single bolt to get the saddle off the only thing that you're going to need to do this is either a four or five or six millimeter allen wrench depending on the configuration of your bike and a little bit of grease is handy and I'll show you where we need this later on I'm going to loosen the bolt on this you'll notice that I've got quite a bit of thread sticking out and this is where your photo helps to kind of go back to the same amount of thread sticking out on both sides so I'm going to use my five millimeter allen wrench and since this is a two bolt configuration I'm going to start to kind of loosen these evenly and what we're going to do for this is we're going to try to leave one of the bolts in and actually I'm going to try to leave both of them in and I'm going to loosen as much as you can without the bolts coming out so pay attention to where the threads are you will loosen this note you'll notice on this as with most seat posts you have a bottom plate and a top plate and the rail of the saddle fit in here now also your photo will help to know how far back or up your saddle is adjusted and you can put it back the same way so let's go ahead and lose from these as much as you can without the bolts coming all the way out alright I've got these pretty loose about as loose as I can without them coming out sometimes when it's really loose you can just kind of work the saddle out like this if that does not work what you're going to have to do is loosen what read one of the bolts in and then loosen one and try to lift up the plate so that you can get the settle out that way most of the time that will work there are a few occasions where you would have to remove both bolts and completely remove the plate and then just do that in reverse order when you're installing the new saddle fortunately for this one I don't have to remove angular Bowl so I'm going to put this on back in to make reinstallation easier before you reinstall the other saddle or install a new saddle I'll wipe everything out real good so I've taken a paper towel not just put some basic isopropyl rubbing alcohol on it you just wipe everything down because you get a lot of dirt and road grime coming up from your back tire hitting the saddle and you can get some junk in there now this is where it does tell so what I'm going to do is I am going to take off one of the bolts here and be careful because most of the time you're going to have something at the top like this little nut at the top that goes in and this can fall out so now that I've got the plate and by the way this is the bottom plate just make sure you put it back in the same way so I'm just going to wipe everything down real good before I reinstall the other saddle and I'll also recommend wiping down the rails of your saddle so even the one you're taking off just to keep it clean and this is a new one that's going on I'm just going to make sure those are clean and get those what rails wipe off if you don't what can happen is you can get some sand articles and it can cause some creaking before I put the new saddle on this is where the grease comes in I always recommend putting just a tiny bit of grease on a bowl kind of working it on the threads and this is an area that like I said before it takes a lot of spray from the rear wheel if you get a lot of water and stuff in there it can cause some corrosion on your threads and that can cause the threads to kind of seize up and it's no fun to have a seized up bolt on a bike so I've got that one and I'm actually going to take this one out and put a little bit of grease on those threads as well now it's time to reinstall or install a new saddle and I'm going to put a little bit on my fingers and I'm just going to put some grease on the rails and that will also keep the rails from creaking it's not real common but it can happen and then you don't want to have too much so if you get a little excess just wipe it off just a light stand coating on those rails now I'm going to try to work this back in hopefully I can do this without having to remove one of the bolts and it's kind of hit or miss and sometimes what you can do is push the saddle forward and then rock it back into the channel of those plates and like I said it just takes a little patience we take a little trial and error to get these in and if you're not successful keeping the bolts in I was able to get it by moving it forward if you're not successful doing that you're going to have to just remove one of those bolts and then you're going to have to just do it with the plate lift it up a little bit so you probably also will have to pull down on these bolts as you tighten them or put your finger on top because that little nut will pop up and there's a little channel of those going on and you just have to put your finger on the top of that not to it is it let that so I'm going to tighten this just kind of remember how much thread you had sticking out and then I'll tighten the other one now I've got these bolts fairly snug and I like the two bolt design because it's a little easier to adjust really fine-tune the adjustment of the saddle in terms of its tilt so if you wanted to tilt it forward like this you would first of all loosen the back bolt and then tighten the front bolt and that will bring the nose of the saddle down and of course if you want to tilt it back loosen the front bolt and then tighten the back bolt and you can really fine-tune the adjustment again look at your photo make sure the rails are in the proper position and you'll notice on the rails there's a max line right there probably can't see in the video but that is you don't want the saddle back past that so this little edge of this plate you would not want the saddle back so the max line is past that and there's also a max line in the back so pay attention to that and to Snug these up I always recommend a torque wrench if you have one if you don't it's a good investment it can pay for itself if it just saves one component and you will sometimes see torque specs on the bike this one on the back says 8 Newton meters and I'll show you that in the video so the back of this seat post has the torque specs and if you can see that it says 8 NM or 8 Newton meters I'm going to go 7 I'm a pretty white guy so I'm going to just finish torquing this down to 7 Newton meters the last thing that you'll want to do is just sit on the bike and see how it feels and make sure it doesn't feel like the saddle is too far forward or too far back again if you're doing this with a new saddle and you don't really have a reference go flat and then adjust from there so that's how you swap out or install a bicycle saddle if you have any questions or comments leave them below and if this video was helpful for you give it a thumbs up for me if you don't mind thanks for watching

Channel: Clint Gibbs

Views: 97,766

Keywords: bicycle saddle, bicycle maintenance, install a saddle, replace bicycle saddle, bike repair

Id: ORrMMjet7_c

Length: 9min 14sec (554 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 12 2017