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[cool]Good morning everyone. My question today is. If I put to much or not enough air in the bladders of my Fish Cat 4 does that affect my seating position? It seems that I have a tendency to slip forward. It happens frequent enough that I find myself pushing back onto the seat to get comfortable quite a bit. Last night after a day of float tubing and already home it came to me that maybe if the bladders were a little more firm, or maybe I have to much air. The other alternative, I thought about was securing some velcro on the seat of the tube, and on the seat of my waders. (just a thought). Then I was thinking (dangerous for me to think), that maybe my waders are to big. They fit fine around the chest. I got my original float tube equipment on a trade. The waders are meant for a taller person. I am 5'7", and weight is 218lbs. So maybe the reason I start to slide forward is because of the excess of material. Anyway some experience here would be apreciated. Looking forward to my next trip asap. Just thought I'd post a picture of my not tricked out yet tube. Tube On.
Daniel
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[cool][#0000ff]There could be any one of several contributing factors. My first guess is that it is a matter of seat adjustment. The little straps at the back, that connect the seat back to the bottom need to be as tight as possible. Next, the side straps to control back seat position need to be tight enough to hold you up but to allow a little backward leaning.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Let's assume that is all okay. Some high seating float tubes are put together slightly off kilter. I had a high-end H-3 Freestyle that was that way. It did not matter how I adjusted the seats, I was always facing slightly downhill and kept sliding forward. I even tried shimming it on the inside, with a ridge on the front of the seat, to slow me down. It helped a bit but I ultimately had to use insert seats made from cut down lawn chairs to tilt me back far enough so that I did not have to keep pushing myself back up in the seat. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]I wouldn't blame your waders. That is not the issue. If the air chambers are firmly inflated they should provide enough floatation to keep you tilted slightly back...if your seats are properly adjusted. Try all of that first. [/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]If you are over 200 pounds, you are crowding the ideal weight capacity of the Fish Cat 4. They do not have quite as much floatation in the front as the larger Fat Cats so they might be more subject to rocking forward if you lean a bit. Just concentrate on leaning backward more or at least sitting straighter.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Here are some pics of different seat inserts I have played with. The blue stadium seat might be a good option. You bungee the back of it to the back seat on your tube and it is not as slippery as the PVC seat on your tube.[/#0000ff]
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I suspect that the effort of using your legs to fin along, together with the posture of the seated position are overloading the foam seat so that it flexes and changes ever so slightly from a horizontal seat into a "U" slide.
A chap asked me about this problem a period ago, I suggested that he needed to stiffen the foam seat up, but without making it significantly thicker.
The idea was to make the foam into a sandwich with foam as the middle layer.
We discarded fibreglass itself which might cause pinhole wader leaks from an odd sharp fibre sticking out. But we used the fibreglass sandwich construction technique to solve the problem.
Take some cloth like medium cotton, denim, linen, eg an old shirt. Paint the foam seat with slightly diluted white wood glue (5 - 10% water added) which has the consistency of paint to wet it's surface. Lay the cloth onto the airboard foam. Paint over with more of the thinned white glue thus wetting all and pasting the cloth on.
Wait to dry. A hair dryer will speed up the drying time and reduce to a few minutes.
Then paint over again with undiluted thicker white wood glue to seal, and smooth the new surface. This needs a longer dry time, say overnight, but the hair dryer will cut it to an afternoon opr evening..
You end up with a very thin but tough layer laminated on top of the foam, which now has the toughness and flexibility of thin suede leather.
Give the other side of the seat the same treatment to create the sandwich effect.
The foam seat will now be greatly more rigid than it originally was.
It will retain it's shape and resist forming into a "U" shape in the middle far better than before. This gives extra support in the crucial spot needed to eliminate the sliding-out-of-the-seat syndrome.
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"overloading the foam seat so that it flexes and changes ever so slightly from a horizontal seat into a "U" slide. "
[cool][#0000ff]That is a logical thought, but not likely on a new tube. I have fished on several tubes with the rigid foam seats, without a similar problem, and I weigh well over 250. Still, adding some extra stiffness is not a bad idea. And it can be done without adhesives...especially wood glue which will not hold up well after repeated soakings. All it takes is a piece of plexiglas...or even plywood...inserted between the bottom of the seat and the pocket. You do not want to put a hard surface on the foam top because that is all the cushion there is for the seat and it is plenty hard after sitting on it a while.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]If anything, there is the possibility that the two foam seat inserts were put in wrong. They have to be inserted "side to side" rather than lengthwise. See attached pics.[/#0000ff]
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ly I have no solution.