Choosing the right Kart Seat

When choosing your new Tillett seat, please take into consideration that it is often tempting to pick a seat that is too big.

In a new seat, it is wise to choose a tight fit, as this offers the best protection for the ribs and the body. When a seat is too loose, the chances of damaging the body are much higher. In the course of an accident, if you move towards the side of a seat, the impact is much greater than if your body is hard against the side of the seat. In the same way people wearing no seat belt in a car crash will damage themselves far more than one instantly restrained by a seat belt. The best way to work out your seat size is by using your waist size and weight.

Download the Tillett Seat Dimension Guide - HERE

Kart Seat Fitting Instructions - HERE

Rigity and Weight

RIGIDITY

Altering the rigidity of the seat will affect the handling of the kart. To make sure that the seat you buy this year will be the same as the one you buy next year, Tillett Racing Seats are made to set specifications. Other seat manufacturer's products often vary in thickness and the mouldings are nearly always resin rich, which makes them inconsistent in rigidity and strength. Our seats are unique in that they can be purchased with various consistent levels of rigidity.

THE T5, T7, T8 Handmade, T9, T10 and T11

When you buy most Tillett seats, you can choose between at three levels of rigidity.

Flexible (a seat that allows the chassis to flex more)
Standard (based on most karts uncovered seats)
Rigid (a stiff seat with little flex )

THE T8 & T12

The T8 and T12 seats are injected into predetermined cavity, and by changing the materials, we can alter the performance characteristics with total consistency. Therefore you can order soft or standard throughout all the T8 and T12 range. (For an increased range of rigidity order the hand made T8 and T11 versions can give you the same shape with an increased range of rigidity.)

THE FLEXIBLE

T5VG, T7VG, T8VG, T9VG, T10VG & T11VG
The flexible seats were originally designed for use with Formula A karts running on high grip tyres. Nowadays we also find that these seat work particularly well with engines like the Rotax Max. An engine with low bottom end power often needs more chassis flex to lift the inside rear wheel and this helps to avoid bogging the engines down when driving out of the corners. However, many people use the flexible (VG) seat in all sorts of different classes, often improving lap times. The above is not a cast iron rule and does depend on track condition, make of chassis and tyres. A chassis, which has a problem and is not balanced, or is bogging down out of corners, can sometimes be transformed by changing the seat's rigidity.
There is also a VP rigidity, which is very thin and flexible and is only ordered by customers determined to get the most flexible seat possible. These have to be made to order, and can not be ordered online.

WEIGHT

It is easy to make a seat light, it is not so easy to make a lightweight seat that can hold a driver securely without breakage during an accident. Using carbon-KEVLAR® fabric is almost irrelevant if the resin and curing processes do not compliment the expensive fibres, with an ultra light seat most of the seat strength can be lost and fracturing can occur if every element of the seats construction is not correct.

The Carbon/Kevlar seats can be as stiff or as soft as all our other types.

The rigidity that matches our standard T5, T7, T8, T9, T10, T11 and T12 seats and most other makes, is designated 'K' in the table below.
The rigidity to match a flexible T5VG, T7VG, T8VG, T9VG, T10KG and T11VG is designated the "KG".

For a lightweight, rigid seat, order "CR".

All of the weights quoted below are approximate as the weight is also affected by size.