One of the things we always wished was better on our boat was the view from the helm when sitting on the helm seat. We like the mounting position of our Chartplotter on the binnacle and don’t want to change it, so we need to be able to see “over” it. This works great when you’re standing behind the wheel. However, if you wish to sit, the helm seat is so low that not only does the Chartplotter get in the way, but the dodger and cabin top impede the view as well. Here’s what it looks like when sitting on the bare helm seat.

The boat came with a stiff factory made helm seat cushion that, when snapped to the helm seat, will boost you up by about six inches. It still wasn’t adequate. The cover on our seat cushion was starting to look raggedy so as Paula undertook to make a new cover, she also added another two inches of foam to make the seat even higher. Here is what that looked like:

It helped some, but was still not quite enough. It wasn’t practical to extend the cushion any higher because it started to become unbalanced (the height would be bigger than its width/depth) and it was beginning to make the backrest less useful. We thought about just permanently mounting a real captain’s chair to the helm seat, but there were two big problems with doing that:

1. It would completely block the passageway to get onto the swim platform.
2. It would cover up (or at least impede) access to the rudder post where the emergency tiller attaches.

So if we were to go with a real captain’s chair, it had to be easily removable and able to be stowed below. We also had just varnished the teak on top of the helm seat, and wanted whatever solution we came up with to be “friendly” to the nice finish.

We thought if we could mount a chair on top of a platform that could itself be easily secured and removed from the helm seat, that might work. To start with, we chose starboard as the material for the platform since it is weatherproof and wouldn’t scratch the varnish finish on the seat. We special-ordered a 1 inch thick piece from Boat Outfitters cut to the largest dimensions of the existing teak seat (21”x17 ¾”). The starboard color choice “seafoam” closely matches the light ivory Island Packet gelcoat color. Here is the piece as it came:

Next, we cut the starboard to match the profile of the existing seat, and then used five stainless latches to secure it to the original helm seat.

By stacking up a bunch of books on the existing seat, we determined that the optimal height for the new seat would be 14” – 16” off the teak surface of the existing seat. Since we already made up 1” with the thickness of the starboard platform, we now had to find a pedestal/seat combo that fell into the 13” – 15” range. We went with the shortest version of the Springfield heavy-duty Mainstay Pedestal (hydraulic adjustable from 10” – 12”) and the Springfield Newport molded seat. The molded plastic seat plus its cushion added about 3” to the overall height when mounted on the pedestal. This setup gave us the ability to adjust the seat from 14” (me) to 16” (Paula). The first step to mounting the pedestal on the starboard was to drill the mounting holes and recess the underside of each hole to accommodate a fender washer for the nut and bolt.

The version of the pedestal we got has a sliding seat mount allowing the seat to be moved fore and aft. It also swivels and can be locked in place at any position. The chair can be removed by pulling up the chair from the pedestal (once the interlock is released) for storage or if chair replacement is desired.

When in port or at anchor, the latches are released and the entire package is stored below in the aft cabin opening up easy access to the swim platform. Should we ever need to use the emergency tiller, the platform can be quickly unlatched for access.