Terry leather saddle durability?

Just got a Terry Liberator leather (Italian) saddle from Performance to
replace a two year old Cloud-9 lycra-covered saddle on which the lycra was
wearing through.

After one 17 mile ride on the Terry (dry conditions), the leather top on one
side was chaffing off (actually the surface coating on the leather was) over
a 2 sq. inch area. Looked like what happens to your skin after it has been
in water a long time and you rub it making the dead top layer chaff off.
Same thing was happening on the other side on a smaller scale.

I was utterly shocked. I bought leather because I thought it would be more
durable. (The leather seats on our 13 year old Toyota have never done this.)
Is this typical of the leather Terry uses? Is this typical of other leather
saddles? It can't be, I hope. Who would buy the things?

This crushes my favorable opinion of Terry.



- GRL

"It's good to want things."

Steve Barr (philosopher, poet, humorist, chemist,
Visual Basic programmer)

"GRL" wrote in
:
I was utterly shocked. I bought leather because I thought it would be
more durable. (The leather seats on our 13 year old Toyota have never
done this.) Is this typical of the leather Terry uses? Is this typical
of other leather saddles? It can't be, I hope. Who would buy the things?

How heavy are you? Some bike saddles use a super-thin leather cover that can
wear out pretty quickly under a very heavy rider. Compare those to a thick
leather saddle like those made by Brooks.

"GRL" wrote in message
...
Just got a Terry Liberator leather (Italian) saddle from Performance to
replace a two year old Cloud-9 lycra-covered saddle on which the lycra was
wearing through.

After one 17 mile ride on the Terry (dry conditions), the leather top on
one
side was chaffing off (actually the surface coating on the leather was)
over
a 2 sq. inch area. Looked like what happens to your skin after it has been
in water a long time and you rub it making the dead top layer chaff off.
Same thing was happening on the other side on a smaller scale.

I was utterly shocked. I bought leather because I thought it would be more
durable. (The leather seats on our 13 year old Toyota have never done
this.)
Is this typical of the leather Terry uses? Is this typical of other
leather
saddles? It can't be, I hope. Who would buy the things?

This crushes my favorable opinion of Terry.

I think you got unlucky. I put over 4K miles on my leather Terry Butterfly
saddle just last year and it's going strong - no rubbed off places at all.
On my new bike I've ridden about 1200 miles on a different Terry Butterfly,
also leather, and same results. Also, my husband rides a leather Terry Fly
and put over 6K miles on last year with no problems.

I'd return your saddle for an exchange - sounds like it is defective.

Good luck!

It's not the leather itself that is wearing. It's the finish coat coming off
from contact with my cotton shorts. In any case, that old saddle was
lycra-covered which is nowhere near as tough a material as any leather I'm
familiar with...and it lasted two years with the wear-through coming at the
corners, probably exacerbated by lots of sun-exposure (my bike lives on my
bike carrier when not in use with the saddle covered by a plastic bag).

This Terry saddle wear is on the flat surface area, not the corners. It
looks like the result of really poor leather finishing. I mean really poor.

--

- GRL

"It's good to want things."

Steve Barr (philosopher, poet, humorist, chemist,
Visual Basic programmer)
"Ken" wrote in message
...
"GRL" wrote in
:
I was utterly shocked. I bought leather because I thought it would be
more durable. (The leather seats on our 13 year old Toyota have never
done this.) Is this typical of the leather Terry uses? Is this typical
of other leather saddles? It can't be, I hope. Who would buy the things?

How heavy are you? Some bike saddles use a super-thin leather cover that
can
wear out pretty quickly under a very heavy rider. Compare those to a
thick
leather saddle like those made by Brooks.

GRL top-posted:
{text moved}
Steve Barr (philosopher, poet, humorist,
chemist, Visual Basic programmer)
"Ken" wrote in message
...
"GRL" wrote in
:
I was utterly shocked. I bought leather because I thought it would
be more durable. (The leather seats on our 13 year old Toyota have
never done this.) Is this typical of the leather Terry uses? Is
this typical of other leather saddles? It can't be, I hope. Who
would buy the things?

How heavy are you? Some bike saddles use a super-thin leather cover
that can wear out pretty quickly under a very heavy rider. Compare
those to a thick leather saddle like those made by Brooks.

It's not the leather itself that is wearing. It's the finish coat
coming off from contact with my cotton shorts. In any case, that old
saddle was lycra-covered which is nowhere near as tough a material as
any leather I'm familiar with...and it lasted two years with the
wear-through coming at the corners, probably exacerbated by lots of
sun-exposure (my bike lives on my bike carrier when not in use with
the saddle covered by a plastic bag).

This Terry saddle wear is on the flat surface area, not the corners.
It looks like the result of really poor leather finishing. I mean
really poor.

So take it back.

Bill "problem solved" S.

Now why didn't I think of that? (Actually it's sitting in a box waiting to
go back to Performance.)

You may recall that the original post had a number of questions. Not one of
which was "Anybody know if I should send it back to the vendor?"

But thanks for stating the obvious, anyway.

--

- GRL

"It's good to want things."

Steve Barr (philosopher, poet, humorist, chemist,
Visual Basic programmer)
"S o r n i" wrote in message
...
GRL top-posted:
{text moved}
Steve Barr (philosopher, poet, humorist,
chemist, Visual Basic programmer)
"Ken" wrote in message
...
"GRL" wrote in
:
I was utterly shocked. I bought leather because I thought it would
be more durable. (The leather seats on our 13 year old Toyota have
never done this.) Is this typical of the leather Terry uses? Is
this typical of other leather saddles? It can't be, I hope. Who
would buy the things?

How heavy are you? Some bike saddles use a super-thin leather cover
that can wear out pretty quickly under a very heavy rider. Compare
those to a thick leather saddle like those made by Brooks.

It's not the leather itself that is wearing. It's the finish coat
coming off from contact with my cotton shorts. In any case, that old
saddle was lycra-covered which is nowhere near as tough a material as
any leather I'm familiar with...and it lasted two years with the
wear-through coming at the corners, probably exacerbated by lots of
sun-exposure (my bike lives on my bike carrier when not in use with
the saddle covered by a plastic bag).

This Terry saddle wear is on the flat surface area, not the corners.
It looks like the result of really poor leather finishing. I mean
really poor.

So take it back.

Bill "problem solved" S.

GRL wrote:
Just got a Terry Liberator leather (Italian) saddle from Performance to
replace a two year old Cloud-9 lycra-covered saddle on which the lycra was
wearing through.

After one 17 mile ride on the Terry (dry conditions), the leather top on one
side was chaffing off (actually the surface coating on the leather was) over
a 2 sq. inch area. Looked like what happens to your skin after it has been
in water a long time and you rub it making the dead top layer chaff off.
Same thing was happening on the other side on a smaller scale.

I was utterly shocked. I bought leather because I thought it would be more
durable. (The leather seats on our 13 year old Toyota have never done this.)
Is this typical of the leather Terry uses? Is this typical of other leather
saddles? It can't be, I hope. Who would buy the things?

This crushes my favorable opinion of Terry.

I use Terry Fly Ti saddles on both my mountain bike and cyclocross bike.
I've ridden quite a few miles on both and crashed a bunch of times -
mostly offroad but a couple of times on asphalt. Aside from a slight
dulling of the finish (which I could probably fix with some polishing if
I cared about such things), the saddles have held up great and I don't
see any quality issues.

I bought both saddles from Performance as well so I'm not sure why yours
is wearing so soon (unless the Liberator and Fly are made to different
quality specs). I'd imagine you just got one from a bad run or when the
quality control employee was on a smoke break.

- khill

Just got a Terry Liberator leather (Italian) saddle from Performance to
replace a two year old Cloud-9 lycra-covered saddle on which the lycra was
wearing through.

My Terry's Liberator which is in almost daily use for the last two years is
absolutely fine. I periodically "proof" it with a gentle application of clear
dubbin, and it is absolutely fine.

Cheers, helen s





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--Due to financial crisis the light at the end of the tunnel is switched off--

I have a Terry Fly saddle with 7000 miles on it. Aside from a bit of scuffing,
it is fine. Before that I had a Terry Liberator that I put about 4000 miles on
without a problem. Maybe you have a bad saddke.

Joel

Thanks to all who replied with experience with Terry leather saddles. I
think it likely that I just got a saddle with a bad finish. Only problem
with returning it to Performance for a replacement is that the replacement
is likely to be from the same lot and the whole lot may be (probably was)
bad.

So I think I'll just send it back for a refund. Went to a local shop
yesterday looking at vinyl saddles and bought a Specialized Milano (leather,
chrom-molly, like the Liberator) which had very favorable ratings in
mtbreview. It's made in Taiwan and the leather does not have the slick
(shiny) finish of the Terry. We'll see how it holds up later today.

Probably would have bought it local in the first place when I went to look
two weeks ago and asked for leather saddles, but they said they had none.
We stumbled on this one while looking at vinyl saddles yesterday. Sheesh.
People really ought to know what the heck they sell.

Again, thanks to those kind enough to answer my questions.

- GRL

"It's good to want things."

Steve Barr (philosopher, poet, humorist, chemist,
Visual Basic programmer)
"GRL" wrote in message
...
It's not the leather itself that is wearing. It's the finish coat coming
off
from contact with my cotton shorts. In any case, that old saddle was
lycra-covered which is nowhere near as tough a material as any leather I'm
familiar with...and it lasted two years with the wear-through coming at
the
corners, probably exacerbated by lots of sun-exposure (my bike lives on my
bike carrier when not in use with the saddle covered by a plastic bag).

This Terry saddle wear is on the flat surface area, not the corners. It
looks like the result of really poor leather finishing. I mean really
poor.

--

- GRL

"It's good to want things."

Steve Barr (philosopher, poet, humorist, chemist,
Visual Basic programmer)
"Ken" wrote in message
...
"GRL" wrote in
:
I was utterly shocked. I bought leather because I thought it would be
more durable. (The leather seats on our 13 year old Toyota have never
done this.) Is this typical of the leather Terry uses? Is this typical
of other leather saddles? It can't be, I hope. Who would buy the
things?

How heavy are you? Some bike saddles use a super-thin leather cover
that
can
wear out pretty quickly under a very heavy rider. Compare those to a
thick
leather saddle like those made by Brooks.