It's a little bit misleading in the photos because the photos are of the pads on the seats. The seats in the kayaks are hard molded plastic, and the foam just goes on top of it. When I was checking out my kayaks this morning I would say that the smaller pad is about 3/8" thick, and the larger is maybe 1/2" thick. I generally sit on the hull with no padding or anything, and I like it a lot for probably all of the reasons you do. BUT- what I don't like is when I launch in surf or get in with wet feet and water gets into the cockpit. Then I end up sitting in water for hours and hours. I bought some Immersion Research Guide shorts with neoprene lining, but they don't keep you from getting wet, just from getting cold when you're wet. So the idea is that I would sit on something to get my rear out of the water. I'm going to try it out- what I plan to do is fill out the places where it's shaped to scoop up I"m going to fill it out with foam, and put the whole thing together so that the flat part is flat on the hull. So that would make it no more than about 3/8" Some day I will put more work into getting UN-locked out of my account so I can post photos.

m