Replacement leather driver's seat insert, 1999 SLE?
Thread Starter
Senior Member
Posts like a Camaro
Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 922
Likes: 8
From: Gilroy, California
The local upholstery guy. I'm sure he'* marking up his materials, and I'm a businesman myself, so I have no objection to a craftsman (he DOES do good work) making money.
Senior Member
True Car Nut
Joined: Mar 2004
Posts: 3,066
Likes: 10
From: Ames, Iowa
I got replacement leather for my torn driver'* bolster from a Le Sabre in a junkyard- then matched it to my '92 SSEi with leather dye (paint) from my local shoemaker. The back seat bench cost me $30 and has enough leather to do at least two bolster repairs. I removed the cover, pulled the stitches, and used the removed piece for a pattern. I also own a commercial sewing machine that sews leather. Most guys ain't gonna' have these. But you don't have to do too many re-upholstery jobs to make the $300 price (Harbor Freight) pay for itself.
And all you have to do is sew just a bit away from the original perforations in the adjoining vinyl and leather to hide the old seam. My job wasn't perfect in this regard, but you would never know it unless you were looking really carefully.
Just my $.02
And all you have to do is sew just a bit away from the original perforations in the adjoining vinyl and leather to hide the old seam. My job wasn't perfect in this regard, but you would never know it unless you were looking really carefully.
Just my $.02
Junior Member
Posts like a Ricer Type-R
Joined: Apr 2005
Posts: 14
Likes: 0
From: North West AR
Originally Posted by randman1
mrpontiac80, I do have one question for you but I'm having trouble wording it correctly. We'll use the left bolster section for an example cause this is usually the section most would be interested in changing. This section has the top stitches (I believe you call them "baseball" stiches in the industry) as do the adjacent sections. I assume that these need to be removed in order to sew the new section in. My question is about the looks of the adjacent sections which are now preforated from the previous baseball stitch. How do the pros go about hiding this preforation?
Actually we call a seam with a stitch on both sides a French seam and a seam with a row of stitches on one side only a Top stitch. In answer to your question though... To do the job properly, you should replace any other section that is part of a french seam or top stich, because the stitch holes will have to be "taken up" or hidden OR you have to get back into the same stitch holes that are allready there which is tough sometimes. However, you can jsut replace the bad section and do one of the above meathods to deal with the old stitch holes but I just do not recomend it.