So my custom upholsterd Sparco Evo that came with my MCS is a bit ugly and I have been looking at new seats and re-upholstery but did not want to spend the money. After much searching I finally got a tip and just visited a large leather/upholstery warehouse who carries leather paint!

It is a spray paint that adheres to finished upholstery leather and it only cost $10. I really have nothing to lose as the seat already doesnt match so I bought some and will give it a try. This could be very cool for those who would like to spruce up their interior or change their leather seat color but dont want to spend much money. $10 is much better than the $1000+ alternatives I was looking at.

I will post some before and after pics when I am done. If all goes well I may get a few other colors and be spraying more than just the seat.

 

Um...if you got custom upholstered seats, why did you get ugly ones?

 

They came with the car

Good luck! Definately post pics

 

Can not wait to see some pictures! Sounds like a similar product for carpets. At my old job (auto body paint supplies) they carry stuff like this in spray form for vinyl and leather! I never used it but I know this stuff does sell!

Garrett

 

Have you thought about just swapping with somebody? I'm not sure if I'd trust spray on stuff

 

Yeah, go on craigslist, get a free piece of leather furniture first, and spray that up before you hit the sparcos.

 

No one else has a custom leather upholstered Sparco Evo that I know of, and I wanted to retain the leather. I wouldnt have trusted the paint, but when a huge upholstery company strongly recomends it, I'm game.

Anyways, I was brave and just did it. That stuff is amazing! Turned out great, looks way better and matches the gray interior better. I'll post pics tomorrow. It really looks like the seat/leather originally came that color. Now I have a custom custom Evo.

 

Slacker! Post pix NOW!

 

I wonder what the wear will be like over time. I guess it is cheap enough and easy enough to just respray it if any wear shows! lol Glade to see you got a cheap good alternative!

Garrett

 

Hope that stuff doesn't rub off on your clothes

I'm curious to see the pix.

 

The Minitor,

Do you know if this stuff will work on the stock seats? Just curious!

Garrett

 

So overall it was a success. The seats are darker and look newer, but now that it is in the natural light outside, I see that they are still not dark enough, so I am going to go buy another $10 can of paint and do it again. It was pretty painless though and came out with no runs or bleeding. The only real tricky part was masking off the blue suede. I didnt damage the suede, but I did leave a couple light spots where the tape covered the gray. Not a problem since I am going to go a bit darker anyway though, I will just take more time masking next time. This is real nice quality stuff though. 10 minutes after spraying it was dry, and when I was removing some tape residue from the blue suede, it didnt come off with water, and not even with acetone. Thats a good sign. Here are some pics:

Original color, seat masked:

Notice it looks kind of worn and dirty.

4 coats of SEM "very dark gray":


Finished product:

(2 light spots on bottom seam between the gray/blue, will fix soon)

I was pretty stoked because it looked better/newer, and then I took it out to the car and noticed that it was much lighter in the real light than in my dark condo. Good for a first try though, guess I will spend another $10 and go darker. Here is before and after.

Before:


After:


And man did that paint give me a buzz.

 

Yes, it would work the same on stock seats, and would be a bit easier to do. If I would have known about this years ago I'm sure my saab would've had bright red leather inside.

 

Was thinking maybe doing the stock seats. But I am still on the fence of getting a new seat for the driver side. But worried about the air bag light (which is on now anyway and need to have reset) and I will miss the heated seats for the winter. What to do what to do! Not sure if there is a fix for the 05 cars for the airbag light.

Nice work by the way, looks much better! Now stop wasting time and get out and get another can!

Garrett

 

I just picked up a can of a darker gray called "very dark pewter". That should do it. I'll hopefully try again tonight. I picked up a blue and a metallic silver too, maybe I'll finally get around to fixing some scratches int the silver or if the blue is good the downtubes might get sprayed. I'm so tempted to spray the leather of the steering wheel blue, I hate that dull gray. I have been looking at wheelskins but dont really like the look. This could be interesting.

 

Go for it! Just hope you do not come out looking like a blue smurf if it rubs off from the stearing wheel!

Garrett

 

No, it doesnt rub off at all.

Edit: Just photoshopped it, blue steering wheel is not good. Maybe downtubes and door tubes though.

 

What is the name of this product?

Garrett

 

SEM Classic Coat flexible coating. I just sprayed a piece of leather with the silver, it looks pretty cool. It really dries completely in under 10 minutes and is super flexible. If the gray doesnt match up I might make the Sparco Silver. Anyways, I brought it all to work as the boss is gone this week and I think I am going to start some spraying soon.

 

Just finished spraying, looks better and I did a better job masking but we will have to see it when it is back in the car, it still looks a bit light which is wierd because this was their darkest gray. I'll post pics tomorrow.

 

Does the texture feel just like the leather did before spraying it? Also, do you know if I could buy this stop online? I am interested in trying this on my stock leather sport seats.

 

Texture is similar, but a bit different. Kind of what you'd expect - feels like a very thin layer of latex paint on top of leather. The leather on my sport seat was different to begin with than the stock leather though. Feels durable, I'm not worried about it coming off. Still looks like leather too, which was my main goal. Search for SEM classic coat. Its listed as a vinyl paint I believe. I got mine from Perfect Fit McDonald who does sell it online, but I searched earlier and found it many places. The only problem is the online color charts arent very acurate compared to the real deal. Would be best to find a local dealer unless your color is an easy one. If I had stock gray seats I wouldnt hesitate to spray them body color, but that is just me. (I dont want to recomend it and then someone get mad at the result)

 

Man, I hope you are wearing a mask with all this aerosol spraying

 

No I wasnt, and neither were my co-workers. We all had big silly grins on our faces though.

 

Here's the best I'm going to get. I believe its the darkest gray they had that would match. It is still a bit off in the sun, but not very noticeable and a huge improvement.

So here it is, one custom painted leather sparco, total paint cost $20:



Not bad for $20 considering the alternative was a $1000 re-upholstery or new seats. Its a bad pic but I'm not used to the sun here in Seattle, but I really cant complain about it I guess.