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I couldn't find a lot in the forums in regards to reupholstering the seats in a Gen1 so I figured I'd share my experience.
Disclaimer: I don't know what the eff i'm doing.
Was originally set to go with katzkin. Rep was awesome, price was just over $2500 including heated seats. But I had some questions and the local installers just didn't give the time to answer. It was clear they didn't need my business. So, as much as I wanted to go with Katzkin, I decided just to do this myself. I ended up ordering from https://leatherseats.com - also, super easy to work with.
State of current seats:
Cost of materiels:
Leather covers - $1100
Generic heating pads - $30 on ebay
DAP Weldwood Contact Adhesive - $30 on ebay
Marine button kit - $15 on amazon
Bungee cords - $12 lowes
Hog ring pliers kit - $12 on amazon
Thermistor - $6 on amazon
First thing of course, take all the seats out of the car. Plenty of guides on how to do this in the forums.
Once the seats are out, time to remove the existing covers. All seats are glued except for the bottoms of the 2 in the front.
I have a steamer that I used at first. Multiple videos/sites seem to point to this being the fastest and most efficient way to remove the old leather. But, I found it easier to use a razer blade to cut as close the condensed foam as possible and then take a 240 grit sanding pad with the grinder and just sand down to the condensed foam cushions.
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On the rear seats, the leatherseats.com replacements were a little sloppy with the stitching on the seat belt loop, and the velcro seemed cheap and overall it didn't look good. I took a drill to the buttons on the original seat so I could re-use the plastic beauty piece. I bought the marine buttons off amazon, used a seem ripper to undo the not so good looking stitches, re-stitched it and added the new button and old beauty piece. If you decide to get these seats, I would suggest you ask them to leave the velcro off and then do this method. It looks so much better.
The upper rear back seats were easy. It was a good place to start to gain some confidence. The bottom rear seat though... wow, that was not fun. I don't love the way it turned out, but I did start in the back so I could get some experience before tackling the front.
As for the front, the installation was not as bad as I thought it was going to be. For the heating pads, I did not cut the pad as the directions on this $30 set said not to. Should I have cut it - yes. Might I regret not cutting it - potentially. Will I end op taking them out of the car and re-doing them if they fail (and wifey complains) - unfortunately yes. I wanted to use the OEM switches so I pulled the thermistor out of the existing seat to test with the new pads. Running a few tests before I commmitt to anything.
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I figured since I couldn't use hog rings on the upper seats I was going to have to get creative so I might as well do the same on the bottom. I ended up sewing bungee cord to the seam of the leather, pulling it through the foam and tying it down with a washer.
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This is turning into a 2 week project. Will post an update once fully complete.
Well done.
What color is that leather ?...(black?)?
I just need to re-cover my front driver - Panther Black
The site was a little slow to load with all the (unnecessary) visual fx. So I bailed before I could get to the end of my selection.
I wonder if they sell upholstery just for the front seats?
Will try again or contact.
Thanks for the DIY pics and the link!
Flipping fantastic. Nice work. Thanks for sharing.
I did the same thing on my 300ZX two years back. I also had little success locally and practically no experience with upholstery (but was thrilled with the results). I wish I would have installed heated seat pads on mine.....doh.
Thanks. I got black leather with graphite stitching (and the perforations)
BUT - It is slighlty darker than the oem panther black seats. Could be due to the age and sun exposure of the old seats though. If you're trying to match only the top and/or bottom of a seat, you might have better luck on ebay.
If you're considering replacing only the front you'll probably have to email them. The site seems to only let you choose full sets.
Flipping fantastic. Nice work. Thanks for sharing.
I did the same thing on my 300ZX two years back. I also had little success locally and practically no experience with upholstery (but was thrilled with the results). I wish I would have installed heated seat pads on mine.....doh.
300ZX - the good ol days! I had a late model 3000GT.
I don't want to say this was easy, but I was surprised to find the re-upholstery less challenging that I expected. I do have some wrinkles, and a few hiccups I know a pro would have done a bang up job on, but, extremely content with the results I got.
Great job, looks awesome. I love the color of the old Cordoba beige combo. Looks like you went all black to something darker then panther black which in person when it was new looks like very dark gray.
Great job, looks awesome. I love the color of the old Cordoba beige combo. Looks like you went all black to something darker then panther black which in person when it was new looks like very dark gray.
MINI had some cool interiors back in the day. When i got mine i wanted this but did not have the money to upgrade.
Heeeyy! I just got my most recent ECS order delivered last night. Final bits and pieces to get this thing back on the road.
We did switch it up from cordoba to black. After 12 years of it my wife wanted a change. Had she found the right fuscia leather, it would have been fuscia and black. I tired to get her to do the R56 front seat swap, but she didn't like the feel of em. shoot, I tried to get her to just get a new model... but she's convinced the only mini worth owning was the Gen1 convertible. This is her second R52. I've seen a post with your miles somewhere, so I'm guessing you feel similar.
Its good to know the panther black is more of a dark gray/charcoal type of color. That will answer @Here2Go a question. So its not just sun fading, panther black is a lighter color. leatherseats.com does have a shade lighter called dark graphite that might be a closer match to the panther black. I think they do send sample swatches.
This thing now has:
- new top
- new headliners
- new rear trim
- new leather on seats
- new (used) carpet
- new (used) trim all the way around
- new exhaust from manifold back
- other bits and pieces here and there.
should have seats finished this weekend.
Powerfold mirror retrofit is next
And I'm still working on the custom carplay/aa nav system but the chip shortage has derailed me by months on that part.
Some more info on the experience with the heated seats.
Pretty much all instructions I've come across say to put the heating element UNDER the occupancy sensor. But, the original seat had the element on top of the sensor stiched into the seat cover. So I made the decision to install it the same way. I believe the occupancy sensors were recalled at some point, so if you haven't had yours fixed and plan to upgrade the leather, you might want to do that first.
With the old thermistor attached I was getting temp readings around 110 F. I used a 10k thermistor on my install and was getting temp readings up to 130 F.
I've seen others in the forum use a 5k, and in the BMW forums the consensus seems to be 6.8K.
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Here is the original passenger side seat with heating pad. And the seat with sensor. The sensor is held in by hog rings and the plastic from the current leather seat. I'm going to cut plastic so I can re-attach it the same way. .
300ZX - the good ol days! I had a late model 3000GT.
I don't want to say this was easy, but I was surprised to find the re-upholstery less challenging that I expected. I do have some wrinkles, and a few hiccups I know a pro would have done a bang up job on, but, extremely content with the results I got.
That's exactly how I feel on all accounts. It was kind of a fun project. Rarely challenging, but time consuming and very fulfilling.
Quick update. After 6 months, these things still look and feel amazing.
Looks good. I reupholstered a couple car seats with katskin and another brand that I can't remember. Had sore fingers/hands for days after. Learned to use the hog ring pliers though.
Question: Are the rear speaker grills gunmetal or anthracite color? Or did you paint them yourself?
@Jonny - great video. I used that to help get some confidence in what I was doing.
@RudeJoe - I used the Tesla Steel Grey spray cans to paint much of the silver and chrome in the car. Also repainted some of the parts that were already anthracite to to touch up scuff and worn areas. Its a really good match imo. Here is a thread on it - https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...e-paint-2.html
