Do-it-yourself repair and restoration of car seats. Car seats: we reupholster ourselves How to cover seats with leather

Reupholstering car seats is a procedure that can be entrusted to a specialized salon, or you can do it yourself. You will make the interior of your car original and unique. The reupholstering process is quite painstaking, but the result obtained is worth the time and effort.

Do-it-yourself seat reupholstery begins with the selection of material. Typically, leather, suede, velor, flock, etc. are used for these purposes. It is advisable to select the color and shade to match the interior upholstery. The easiest option is to make a banner from a material of one color. Using inserts of a different color will add originality to the interior of your car.

It is worth considering that it is necessary to choose a material that is designed to withstand temperature changes and is not subject to fading. The most budget-friendly finishing materials are velor and Alcantara. They have good performance and are popular among motorists.

The most expensive material for car seat upholstery is leather. Leather seats look elegant, but be aware that they can be uncomfortable in hot weather. The problem can be solved by using air conditioning in the car.

To reupholster a car seat you will need: needles, strong sewing threads (Extra Strong or for shoes), adhesive interlining (3–5 m), foam rubber, marker, scissors, sewing machine and glue.

Preparing for reupholstery

Working on reupholstery requires perseverance, patience and following recommendations.

Before you start updating the seats, it is necessary to carry out preparatory work:

• dismantle the seats, which are secured with four bolts. Before doing this, disconnect the battery terminal and electrical wiring terminals.
• remove all fragments of old covers and sign them. In addition, it is better to write the name of the material that will be replaced in this place.
• remove the standard cover from the seat, first bend the metal clips from the back.
  cut the cover at the seams, it will be used to cut a new one.
• calculate the material. Take measurements of each part of the old cover. Make a pattern, leaving at least a few centimeters at the edges.

Constriction technology

Place the pattern from the old case on the selected material and fix it. This will allow the pattern and material to remain stationary while tracing and cutting. Also, be sure to leave a space of 2-3 cm from the outlined edges.

If you choose Alcantara for sewing covers, it is worth remembering that this material is fleecy, so you need to make sure that the pile is in one direction. The selected material can be reinforced with fabric-based foam rubber. The foam rubber itself is connected to the fabric with glue, which is best sprayed with a spray can.

The next step is stitching the flaps. The edges of all elements are carefully sewn together using a sewing machine. Then you should cut off all unnecessary strips of foam rubber. All seams must be glued to each other from the wrong side. After the glue has dried, beat off all the flaps with a hammer and sew with a double stitch.

Before installing a new car seat cover, you must thread the straps. Then turn the product inside out and pull it first onto the back and then onto the seat. Using plastic clamps that are threaded through special holes, pull the cover to the base of the “seat” and secure it by the spoke. Pull the edges of the new trim evenly over the seat.

If leather was used as upholstery, after stretching the cover over the seat, it must be warmed up with a stream of hot air. A hairdryer will work for this, but don't go overboard with the heat.

At the final stage, the covers of the upholstered seats need to be steamed with an iron (through the fabric). The technology is simple.

Advantages of reupholstery in the studio

If there is an urgent need to upgrade car seats and funds allow, it is better to have the covers reupholstered in a workshop. The main advantage of reupholstering car seats in a sewing workshop is that the service is performed by experienced professionals.

In addition, the workshop will offer you proven material and help you make a choice. The service will also be provided with a guarantee. If necessary, the order can be completed in a short time.

Video “Do-it-yourself interior reupholstery”

From this video you will learn how to properly reupholster the interior with your own hands.

Sooner or later, the car owner begins to think: shouldn’t the interior of his “iron horse” be reupholstered with leather? The reason for these thoughts can be anything. For example, the car is already old and the standard interior covering has become unusable. Or the car got into an accident and the airbags deployed, turning half dashboard. The reason is not so important, the answer to the question is important: is it possible to reupholster the interior yourself? Can! Let's try to figure out how to make a tight fit correctly.

Selection of cladding material

When choosing genuine leather for interior trim, you should remember several important nuances. First of all, this material varies not only in quality, but also in physical properties.

Genuine leather: characteristics

On the surface of real, untreated genuine leather there are a lot of different defects: cuts, scratches, pockmarks. This leather is only lightly sanded and impregnated with acrylic emulsion. Due to impregnation, the material becomes more durable, but practically stops breathing.

There is a second option: leather without impregnation, with a completely preserved “natural pattern” (called mereya). This material is not very durable. But it is very convenient and incredibly expensive. The explanation for the high price is simple: only the highest quality skins that have passed the strictest selection are used to produce such leather. The material is not embossed or impregnated. And the resulting leather is only slightly colored with aniline dye.

The relationship between the durability of leather and the degree of its processing can be seen in the graph.

The graph shows how stain resistance varies depending on the type of leather treatment.

On the top line is leather without aniline impregnation (aniline unprotected). And at the very bottom there is the so-called split leather (also known as split), which can hardly be called leather. But it is very durable. Today, the above options are used less and less for interior decoration.

Aniline and acrylic have been replaced by polyurethane impregnation, which makes automotive leather durable, resistant to temperature changes and mechanical damage.

Eco leather: reviews

Eco-leather is an artificial material created specifically for finishing car interiors. It appeared recently, but has already gained popularity among car enthusiasts. The reason is simple: in all respects, eco-leather is comparable to natural leather. And some characteristics of this material are even better than those of traditional leather (in particular, resistance to mechanical damage and temperature changes). It is for this reason that high-quality eco-leather, as a rule, costs more than natural leather.

The conclusion from all of the above is simple: the choice of material for upholstering the interior depends primarily on the financial capabilities of the car owner. If he needs an excellent result, it makes sense to spend once on eco-leather and forget about problems with the interior for many years. In cases where you do not plan to invest a lot of money in tuning the car, it is reasonable to upholster the interior with leatherette. Well, if a person is a supporter of everything natural, then you can “tighten up” with ordinary skin.

Car interior reupholstery process

Before moving on to actually replacing the existing coating, you should select everything you need for the job. Here it should be said that the amount of leather for covering the interior can vary from 8 to 15 square meters. Exactly how much material is required depends on the specific car model. The same rule applies to materials used for sound insulation (in our example it will be foam rubber).

Tools and Supplies

To carry out the work you will need:

• leather;
• foam;
• stapler;
• hacksaw;
• drill with a set of drills;
• threads;
• universal glue;
• sewing machine;
• Phillips screwdriver;
• flat blade screwdriver;
• marker;
• pattern paper;
• sandpaper;
• plywood;
• construction hair dryer;
• masking tape.

The sequence of actions when reupholstering the interior with your own hands

Before proceeding, it should be noted that the process in question consists of three stages. This is the pulling of the doors, seats and ceiling of a passenger car.

Covering doors: instructions and photos

Do the work in this order:

1. Using a damp cloth, the door trim is cleaned of dust and dirt. Then it is removed using a Phillips screwdriver.
2. The removed casing is covered with masking tape, all protruding parts (except the handle) are outlined with a black marker.
3. Next, the tape is carefully peeled off. Holes are cut in it in accordance with the previously drawn lines. It turns out to be a kind of stencil or pattern.
4. This stencil is placed on a sheet of plywood and outlined with the same black marker.
5. The resulting shape is cut out with a regular hacksaw, the edges of the plywood are carefully aligned and sanded with coarse sandpaper.
6. Using a drill, holes are made in the plywood mold for the window handles.
7. Now a layer of foam rubber is applied to the sheet of plywood, followed by leather (the leather must be cut so that there is a margin of at least 2 centimeters along the edge).
8. The above stock of leather is wrapped and stapled with reverse side plywood form.
9. Then holes for the door handle and for the window lifter handle are carefully cut in the leather with a knife.
10. The resulting leather cover is carefully removed from the plywood blank.
11. The cover is stretched over the previously removed door trim, the edges of the cover are stitched manually from the reverse side.
12. Similar actions are performed with other door panels of the car.

How to cover the interior ceiling panel

Covering a car ceiling is a little more difficult. However, if you do everything carefully, the result will please you. To do this, simply follow the algorithm below:

1. The ceiling panel is unscrewed using a Phillips screwdriver and removed. The standard coating is cut off with a knife, then the panel is cleaned of dirt and glue residues.
2. After initial cleaning, the ceiling panel is sanded with fine sandpaper.
3. The panel is applied to the skin and outlined with a marker. A piece of the required size is cut out of the leather (when cutting out a piece, you must leave a margin of at least 2 centimeters of material on each side).
4. Universal glue is applied to the middle of the sanded panel. Then skin is applied to it and fixed.
5. Now a strip of universal glue is applied to the edges of the ceiling panel (along the entire perimeter).
6. The skin is carefully straightened from the center to the edges and glued to them (to do this, you just need to press it down firmly).
7. The remaining supply of leather is tucked over the edge of the panel and glued to the back side. Using a knife, holes are cut in the leather for the mounting bolts.
8. The leather-covered panel is mounted in its original place.

Car seat reupholstery technology

More experienced craftsmen will be able to remake seat covers. If this is your first time starting this type of work, scrupulously follow the sequence of actions below:

1. The seat is unscrewed and removed from the car interior.
2. The old cover is carefully cut off from it. Moreover, the cover must be cut strictly along the seams (it is best to do this with a thin stationery knife).
3. The resulting fragments of the old cover will serve as a pattern. They are applied to the skin and outlined with a marker. Then fragments of a new cover are cut out of the leather (each fragment is cut with a mandatory margin of 2 centimeters around the entire perimeter - this is necessary for stitching the sections).
4. The resulting pieces of leather are glued onto foam rubber. After the glue has dried, the foam rubber along the edges of the leather is cut off. Now the elements of the leather case have a foam lining.
5. Pieces of leather with lining are sewn together using a sewing machine.
6. The resulting cover is placed on the seat, the resulting folds of the skin are slightly heated with a hair dryer and smoothed out manually.
7. The reupholstered seat is installed back into the cabin.

Video: reupholstering the seat with leather

The cost of reupholstering the interior in a tuning studio

It is very difficult to say how much it will cost to reupholster the interior, since the cost is influenced by several factors.

• car category;
• material price;
• number of elements to be dragged.

The last point has a particularly strong impact on the cost of work, since not all car owners try to completely renovate the interior. Some limit themselves to just seats. Others reupholster the seats and ceiling, etc. Estimated cost of reupholstery individual elements is given below.

Table: how much does it cost to reupholster interior elements with leather?

From this table it becomes clear that the price of a leather interior for an ordinary passenger car can vary from 60 thousand rubles and more. Reupholstering the interior with high-quality eco-leather costs about the same.

Even a novice car enthusiast can reupholster the interior of his car with leather. All you need is patience and ability to use sewing machine. If the car owner does not have such a skill, there is no need to be upset. You just need to practice a little on regular fabric before sewing leather.

Car seats today are very high. In order for repairmen at a car service to undertake to replace the seats of your car, they will first give you a preliminary invoice, which you are unlikely to like. What to do if the seats have become unusable and need to be replaced? It's simple. Learn to do it yourself!

The seats are in disrepair

It has long been noted that the level of comfort from driving a vehicle depends on the interior decoration and the condition of the seats. And it’s not for nothing that in the process of car production, famous designers hire brilliant designers who can beautifully design everything inside.

Over time, everything ages, including. It is clear that such eye damage will not please. Sagging chairs, in addition to being aesthetically unpleasant, also cause discomfort. While driving, passengers and the driver himself are unable to relax and the seats constantly cause inconvenience.

How to eliminate these flaws with your own hands? Nowadays, this will not be difficult to do. Everything can be eliminated: upholstery defects, scuffs on armrests, tears in seat backs and much more.

Often forced to repair road accidents. Even the most can damage the integrity of the seat frames, and the previous luster of the interior will disappear.

Preparation

Before you start changing anything, you should arm yourself necessary tools and, most importantly, decide on the material. A lot will depend on the material: the price for it, etc. It’s not the same thing: working with leather, vinyl or textile fabrics. Although the essence of repair is the same everywhere - repeatedly covering the damaged area with a specially selected composition, and then carrying out heat treatment.

To begin with, it is useful to choose color scheme, with which we will work. This will depend not only on the taste of the owner, but also on the integrity of the painting. Everything should look harmonious.

We start, of course, by dismantling the old seats. If the seats are upholstered in leather, they will need to be removed. It is advisable to work at home, where it will be more convenient to place fragments of leather or Alcantara on the upholstery material. It is recommended to sign each part of the standard cover, indicating the name of the material from which we will prepare the cut itself. You can use a regular marker to make marks.

We remove the standard cover from the car seats. We remind you that the chairs must be removed so that the work can be carried out comfortably.

We remove the old cover as follows: press out the metal clips located on the back of the chairs. The cover always comes off upwards.

After removing the cover, we see a frame made of foam rubber. It will also need to be removed. This will not cause any difficulties, since the foam frame is held in place only by paper tape.

Lumbar support

We will need a set of the following tools and devices:

• nuts with washers;
• cold welding;
• long bolt;
• tow strap;
• a homemade plate made of easily bendable material.

We take the nut and clamp the plate, after which we press it with cold welding for reliability. We bend it. Here it is important to pay attention to the following: the belt itself is placed on parallel supports and the friction process occurs only at the edge. Cold welding will help where the components should be built up so that the belt lays flat.

We fix the belt with a long bolt so that it does not fidget. To secure the bolt, fixation with glue is provided. Thus, it will not spin and the bolt will not go anywhere.

Padding

Let's move on to working on the material. The removed cover will need to be ripped apart first. In this case, it is necessary to divide it into separate parts in order to subsequently use it on new material.

We press each piece of leather or Alcantara with weights to the new material. Take a gel pen and trace the edges of the material. To combine the flaps, we mark them with short notches along the perimeter. It is worth knowing that Alcantara, like leather, can be easily cut with scissors.

Alcantara is a material that looks more like suede than leather and has a short pile. This pile is directed in one direction. This is very important to take into account when cutting, because if the direction of the pile is not the same, flaws may form and it will look bad.

The next stage in the work involves reinforcing leather or Alcantara with foam rubber. This is a prerequisite for proper re-upholstery. Repairing car seats with your own hands is not a difficult task, but there are many nuances in this work that you should know. And foam rubber is one of important little things. It is imperative that the thickness of this material be 5 mm, and on the reverse side the material must be fabric-based.

The video shows how to repair car seat upholstery:

Glue foam rubber only with spray glue! All pre-cut parts of the covers are glued to the foam rubber, not from the fabric side, but from the foam rubber side.

It is important to know that under no circumstances should you apply foam rubber for upholstering seats with a brush. This way you can easily. The thing is that the glue is able to penetrate deep into the pores of the foam rubber and, if you squeeze it a little, glue the entire internal structure of the material. And the foam rubber will not return to the reverse position. Therefore, you need to glue the foam rubber correctly: using a spray can. For example, the German adhesive spray Mah has proven itself well.

When working with Alcantara, it is important to place the pieces of flaps with the pile in one direction when cutting.

When sewing, you need to use a good sewing machine. A sewing machine that will be able to sew with a lockstitch with a triple feed is suitable. This type of sewing will allow the drive to slowly advance the material. about 10–30 thousand rubles.

After we have sewn all the parts, we need to glue the seam flaps that are apart to the sides on the wrong side. First of all, we cut off the strips of foam rubber remaining near the lapels, and then we clean the leather or Alcantara lapels for gluing. After this, we move the cuffs to the side and press them against the foam rubber.

The video describes in detail the process of reupholstering a car seat:

It is important at this stage of re-upholstering to beat off the seams of the material on the foam rubber. This should be done with a regular hammer.

Now we sew the lapels and for this we use a double finishing stitch. You should know that there is no need to trim the free edges behind the stitching thread, since this will not be noticeable under the foam rubber.

We continue repairing leather car seats. We have a new cover, which we turn inside out and straighten it out. Now you need this very case and . It seems easy to do, but it's not.

To make it work, you need to start from the back. First we thread the straps, and only then we pull the cover to the back of the chair.

At this stage of work, you can turn a regular driver's seat into a sports seat. To do this, we extend the sides of the seat using polyurethane and give them the desired shape. You can simply take pieces of foam rubber and glue them to the side of the seat. Next, you will need to cut fiberglass plates of the desired shape and install them on the sides of the seat. Then glue thin foam rubber onto them. The entire structure must be strengthened and tightened as a single chair.

After you put the cover on the back, you should move on to the “seat” of the chair. Usually there will be no difficulties in this part of the chair. Everything should go smoothly. Unless, of course, the seat has a relief shape. Then you will have to use plastic clamps that secure the cover to the frame. These same clamps will need to be threaded through the pillow. There are special holes there, and then hook onto the spoke. As for the edges of the cover, they need to be pulled onto the frame of the chair along the contour.

Seat leather repairs should always end with drying the tightened parts and steaming them. Leather cases should be warmed up with a stream of hot air from a hair dryer. And it is important not to overdo it so as not to burn the material. When treating leather cases with a stream of hot air, do not overdo it!

After the leather dries, it will stretch over the structure of the chair like a drum. It wouldn’t hurt to iron the seats with steam, but be sure to use a cloth.

The reupholstery is complete. All that remains is to clean the stains left by fingers and glue, as well as various abrasions.

They will last a very long time, especially if you carry out repairs and care for the chairs in a timely manner. In the process of reupholstering, you can improve other elements of the interior of the cabin, that is, doors, ceiling, panel, etc.

A car may have an ideal body and wheelbase, have a powerful and unworn engine, but if its interior looks “worn”, then the whole impression of the car will be spoiled, and it will be perceived as second-rate. In this case, one of best solutions The car seats will be reupholstered, which you can do yourself without any problems.

Let's not lie self-upholstery car seats, although it can be done without unnecessary problems, will require maximum concentration of attention from you and will take quite a lot of time. If you have the means, it is better to leave this work to professionals. If you are determined to update your car seat covers yourself, then in this article you will find all the necessary information.

What material should I use to reupholster car seats?

There are five most common materials for upholstering seats in vehicle: flock, vulure, Alcantara, suede and genuine leather. Usually, the color of the material is chosen based on the color of the car's interior trim, but if you want something special, then no one forbids you to choose a different color. Also, it is worth noting that you can completely cover the seat not with material of the same color, but make inserts that will improve appearance car interior, although, of course, one-color seat covers are much easier to make.

If you want to reupholster the car seats, you don’t have to go to a specialized salon; you can solve the problem yourself. In this way you can update the appearance of the interior, give it an original style and remove worn out seats. To perform this work, it is not necessary to have a sewing education; it is enough to have a sufficient amount of patience and desire. The work of changing the casing cannot be called difficult, but at the same time it is quite painstaking.

Materials and tools:
- Perforated eco-leather (beige color used) 2.5 m
- Eco-leather without perforation (beige color was used) 1.5 m
- Artificial leather (black used) 3.5 m
Note: you should choose special leather for the car; it is designed to withstand temperature changes and is also resistant to fading. Furniture leatherette is not suitable due to the fact that it is not adapted to the conditions of a car, but is only suitable for apartment conditions.
- Thin foam rubber thickness 0.5 cm (for gluing leather parts)
- Furniture glue
- Sewing machine
- Leather needles No. 90 or 100
- Threads for sewing leather (regular ones are not suitable, suitable marked Extra Strong or for shoes) three 200-meter spools
- Adhesive interlining 3-5 m
- Machine oil

Step one. Preparation of material.
All existing foam rubber was glued with non-woven material using an iron. This procedure is required so that during operation the foam rubber can withstand the load on it and does not crumble. An additional benefit of non-woven fabric is that it makes the foam easier to slide when sewing.

Step two. Preparing the seats.
For convenience, the seats can be removed from the car. Next, you need to remove all the old casing.

Step three. Marking.
At first glance, looking at the case, everything seems quite clear. But when the old case is cut into pieces, it will be very easy to get confused. Therefore, the author, armed with a marker, numbers each part of the case. To remember which number corresponds to what, the author drew a diagram of each seat with backs on a piece of paper and numbered the parts of the cover. Using the numbering on the trim parts, it will now be impossible for the sheet to get confused.

Step four. Knitting needles.
On the back of the cover there are pockets with knitting needles. Since they will be needed for the updated covering, they needed to be pulled out and put aside for now. The location of the spokes was also noted on the paper diagram.

Step five. Preparing the pattern.
After all the preparations, you can rip out the covers and cut off the seam allowances. This is what the patterns for the new skin look like.

Step six. Open it up.
Every detail was transferred to leatherette. To avoid getting the parts in a mirror image, they are applied to the wrong side of the material, wrong side up.

Step seven. Seam allowances.
The author made seam allowances of 1 cm on all necessary sides. All parts are also numbered.

Step eight. Tenderloin.
All prepared parts of the cover are checked again, after which they are cut out.

Step eight. Set of parts.
Thus, the author received a complete set of parts for the covers. In the photo, you can see back seat, the back and front seats are made in the same way.

Step nine. Glue.
As mentioned at the beginning of the article, leather parts require sizing with foam rubber. The author only had to do this work with beige leather, since the black leather was already glued when purchased. The glue was applied with a rubber spatula and brush. Before the main gluing, the author practiced on scraps.

Step ten. Features of gluing and knitting needles.
When gluing the perforated eco-leather with foam rubber, the glue began to seep into the holes. Therefore, the author decided to glue the backside first with non-woven material, and then glue foam rubber to it. The general picture looked like this: leather, non-woven on it, foam rubber on top of it, and then non-woven again.
After the parts had dried, you could start cutting them out and start sewing. Starting with the central parts, markings for the lines were applied.
The knitting needles were attached from the inside out, and their future location was marked by checking the drawn diagram. For the knitting needles, strips were cut from the fabric of the long knitting needles. Folding the fabric along the knitting needles, sewed the necessary parts to the wrong side.

Step eleven. Lines.
Decorative stitches were made with a sewing machine, while the front side of the material was oiled for better movement of the foot along it.

Step twelve. Assembly of parts.
When all the parts were ready, it was time to start assembling. All elements of the cover were sewn into one, checking the drawn diagram. All parts were ground down one by one.

Step thirteen. Clothespins.
Stationery clothespins can be very helpful when working with a sewing machine. The author used them to connect the parts for smooth sewing; their advantage is that they do not leave marks on the material.

Step fourteen. Appearance.
After sewing machine you need to cut off the excess foam.