nvrlft

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This year I have decided to forego costly mechanical updates to my 1991 C4 and take on some DIY restoration projects. I have had the exterior buffed and polished and now follow my mechanics advice to use a spray on quick wax after every hand wash. I also replaced the front hood seal, headlight rings, and rear spoiler wall. I am looking forward to doing the lower side rails as those seals are completely gone.

These projects pale in comparison to this undertaking which is the restoration of the interior leather. The seats are badly faded, cracked, and stiff. The driver’s side has two grooves cut into the leather and the passenger side looks like it experienced a chemical spill. I would rather not discuss this further…
Anyway, the initial removal of the seats was a nightmare. It took half a day in the summer heat of Virginia to wrestle them out. Three of the 10 bolts required an impact wrench. Clearly the seats had never been removed. It is fortunate that I ordered a full set of new bolts as most of the originals are thoroughly hosed. I will be using anti-seize when I reinstall. It was a fun tour of the crap below the seats. Coins, old pack of gum, and an old Blaupunkt amplifier (its available) were all removed. The seats are now happily ensconced in my wonderful gf’s garage.

I can report on each step taken. This is a project that requires a great deal of patience as the leather needs to thoroughly dry and rest between sessions. I estimate it will take 7-10 days to complete. I usually start going crazy without the car after about 4 days so I need to stay focused!

I have made a trip to Home Depot and ordered Restore kit #3 from Leatherique. The HD trip was about $40, primarily towels, spray bottle, latex gloves, etc. the restore kit was $185, Color Code LG for Porsche Cashmere Beige.

Here is a rough outline of tasks:
1. Take seats apart if possible
2. Clean seats with Laquor Thinner to remove any surface dirt and strip as much as possible – Let dry
3. Apply liberal amounts of Rejuvenator Oil. I figure this will be 2-3 sessions with a full 24 hours of drying per
4. Apply Prestine Clean – Again 1-2 sessions
5. Apply Prepping Agent and wet sand with 600+ wet sand paper to remove surface cracks – 1-2 sessions
6. Use Crack Filler (colored with dye) to fill deeper cracks
7. Apply 2 coats of dye by hand using soft cloth or paper towel. Dye can be 10-20% diluted. Always maintain integrity of the dye by using bottled water and clean/new containers
8. Apply final 1 or 2 coats of dye with a spray gun. This is TBD as I haven’t committed to buying this piece of equipment

I appreciate any feedback on this list as I work through it. I will try to post before/after shots as I work through this. The rear seats and door panels seem to be in good shape so I plan to hold off on them as the colors may match up rendering further work unnecessary.

Jon Hansen

My seats are Light Gray and I have done them several times with the Leatherique conditioning system and Glyptol dye system.
If your seats are cracked badly just in the bolster areas, You can spot strip all the dye off down to the leather with lacquer thinner. There is no need to strip off the entire seat's finish if it's not all bad.
After stripping, I wet sanded the leather using 400 grit and Prestine Clean to smooth out the cracks. I applied the dye from there, after conditioning and allowing overnight dry time.
I just used a small (1" x 2" x 1/2") piece of dish sponge and blotted on the dye for all coats. Put the sponge on the mouth of the dye bottle and invert to get dye on the sponge. Just apply very thin coats and the results will be so smooth it looks like it was sprayed on. If you get any crud in the dye, you can brush it off or resand it between coats.
Don't apply too much dye to try and fill in the cracks. That will only make it look worse when the excess dye cracks off. I've never used the crack filler. I just feathered the cracks out with sandpaper and it worked fine.
By using the blotting method you can add a few extra coats of dye to the stripped off areas to achieve good color hiding, and then feather the color into the good areas.
Once you achieve good color, only add about two more very thin coats, especially if you have had lots of cracking. Too much dye is not good.

If you don't know what you are doing with a spray gun, you will cause an expensive mess.
Have fun!

c didy

Nice approaches. Jon, can you tell why you had to do it several times? How long can you expect this to last?

911Jetta

NVRLFT and Jon,

Great description of the process. I have black seats so they hide their wear much better, but one of these days I want to make them perfect, so your tips are very helpful to me.

Is it easy to switch seatbacks?

I'd like to put my passenger seatback on the driver's side. It has almost no wear and the cushioning feels a tad firmer. It looks like an easy conversion, but I'm worried about a spring or bolt coming undone and then spending 10 hours getting a spring back in the right slot...

nvrlft

Switching seat backs sounds like a great idea. See the Day "1" post below/

Boeing 717

I did this a while back, it came out awsome. I pretty much did what you did, go easy on the Sandpaper though. Buy the cheapest airbrush you can find it doesnt have to do anything but spray.

nvrlft

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Seat Dye Project Day 1 – Laquor Thinner
This first piece of the project went as planned and was a real stunner. The LT removed a top layer of goo that appeared to be dirt, grime, and old dye. The amazing thing was the “real” condition of the leather was exposed and it is not a pretty sight. As you can see in the pictures the amount of cracks and discoloration is remarkable.

I had purchased a packet of four sponges. I went through 3 of them and they were totally corrupted and were immediately sent to the trash bin along with several rags and latex gloves. The fumes were bad. I wiped down the seats with a damp cloth after the application to get any remaining residue off and to neutralize the chemical.

My initial plan included separating the seat and seat back. However this quickly proved too complicated as they are power seats and I didn’t want to screw up the configuration. Hopefully I will be able to get a good consistent finish where the seats are put together. Someone with more expertise and experience might not have a problem taking them apart, I opted out of this.

All in all it went smoothly and I am glad I did a lot of reading as the amount of crud that came off and the true condition of the seats could have been a shocker.

UPS is scheduled to deliver the restore kit today. Next step is applying the first of several coats of Rejuvenator Oil.

Jon Hansen

The first time I did it was mainly due to my over cleaning with lacquer thinner.
The Light Grey gets dirty quickly, and I ended up eating away the color in a few spots. (My learning curve. I now use Prestine clean.) I prepped the seats for the redye with a quick rub of lacquer thinner after cleaning and conditioning, and only really had to dye the problem areas as the color blends quite nicely.
The second time I just did the drivers side bolster and outside seat bottom panel. I had filled in cracks with dye, and the dye was flaking. I stripped to the base leather on the second bit of maintenance and sanded the cracks out for the most part.
Once your leather gets older and starts cracking, you could end up doing this process in the problem areas every few years. It depends on how picky you are and of course, the color.
The Glyptol dye in reality is no more than a water based (latex) paint system.
It is economical, easy to apply, and the results are satisfactory.
Regular conditioning with Leatherique or similar is important to keep your leather from cracking and fading.
I buy it by the gallon and transfer it to a trigger style spray bottle for EZ application. It works great for leather couches and on the vinyl interior surfaces too.

nvrlft

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Seat Dye Project Day 2-3 – Rejuvenator Oil & Prestine Clean

Not as much drama involved in this step. The instructions that were included with the Kit seem to imply that this is a “lather-rinse-repeat” process. Yesterday evening and then again in the morning I applied generous amounts of the rejuvenating oil to the seats and rubbed it into the leather. I had purchased a spray bottle and the spray pump conveniently fit onto the OEM bottle so I was able to spray. There are no fumes from this. This evening I plan to hit it with the Prestine cleaner and then two more applications of oil, followed by a second, final, application of Prestine. The seats will then need to rest for 48 hours before moving into the most important step of prepping, sanding, and crack filling.

At this point the estimated time to complete, start to finish, is forecast to be 13 days. June 22 to Jul 5

nvrlft

Quick update on the seat project - End of Phase II

There has been significant schedule slippage due to an unexpected surge in social activities. I completed the oil/clean phase of the project this AM. I used about 3/4 of the bottle of Rejuvenator Oil and all of the Prestine Clean. I did perhaps 6 applications of the oil using the spray bottle then hand rubbing and all of the cleaner, applying it with a towel or sponge. The leather is much softer and pliable. There has not been a dramatic change in appearance since I applied the laquor thinner last week.

The seats now need to "rest" for 48 hours.

The next steps are most important. I will be applying the Prepping Agent, crack filler, and sanding. Before/after photos will be provided as I move through this 3rd phase.

In preparation for the dying process I went ahead and ordered a cheap compressor/air brush system. Hopefully this small investment will make a big difference in the final outcome.

nvrlft

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Over this weekend I moved on to the prepping agent (PA) and the sanding. This was relatively straight forward but there were several lessons learned...especially for those of us that get over anxious and may want to veer left and skip a step. My initial foray into this was to soak down the seats with PA and with a sponge rub it in to commence the removing of the existing dye. This was very effective. As you can see in the photo of the paper towels there was a lot of dye removed. The seats lost color and more bad stuff was revealed.

After this initial step I attempted the crack filler (pic not included). This was an error as the next step should have been wet-sanding the leather with using the PA. So anyway, I used the crack filler and it became apparent that this would be a very effective product. I did not have a lot of deep cracks, but rather many spider webs. The only real cracks were on the driver seat, left bolster, as you may be able to see in the photo. I was concerned that the next time I hit it with PA and sanded the crack filler would disintegrate.

I will leave you in suspense as to what happened next

Anyway, this initial soaking down of the leather demonstrated the effectiveness of the PA and showed the remarkable damage to the leather beneath the dye.

The next step is more PA in conjunction with wet sanding and then 48 hours of drying and resting

nvrlft

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The prepping agent (PA) piece of the project is complete and the seats are happily recovering in the garage. The earliest the actual dying process can begin is Tuesday evening, although I think I may be busy.

As previously mentioned there were several lessons learned during this phase. I would hold off on the crack filler until the sanding and PA application is completed. But, if you looking closely at the photos, the CF did stay in place, in the deeper cracks during this. So I do not feel this need to go back in and reapply.

The 2 biggest lessons involved the use of the PA and the sand paper.

I nearly ran out of PA so I would have used less of it in the beginning.

The sandpaper was most important. In order to be careful I purchased 800 grit wet/dry sandpaper. This was reasonably effective but I sensed I wasn't being aggressive enough, especially in decreasing the spider web cracks in the aged leather. I hit the drivers seat fairly hard with the 800, but, purchased 400 & 600 before starting on the less gnarly passenger seat. The 400 worked best. It really smoothed the leather and you could see the dye being pulled out and the cracks disappearing. I used the 800 to complete the finish.

Both seats are now nice and smooth with most of the cracks sanded away. Although the drivers seat is remarkable damaged. The passenger seat is very dull from the removal of dye.

I feel extremely confident that the project is on track for applying the dye.

Additionally, I mentioned the project to my neighbor, Tom the Caymen owner, and he has a super nice air compressor and spray-gun. Who knew! This will make the final application much easier and nicer, Thanks Tom!

I will post again in a couple of days with notes on the initial painting.

nvrlft

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I did the initial coat of dye yesterday evening. I diluted the dye by 20% (1 to 4) and this created a solution that was easy to spread and very smooth. I masking-taped all the handles and rails. I used a small brush to work dye into the smaller areas such as around the seatbelt extension and in the cracks around the seat padding. A professional painters sponge was used for the majority of the seat, a small roller was used for the long smooth seat backs.

As you can see in the photo, the dye is very smooth. The small white spot on passenger's left is some of the crack filler peeking through. It will be covered on the second coat.

the plan now is to spray the seats Saturday morning and maybe have them reinstalled Sunday evening. I will post the final update then.

Dsqr964

Well this posting and the results give me hope for my seats. -D²

Good work btw.

nvrlft

Yesterday evening I applied the second coat of dye and there were a couple of lessons learned to share. The surface was not as smooth as I had hoped/thought/imagined. I hit some portions of the seats with 800 grain wet sandpaper. This seemed to help.

As I applied the second layer I was far more careful about leaving any excess dye OR bubbles, which I felt are the main culprit. The diluted dye is very frothy after shaking to mix and does not release this air easily.

After each seat was completed I buffed with a clean dry towel. This also helped smooth the surface and picked up any remaining dye. The dye dries very fast due to the thin layers being applied so there was little need to wait on doing this rubdown.

Given this I will be doing a third manual application prior to the spray gun scheduled for Saturday. I will leave extra time for sanding and the seats should be perfect for a finely sprayed final application.

In other good news I ordered an OEM shift boot cover via Sunset Imports and it appears to be on its way to me (via Germany). Hopefully this will put an end to that particular drama.