Vinyl Sport Seat Repair

[turner.e30]

Hey all, anyone on here successfully done repairs on vinyl sport seats? I've seen plenty of threads specific to repairing leather, but not a good one specific to vinyl. I've got black vinyl sport seats in my 318is that have some cracking on the bolsters. Overall they're in pretty good shape, so if there's a good method to repair it I'd rather do that than reupholster. I'd love to see some before/afters with methods!!

[cory58]

By cracking, do you mean tears or bad creases where the finish has flaked off?

[turner.e30]

Just bad creases. There aren't any cracks all the way through the material down into the foam, if that's what you're asking. I'll add some pics here in a bit.

[cory58]

Just bad creases. There aren't any cracks all the way through the material down into the foam, if that's what you're asking. I'll add some pics here in a bit.

Yes - that answered my questions. I will let others post about vinyl repair because I have no experience. Due to the nature of vinyl, I doubt there's anything that will give the results people get using the Leatherique process on leather. What I can do is point you to the sellers on eBay who sell replacement seat cover sections. If you have one or two bolsters that look bad, you can buy just new bolsters in vinyl. The cost is reasonable and there are many DIYs on the interweb to help you disassemble the seats and install them.

[Vincenze]

You'd better change the foam if you haven't.
When it crumbles, the cover is not supported, and it'll be destroyed in no time.

Black vinyl that isn't perforated should be very easy to match at any upholstery fabric store. They should have batting, needles, etc.

[turner.e30]

You'd better change the foam if you haven't.
When it crumbles, the cover is not supported, and it'll be destroyed in no time.

Black vinyl that isn't perforated should be very easy to match at any upholstery fabric store. They should have batting, needles, etc.

The foam seems to be in good shape from what I can see, but I haven't dug into it very deep yet. I was hoping there would be a way to fill and dye the cracks to make small repairs, but it doesn't seem like that's very viable with vinyl. Oh well...

[Vincenze]

The foam seems to be in good shape from what I can see, but I haven't dug into it very deep yet. I was hoping there would be a way to fill and dye the cracks to make small repairs, but it doesn't seem like that's very viable with vinyl. Oh well...

If the foam is 30-years old, it can't be in good shape.

Essentially, the left driver seat bolster fails the first. If you try to push on it, the cover may move and stretch too much when the foam is bad. Then the cover cracks.

You can try to glue cracks.