1987 3.2 Carrera Backdate project - Sladeys hotrod

[sladey]

Once the brackets had been made for both seats it was time to move onto the colouring. I'm a bit nervous about this as I keep worrying about all my clothes turning red after driving the car. Anyhoo, I haven't got a lot of money invested in the seats so It's got to be worth a go.

I ordered a colour changing kit from the furniture clinic. They offer a colour matching service - I sent in my vinyl and they matched that.

To start out you go over the leather with leather prep and an abrasive pad. This roughs it up a bit and takes the colour off a bit. Stinks like hell.

Once all that's been done do something similar with alcohol cleaner

The drivers bolster had some damage on it, which had previously been repaired (not brilliantly) - stripping off the covering exposed this



I bought some flexible filler and sanded this area down and filled the worst of the cracks.

[sladey]

Once it was all treated and masked I was ready to start the dying process


After a bit of spraying


It was after I'd done the first coat on the two seat backs that I decided I would read the instructions again. D'OH!!!!!!

You're meant to do a few coats with a sponge before you start spraying. t055er! On the plus side the main reason for doing this is to get the dye into all the cracks, and I can still do a couple more coats like that before returning to spray gun; and also I can do it properly on the bases

This is what it should have looked like after the first coat



I may have started them wrong but they are looking Ok so far


The other point is the colour itself. When I first got it I was gutted as I thought it was nowhere near. However after just painting 3 coats onto some scrap leather I was pleased with the results



If it's properly sprayed on it won't be blotchy and the colour will be close

[DustyM]

So how did they turn out in the end Mark, pleased with them?

[sladey]

This has (as usual) taken a bit longer than anticipated.

The colour went on nicely - once I'd used all the die up I was pleased with the finished colour





Then it was time to spray the sealant on. Totally cocked that up - managed to more or less squirt it onto the seats and then had to wipe it all off. After a bit of research on t'interweb I found out what those knobs on the spray gun actually do. The next morning I tweaked them and had another go - got a lovely fine spray (if anything fractionally too fine) and managed to put 5 coats of sealant on.

At this point they looked like this


It's taken the shine off which is not so good, but I've got to put some leather protection cream on after a week and I'm expecting that to bring things back a bit

Here's one of the seats joined together again - pretty pleased so far


I then had to colour the side panels that I'd removed previously. My plan was that rather than dye the leather on those I'd re-cover them with the vinyl used throughout the car. The originals were scuffed in a few placed and I felt it would tie the seats in to the rest of the interior.

In my mind this was no big deal - a bit of sticking and gluing. However there are 7 different panels on each seat - each requiring re-covering. Also on the Ferrari seats the belt is attached to the seat on both sides - at the plug in bit and at the end of the belt. I wanted to have it connect to the sills on the porsche as it did before so it meant altering the cover to suit. Here's what it looked like before I started



Cut this lip off


Fibreglass it in


Bit of filler and I'm good to go


Bit of cutting (this is from the other side)


And one more piece done


The seat back required a bit of straightening with the small hammer


But it all went together pretty well


Just to be clear those side/rear panels are the vinyl and the rest is colour-matched dyed. I'm pretty pleased with the match

And one in the car this morning (doing the other one tomorrow night)


Although they look different to the door panels this is the way the light is coming in - if you look at the cover round the seat belt socket - that's the vinyl again - and the match is pretty damn good

Starting to feel weird driving to work in a non-scruffy environment - weird in a nice way though

Just to add - I got my dying kit from the furniture clinic https://www.furnitureclinic.co.uk/ - very pleased with their stuff (though I used my own compressor and spray gun instead of the supplied artists spray gun and propellant cans)

[jtparr]

looking good Mark....just refrain from white pants to work for a few days I guess.....

[Bootsy]

looking good Mark....just refrain from white pants to work for a few days I guess.....

Ditto, I suggest driving 'commando'

[Lightweight_911]

The seats have turned out really well Mark - it will be interesting to see how they stand up to regular/sustained use.

[sladey]

Thanks - yes they'll get a good testing from now on. Friday should be the acid test as the drivers seat goes in thursday night

[DustyM]

Bloody hell Mark, that's fantastic, what's the next challenge.....

[sladey]

Make custom seat-reclining levers
Re-do the dashboard
replace windscreen
fit old stereo, external amp and ioplay streaming thingy
Sort out paintwork runs/orange peel
re-do bits of paintwork blebs
Fit canems engine management stuff to engine
fit ITBs (??)
Wash, rinse, repeat

[jury]

They turned out really nice Mark! I actually like the matt finish, but imagine some shinier areas will start to appear with abit of use....'signature patina' As Mr Parr said, refrain from wearing the white linen suit for afew years.

Bet the car stinks of glue and leather dye

[Nige]

Top result Sladers. I'm surprised you haven't had your signature stitched into the seat backs, I think you're missing a trick by not doing that.

[Uk911]

Cracking job they look the dogs .........KS , well done.

[KS]

Cracking job they look the dogs .........KS , well done.

I didn't do anything.

[Bootsy]

No but you're the tail end of testicles