Anyone done upholstery?

I have a 90 burb that has seen better days.

Anybody done their own upholstery? what materials should I look for?

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I’ve not personally but worked with an upholstery shop often enough to see that almost anything can be used and a lot of them(fabrics) are commercially available.
The base foam has to be in good condition to have the odds of success in your favor, otherwise it would entail much more work.
That prospective class in bag/backpack/apron making might be helpful, as it involves a number of basic pattern & stitching skills that are similar.

George,

I’ve done recovering using upholstery kits & the occasional piece of upholstery from the car dealer(Ford, VW, Mercedes, Porsche, BMW, Volvo etc) - that is the extent of it for seats from me. The higher the quality - the better the finished product…
Seat foam condition is key as Ferman says as well.

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What are the alternatives when the foam is thrashed? Junkyard seats?

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Mmm… this may be interesting, we have a winged chair that we bought second handed and want to re-upholster. The foam feels in perfect condition, but the fabric can be improved a lot.

We are hoping to use a cat-resistant fabric (we have 2, and one of them loves the rough feeling of the chair)

Some aftermarket folks offer replacement moulded foam made to fit your seats and covers. Like anything else you have to read the print - make sure to read the notes on what fits what etc.

Junkyard or used seats(to scavenge the foam out of - a lot of work) - but those are a crapshoot due to wear and tear and the lovely lengthy summer heat cycles we have.

Aftermarket seats are another option - but…so many of those generic “affordable” seats are made to low or no discernable quality standards…

Higher quality seats - are just that , far better in fit and finish and made to last.

Matt, does your truck have the seat belts built into the seat ? This would mean some “makery” in the future for seat belt anchors(as a minimum) for you if opting for non factory seats.

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Tom,

This is for 90 burb. a high quality seat could double the value of the truck. :wink:

I was actually thinking of something like this

My big issue is finding the right thickness and firmness of the foam

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I don’t recall when exactly the switch from Kapok to foam was made but the older seats up until the early 80s usually had kapok over springs as the “foam”.

looking through the seat, :smiley:, it appears to be foam.

Put in a couple of all-aluminum racing buckets and call it a day :smirk:

lol. sorry. didn’t watch the video.
However, if the foam you’re referring to is the white foam under the fabric, that’s the same type of foam used in the reflective backed insulation. The yellow foam is molded urethane foam and is usually on the firm side for them to retain their shape.

Don’t worry about the video, it’s a how to on making the cover.

I’ll take a look at the color of the foam tonight, but the seat is relatively flat very similar to the image on the video above.

Racing seats sound like fun, but I would need a booster seat to see over the wheel. :wink:

When new, the foam isn’t as yellow as in the video but with age it does look like that.
I have seen custom bolstered seats made wherein foam was from flat sheets/blocks and wrapped over a metal tubing form.

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LMC has a replacement piece. for 250. Looks a little pricey for a piece of foam

http://www.lmctruck.com/icatalog/csb/full.aspx?Page=80

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I would buy it, if not a salvage yard seat in known good condition.
For some reason foam is pricey.
Looked into getting some flat blocks before for some other project and they were pricey too. :frowning:
Must be the transport & storage costs.

Seat foam is pricey for a few key reasons:

  1. The raw material isn’t cheap
  2. The molds for casting the foam aren’t cheap
  3. Expertise required to cast foam successfully isn’t cheap
  4. Storage for large seat molds isn’t cheap
  5. Demand isn’t high enough to do it efficiently and make production cheap

Items like this tend to be made to order because storage is expensive and the material can degrade in a warehouse setting, and that $250 no doubt excludes the price to transport the finished piece to the buyer, because transporting large, heavy, mostly incompressible items isn’t cheap.

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True.

This is why I was looking at regular foam like
https://www.amazon.com/Upholstery-Cushion-Replacement-Sheet-Padding/dp/B00I0GVL9K/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&qid=1530199613&sr=8-12&keywords=upholstery+foam

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Having never done upholstery myself, but being interested, too, I’ll ask why you need foam. From my"research", unless it’s abraded away, you can usually rejuvenate with steam. Many YouTubes show it’s super easy :wink: . If it is abraded or otherwise “lost”, I’ve generally seen “pay through the nose for correct” or “just use any foam blocks to build & carve your own shape”, so I’m curious what you find out to avoid the former…

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That’s more affordable now than when I was looking.

What can I say? I’m a cheap SoB

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