Leather Interior Repair with The Interior Guy

Automotive interior repair is a skill of a combination of art and magic, yes I said magic…What I really mean is it’s a skill to be able to trick the eye from not seeing an interior repair that has been made, that is the magic.

One little trick that we keep in our bag of pixie dust, is the art of texturizing a repair.

If you look in your automotive interior you see many different textures on the surfaces of the plastic trim pieces, vinyl covered door panels, and your leather and vinyl seats. All of these textures you see we have to imitate in someway to repair whatever has been damaged.

Texturizing a repair takes knowledge of products to use, skill in using them, and a lot of patience. Yes patience, when doing any automotive interior repair, patience is a virtue, if you get in a hurry you will fail, I promise.

The Grain Pad- This is one tool that makes our magic work so well. A grain pad is a rubberized material made from a two part epoxy like substance. The grain is achieved by mixing the two parts together and spreading the mixer over a piece that your wanting to get the texture from. When the mixture cures you peel off the grain pad and poof theres your texture right there in the grain pad. You then use this pad to replicate the texture in your repair. For you techs, when mixing up a batch of graining compound follow the directions as far as drops go for the catalyst, to many drops and you have a mess, and not enough well it won’t cure. Tape off an area that your wanting to replicate the texture of, about 3″ x 5″, spread the compound over the area then peel off your tape immediately, this will give you a nice rectangular pad to work with. Let cure for about 15-20 minutes, you’ll know when its cured by the feel on top, nice and smooth. If you did it right you should have a nice grain pad that will last for years to come. Making a good impression in your graining pad is the key to a good automotive interior repair. A good grain pad should have a good even texture on one side and smooth on the other, if there are any lumps, uneven places, or a bad impression in the pad these places will transfer into the repair.

Texturizing plastic- Plastic is one automotive interior part that I have the most trouble with, theres only so much you can do to some of the plastic pieces. Scratches in plastic are about the extent of a repair that I will do on an automotive interior plastic, and the scratches can’t be too deep either, or I’ll usually recommend they replace the piece.  Scratches in plastic can sometimes be melted and textured with your grain pad. This technique takes finesse though. Heat the scratched plastic with your heat gun with a tip that concentrates the heat to a small area. Melt the scratch until the plastic shines (but do this slowly) then press your grain pad to the plastic very lightly by using your palm, never use your thumb or finger, this will keep a level repair without your thumb impression in the repair area. Repeat the process if needed until the scratch blends back in. Then dye the plastic to bring back the original look. If you can still see where the repair was made you may have to heat the whole panel until it shines….sometimes melting spots leaves shinny spots, so by heating the whole panel and blending the shine with the heat gun helps. If the scratches are too bad you can use Sems Texture Coat or your water based spray grain to help hide. But when sprays are used, you will lose the original look, I’m not big on spray grain, but it does work as a last result. Sometimes on say, Pontiac dashes, the spray grain almost matches exactly. In fact I have even taken my grain pad and pressed it into the Sems Texture coat after it flashes and been able to get pretty close. Really this one is up to you, like I said before it’s all in the magic to trick the eye. Experiment around a little if you can, and see which technique works the best. I look at it this way, you can’t screw it up anymore then it already is. Plastic repair is a tricky one, this is one area that I myself could probably learn a little more about.

Texturizing a leather repair- Leather repair is one that doesn’t take much texturing at all. Most leather repairs I do the only texture I will use is my leather dye. Leathers in todays automotive interiors are for the most part smooth. The key is to get the repair area level with the surface. This is your best hiding technique. But if a texture is needed, use your waterbased spray grain. Don’t go hog wild with it either, just a light coat will usually work. I like to apply mine the old fashion way with the spray grain in a small jar and sprayed with a mouth atomizer. I have more control where it goes that way. I have used a low heat compound also when mending holes or with large scratches, using my grain pad to achieve the texture. Be careful though when using heat on a leather repair, don’t pucker the leather by putting to much heat to it. Here’s an article on repairing torn leather, this gives you a good idea on using a low heat compound in a leather repair.

Texturizing vinyl- Or graining vinyl as we call it.  This is where your little magic tool comes in, your graining pad.  This is achieved by melting the vinyl then pressing the grain pad onto the repair area to achieve an imitation of the grain that was there. This technique can either make or break you in the vinyl repair business.  To get maximum results, first you need a good grain pad that has the exact match to the grain your trying to achieve.  Before you apply any compound keep in mind the smaller the repair area the easier it will be to hide. If your cut is say a 1/2″ then your repair should not be any larger then 1″, keep your repair areas as small as possible. Not all vinyls will require a vinyl repair compound though so identifying, what kind of vinyl to use it on, comes with experience.  This technique takes a lot of practice and patience, in one of my previous articles I give you a step by step on vinyl repair.

Texturizing your repairs is a very tricky thing to achieve.  With some practice and knowledge of products, the texture can be imitated.  There are so many products out there that can be used to get where you want, I have mentioned a few here that have worked for me, but I’m sure there are more.  If any of you techs have a suggestion feel free to put a comment up.

Just remember to take your time with your repairs, get your color right, keep your repair area as small as possible, and use the right grain pad for your automotive interior repairs and you should have success in texturing a repair.

Steinel - Steinel 34859 - Limited Edition Silver Anniversary Heat Gun Kit

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You left the car window down or the sunroof open and there’s a water stain in your car’s leather seat….or your girlfriend spilled here red wine in your leather car seat on a night out on the town….or your kids decided they were a soon to be artist and tried their techniques out on your leather car seat with a pen, arrggg. Got kids myself, so feel your pain. Stain removal in leather seats can be tough, heres a few tricks to help get you going.

As a professional leather repair specialist I’m here to tell you that there are not to many products that can be used on a leather car seat that won’t remove the finish before removing the stain. Most leather in todays cars is a finished leather with a water borne urethane leather dye applied to it and is pretty susceptible to chemicals and can be removed pretty easily with a solvent cleaner. So when in doubt call a professional.

Water stains in Leather Seat….this is a pretty hard one to get rid of. I recently had reader send me an email on how he could get the water stains out of his car after leaving his sunroof open. This part is kinda for him considering I think I lost his email with pictures, I did get to see them though, so not all was lost. The pictures showed a crease that ran along the middle of the leather seat where the water had puckered the leather. In this type of situation there are two things we could do, one is sand the crease out and with some fillers and dye make the seat new again, this is where a leather professional comes in to play, or replacement of the section that is creased, that’s where an upholstery shop comes in. In these type of situations there aren’t any leather conditioners or cleaners in the world that will remove a creased or puckered leather, what happens is the actual structure of the fibers in the leather have been altered and what you see is what you have.

If the water hasn’t puckered the leather and has just left a stain, a little trick I learned from my good friend Dwain Berlin with Leather Craft Secrets, and you go to your bread box in the kitchen for this one. Take a piece of bread and roll it up into a ball and rub and blot the area with the bread ball, works pretty good. Dwain has a lot of great advice for leather care, and if your interested in some great fun with leather go check out his book, it’s quite impressive and I myself learned a few things.

Most of the time water will just evaporate and with no problems and the stains will disappear. If your car leather gets wet dry it as best you can with a towel and then condition it with your Lexol Conditioner. One way to dry the cars leather is by leaving the windows down and setting it in the sun to dry, or crack the windows and turn your car on with the heat on full blast and let it run for about 30 minutes. I’m not real hip on that one cause it’s a waste of gas but it does work to dry things out better. But always condition, some rain waters are pretty dirty and harsh and the leather needs those extra nutrients to keep it soft.

If the stains are just too bad then new leather dye is the only way to bring it back then call your local leather professional like me to come and make it new again.

Mold Stains in Leather Seat….Or mildew which ever. This one kinda goes along with the water stains. Take and mix a cup of water and a cup of rubbing alcohol and mix them together, take a towel and rub a small amount of the solution onto the stained areas, until the spot is gone, again watch for dye lift, this trick works pretty well and usually removes the mildew pretty quick without dye removal.

Food Stains in Leather Seat….This one can be an easy one if you just don’t eat in your car, but I’m just as guilty as most and eat on the run. A mild dish soap and warm water with a rag or scotch brite pad will do the trick in most cases. Most automotive leather is finished and food stuffs usually will wipe right off. If you run into a stubborn one though try a little all-purpose degreaser on a rag, don’t rub too much or dye may lift. If the stain on your leather car seat from food doesn’t come up with this then the dye from the food has penetrated the fibers of the leather and has dyed it, so it’s time for a professional leather dye job.

Aniline leather or NuBuck leather is a different story though, thats the soft stuff you see as an inserted piece usually in the middle of the seats. You can use the soapy solution but water spots sometimes show up, so a special cleaner works best for this kind of leather. One I suggest is from the guys over at Leather Magic, they have a NuBuck Leather Care Kit that is the answer to all your NuBack needs. This kit includes cleaners and conditioners for the soft stuff, this type of leather is delicate and should be treated as such. Don’t use your usual leather cleaners and conditioners on this type of leather due to fact of the oils in them will damage the look of the leather, then no more soft feeling NuBuck, so definatly check out Leather Magics NuBuck Kit.

Ink, Marker, and Crayon on Leather Seat….Urgent!!! Get to it as soon as you can! If the ink is fresh you have a better chance of removing it from the leather then not. Rubbing alcohol, with a little bit of acetone added will sometimes get it. I’ve heard of hairspray, tried it with not much luck. Usually when an ink pen and leather come together they marry and don’t split to easily. Ink is a dye and is made to penetrate whatever it comes into contact with. Most ink spots I’ve ran into I’ve usually had to dye the leather to cover the spot.

Crayon on a leather seat can be a booger if it’s melted in the seat, you can try this but be careful not to burn or pucker your leather. Take an iron and a paper towel and lay the paper towel over the crayon and with a low heat rub the iron over the paper towel over the crayon. The crayon will melt into the paper towel, move the towel around to clean spots until the crayon is gone, a little of rubbing alcohol should remove the remaining. This trick works on carpet and cloth too. If they’re just marks on the leather seat a little soap and water should do the trick or even a little rubbing alcohol on a towel works good to. If all fails there is a product from Protective Products Corp. that is all natural with no solvents that will remove crayon and lipstick it’s called Solv-It, but just like anything try a spot in an unsuspecting spot to see if it removes dye.

One last trick that I’ve read about around the net and am in the process of testing it, but it the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser, they do work around the house, so why not the car too. I’ve removed crayon and marks on my walls before with them, I do notice it take a little paint with it though, but they do work. If you use one, be careful and don’t go ape sh$#, rub it then look, rub it then look, they will remove dye, so when using it take your time and check it as you go.

Sweat Stains in Leather Seat ….Salt stains from sweat can be pretty gross looking, but there is a little trick. Take and make a solution of 3 parts vinegar and one part water and wet a towel and rub the area clean, the vinegar breaks down the and helps to remove the stain.

Paint on Leather Seat….Paint removal on a leather car seat, well that ones a hard one. If it has dried it’s probably there to stay. If it’s a water color, just use soap and water to remove it. Latex house paint, you can try a little Goof Off but keep in mind this is a solvent and can damage the leather seat and remove dye. I have in the past been able to take my pocket knife and scrape it off. Wet the area first with a little water and lightly try to lift the paint off with your knife or even a razor blade, but don’t cut the leather. Mostly though this really doesn’t work without removing the dye underneath, but I have had luck sometimes. If its car paint, try a little paint reducer on a rag, but just wipe lightly and don’t soak the area with the reducer. Solvents and leather seats just don’t mix.

My best advice to all when it come to stains in your leather car seats, and that is to be conscious of what you do, try to keep our little Picasso’s pen free, keep our food out of our cars, roll the windows up and sunroofs closed, and always remember to treat the leather with your Lexol Conditioner on a regular basis, this helps to keep the leather car seats protected and soft and makes it easier to get the spills and accidents from turning into disasters.

But always remember that we leather repair professionals are here to save those leather car seats and bring them back to there original state. If you have any questions don’t hesitate to contact me for all your leather repair needs.

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Odor elimination in your car has got to be the most frustrating thing I think in the world. You go to the store and buy spray after spray, and nothing. You buy little fragrance plug ins, and nothing. You try everything under the sun you can think of to get rid of that funk you got going on in your car and nothing seems to work. Believe me been there done that. Read the rest of this entry »

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This is definitely not a quick fix or a temporary fix that I’m going to talk about today. This is the way that I repair leather on a daily basis that has been worn or cracked.

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Resurfacing a leather seat in your automobile with today’s leathers require a real technique and the right leather dye to achieve a professional job. There are 2 types of leather that I have seen and worked on in today’s leather car seats. You have Nubuck leather or as some call it the soft leather and you have the finished leather which is mostly what you see. The leather dyes you use are completely different too. Aniline dye is used with the soft stuff and a water borne urethane dye for the finished leathers, both mixed with premium tannery pigments. Resurfacing leather applies to the finished leather, when you dye suede the aniline dye is a penetrating dye, so heres the right way to apply dyes to a finished leather seat. Read the rest of this entry »

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The Dash Peel. A problem I started noticing in some of the earlier model vehicles a few years back and have been fixing them ever since. The cause is the water based dyes being used on dashes and some trim pieces being lifted from the plastic by solvent based dressings and cleaners being sprayed on the inside of our cars in the attempt to keep them looking new and clean.

Solvents and water based dyes just don’t mix, obviously. Read the rest of this entry »

How to mend a vinyl seat is probably going to be your easiest fix, when it comes to vinyl repair. There are those one’s that are a little tricky, but all in all the seat repair is the easiest, there is more padding behind the repair area, under patches can be used to reinforce the repair, they just seem to give me less fits and are easier to mend. Vinyl repair is definitely a game of skill balanced with patience. Taking your time to make your repair look perfect and not just good enough, will make or break a vinyl repair craftsman.

One thing you definitely need to keep in mind is if the hole or crack is to large then is needs to be replaced not mended. I’ve seen some pretty blown out seats in my day and have turned down a lot of work because I know my limitations to my pixie dust, as some of my customers call it ( that is one reason I love my job so much is because the products I use are definitely like magic). If the seat has a hole in it let’s say 3 or more inches maybe 4 but depends on the under structure, it needs to go to an upholstery shop. The thing is a repair is just that a repair, the products are made for small imperfections, not blow outs, that if left can get worse. But by mending them you can make a piece of vinyl look new again and the repair will last longer when done so. Read the rest of this entry »

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There are so many different types of automotive leather seat repair, all with different situations and applications. There are holes, scratches, gouges, cuts, scrapes, worn or cracked, and just down right grungy looking leather seats. I think I got them all covered, well in this article we’re going to talk about how to repair a small hole in a leather seat lean back, for those of you who don’t know what a lean back is well it’s the upper part of the seat.

Now when I say small this can apply for a tear up to 1 1/2″ to 2″, probably might go a little bigger, but lets not push it, if it needs to go to the upholstery shop for an insert then that would be better then a crappy looking leather repair on something that probably wouldn’t hold anyways. When in doubt, insert it. Read the rest of this entry »

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Color Matching is a huge skill and a must in the leather repair industry. I’ve been coming across a few vehicles lately that have been dyed with not so good color matching. Knowing that it’s usually someone either color blind or just down right…well I won’t go that far, but if the color isn’t right then your repair will look worse then if you had just left it alone.

Good lighting does help and pretty much a necessity. Natural lighting is better but in the garages we get stuck in the winter months it doesn’t help much, but what do you do, you improvise as my wife says. I use a dent light, which works pretty good, but I have also have used a under the hood light bar then hooking inside the car that stretches the width of the car and hooks on the door jams, they work great. Shorter light bars are great for light in a small places. Be careful with using florescence they sometimes throw your tinting off, if you can get some natural light to your project then great. The customer sees the the car in natural light mostly anyways so your color needs to be spot on.

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This is a must see. Leather Magic is something else, if this product does what it says then wow. Not only is durable it stretches and holds in place.

There are a few downfalls, one the curing time. 48 hours, maybe for an individual but not for a tech in the field. The compounds I know of are quick and easy…And work. But if there is the repair that will hold up like that and then I’m all for to checking it out, looks. The other concern I have is dye, dying onto a wet surface…HMMMM. Don’t know. Well I’ll make a check into this and see.

Leather repair is a craft and not all products will work on everything. Trial and error to extent, but cleaning and prepping your area extensively, before you start any project will make your ending result a success.

Hope you like this it is pretty wild stuff.

If you got any comments on this one let me know, I’m really curious to see what everyone thinks on Leather Magic.

You get into your car on an average of three to four times a day and the first thing you grab is your worn out leather wrapped steering wheel. Yuck, huh.

The cause, well can be a few things, dirty hands from work, lotions you put on your hands, or if your a nervous type and like to rub your steering wheel. All of these and probably a few more that I haven’t mentioned can damage the waterbased dye applied to your leather steering wheel cover.

The fix can be simple if you have the right products and the know how.

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In a previous post I had talked about the cloth seats in the Ford and Chrysler vehicles and how hard it was to get the bad stains out and that I was looking for a cleaner to remove these stains. I think I’ve found the secret. Foam, yes I said foam. A foaming spray cleaner with a scrub brush and towel. Read the rest of this entry »

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This is a hard one for me to put out there for the average person to read because a lot of the products I use in my leather repairs are sold for professional use and if you don’t know how to use them properly you can make a bad thing look like a really bad repaired thing. It’s taking me a long time to master the craft of leather repair, it’s something you can’t just learn by reading this article. But I wanted to help out those of you who need a helping hand with that worn leather seat. Read the rest of this entry »

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So your driving down the road with what looks like an open parachute attached to the interior roof of your car.
Well that open parachute would be your headliner material. Read the rest of this entry »

Sorry not meaning to be so harsh, it’s just for the past two nights I have been trying to get my website back up and running correctly. So a big apology to my viewers for the glitch in the site.

The problem was in the update from WordPress.  The new 2.5 version was released with a few bugs. Now I myself should have known to wait for a little while until the bugs were worked out but I did it anyway and payed a little for it. My site was viewable, but I couldn’t edit on my end.

Now I have confidence in WordPress and I know the bugs will be worked out, and wanted to say that I Do like the new layout of 2.5. It’s going to take a little time to adjust but the layout is nice looking and things seem to be working as they should.

So I just wanted to say hey to everyone and let you know I’m back, so post your questions in the forum and let’s get back to work.

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Incorporating Sems Sand Free in your repairs can be a life saver. I will say this though, in moderation. Just like most things, more isn’t always better. Read the rest of this entry »

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This is one thing that theres NOT a lot that can be done to fix. Leather has a grain, and a natural tendency to crease in a fashion that isn’t that appealing to some. Keeping the leather soft by keeping it clean and conditioning it can keep those creases from turning into cracks and in some cases from forming at all. Read the rest of this entry »

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One of the most asked questions I get is what to put on the leather seats to keep them soft and looking new and how to do it. Read the rest of this entry »

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Sounds like I’m campaigning for an abortion rights rally or something, but no, really all I’m saying is the choice in paint guns is your key to a good or a bad repair. There are so many choices though, you have airbrushes, gravity feed guns, siphon feed guns, HVLP guns (and for those of you that don’t know what this is, it stands for high volume low pressure, meaning it takes less air to push more paint which cuts down on the over spray),the non hvlp guns, prevals, atomizers. Where do you start. Read the rest of this entry »

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Paint prep is the key to success in any paint project. Whether your painting the outside or inside of your car you need to have a good grease and particle free area for your job to be a success, and success is what it’s about when your trying to make money at what you do. Here a few tips for you to use in the interior of your vehicle, where most of your “slime” is located. The “slime” as I call it is all the silicone dressing that has been put on your cars interior to make it look new, and I use the word “new” very loosely too, to me if your car is clean you don’t need all that slime juice sprayed all over. Besides some of the new dressings are ruining the interiors, thats a whole other article. Read the rest of this entry »