Re-upholsterer / interior upgrade on E85
- Thread starter Swhitehe
- Start date
How much work you looking at? Where are you located? I know a great guy in Cheshire (used to work at Bentley so has amazing credentials) but its not cheap.
You can do lots of things yourself very cheaply with a little time and elbow grease:
Wrap the interior aluminium with fabric vinyl for instance to give a more modern soft touch
The M sport steering wheel often looks like this, grab some alcohol cleaner and wipe it away and the wheel plastics look completely refreshed. Likewise, get a good leather cleaner and clean up the leather wheel itself and it looks fresh again
You can refresh the seats with some leather paint, just clean the seats and apply a few coats and it goes from this
...to this
Im very detail conscious and even did small touches like this, the plastic under the handbrake gets scratched up so I got a sample sized bit of leather look vinyl and wrapped the plastic section under the handbrake
Obviously if you want to go the whole hog rip everything out and get it new you can, but you will be looking at potentially four figures to get seats and door inserts done. Thats not including removing them all yourself, delivering them, collecting etc.
You can do lots of things yourself very cheaply with a little time and elbow grease:
Wrap the interior aluminium with fabric vinyl for instance to give a more modern soft touch
The M sport steering wheel often looks like this, grab some alcohol cleaner and wipe it away and the wheel plastics look completely refreshed. Likewise, get a good leather cleaner and clean up the leather wheel itself and it looks fresh again
You can refresh the seats with some leather paint, just clean the seats and apply a few coats and it goes from this
...to this
Im very detail conscious and even did small touches like this, the plastic under the handbrake gets scratched up so I got a sample sized bit of leather look vinyl and wrapped the plastic section under the handbrake
Obviously if you want to go the whole hog rip everything out and get it new you can, but you will be looking at potentially four figures to get seats and door inserts done. Thats not including removing them all yourself, delivering them, collecting etc.
SteatoLegato
Member
@coldel that wrap of the handles and dash actually looks very nice! - I've not had any experience with that, how difficult is this, any tips/video guide perhaps?
Thanks!
Thanks!
Its not too bad actually if you have plenty of it (in case you balls it up, which I did once or twice!) and if you have the trim out the car and some patience.
Remove the car trim
Clean it up completely ie an ISP wipe so that there is nothing to mess with the vinyl adhering to the surface
Try do it in a dust free environment
Cut the vinyl roughly to shape of the thing you are wrapping with around 5-6 inches excess around the edge
If possible, start from the middle and work outwards. So for the handle for instance peel some of the backing away in the middle of the strip and then cut it so the backing paper is in two pieces. peel some away and stick the middle down first. then slowly peel back the backing and push down so the vinyl sticks. Then repeat the other end. I find working from the middle is best in terms of ensuring it doesnt fold or end up stretching as you lay it down. Dont be afraid to lift and restick, you can do this a number of times. Then you want to trim so you have about a cm or two around the edges then start to fold this over the edges and stick it to the back. Have a hairdrier handy as if you need to heat up the adhesive and make the vinyl curve around corners easier, heat helps. Just dont use too much.
Once you refit the trim its all nicely held in place. The vinyl itself is very floppy, so be careful when peeling away the backing paper it will do its very best to stick to itself lol
The handles are a good start to practice on as they are a simple shape.
Remove the car trim
Clean it up completely ie an ISP wipe so that there is nothing to mess with the vinyl adhering to the surface
Try do it in a dust free environment
Cut the vinyl roughly to shape of the thing you are wrapping with around 5-6 inches excess around the edge
If possible, start from the middle and work outwards. So for the handle for instance peel some of the backing away in the middle of the strip and then cut it so the backing paper is in two pieces. peel some away and stick the middle down first. then slowly peel back the backing and push down so the vinyl sticks. Then repeat the other end. I find working from the middle is best in terms of ensuring it doesnt fold or end up stretching as you lay it down. Dont be afraid to lift and restick, you can do this a number of times. Then you want to trim so you have about a cm or two around the edges then start to fold this over the edges and stick it to the back. Have a hairdrier handy as if you need to heat up the adhesive and make the vinyl curve around corners easier, heat helps. Just dont use too much.
Once you refit the trim its all nicely held in place. The vinyl itself is very floppy, so be careful when peeling away the backing paper it will do its very best to stick to itself lol
The handles are a good start to practice on as they are a simple shape.
Anyone did anything to the center console?
And I don't mean the silver/aluminium bits. I mean the black/dark grey parts around the gear stick and handbrake.
And also the big black part.
Everything is scratched in my car. I was looking for replacements but they are unreasonably expensive and also worn out.
I was thinking about wrapping everything i leather vinyl. Anyone tried that?
And I don't mean the silver/aluminium bits. I mean the black/dark grey parts around the gear stick and handbrake.
And also the big black part.
Everything is scratched in my car. I was looking for replacements but they are unreasonably expensive and also worn out.
I was thinking about wrapping everything i leather vinyl. Anyone tried that?