Rear seat interchange

Discussion on body issues/mods, appearance, interior/trim, and detailing (i.e. how to keep your car looking showroom new, or a reasonable facsimile thereof...).
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elc32955
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Re: Rear seat interchange

Post by elc32955 »

Yep, without question I'm going to have to shop it. These guys are the top-quality shop in the area, they do the work for Porsche, Mercedes, Audi, Volvo, and other dealers & euro indy shops on the Space Coast. Of course they're hungry like everyone else these days...
System Manager and your tour guide for the day. 2015 Caprice w/LFX, former NC DPS staff car. Partial hybrid G8/SS/Camaro SS interior mods, SS MyLink radio upgrade, 2016 Camaro V6 rims, GMPP Malibu chrome exhaust tips, otherwise bone stock for now.
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elc32955
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Re: Rear seat interchange

Post by elc32955 »

Well, I tried a second upholstery shop locally. The good news is that I can get the entire seat section trim pulled & re-installed with a new one for 1/2 hour labor ($35). I can still get a brand new trim section for $199 from Butler Chevrolet if I want to go that route. The shop didn't want to do a sewn repair with backer as they said it might pull loose down the road as that leather is pretty dry, plus it would probably look like crap. Anything else other then a quick trim swap would put me on a repair calendar four months out! Bleh!

The other thing I'd thought of was trying the JB Weld leather repair kit, since I'm just closing up the hole and it's black leather it might work and the cost is pretty good. Worst come to worst if it looks hideous after the repair I can still swap out the seat trim - no harm no foul. Anyone ever try that stuff? I'm guess what I'm asking is if it's snake oil and would I be making a bigger mess or wasting my time trying it?

Eric
System Manager and your tour guide for the day. 2015 Caprice w/LFX, former NC DPS staff car. Partial hybrid G8/SS/Camaro SS interior mods, SS MyLink radio upgrade, 2016 Camaro V6 rims, GMPP Malibu chrome exhaust tips, otherwise bone stock for now.
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elc32955
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Re: Rear seat interchange

Post by elc32955 »

Tried the JB Weld kit, bought one off Ebay for $10 shipped. My experience with the same was as follows;

It's a multi-stage kit, first you clean the leather with a non-soapy cleaner (I used 409), then you trim and insert a piece of backing cloth into the cut/tear to reinforce the glue bonding for the repair. Kit claims you can fix a cut/tear of up to 2 inches long, mine was 1.5 inches so it fit their profile fine. You then use a plastic spatula to even out the backing material under the cut (no folds or lumps allowed!) and then put a special glue into the cut/tear. Make sure to glue the direct underside of the cut area so that the backing cloth adheres to the underside of the cut/tear and also that the glue on top is even. Set the seat aside, wait 24 hours and the glue will then be well set. After the 24 hours has elapsed you will see some shrinkage to where the wet glue compound has migrated into the defect area and has left a depression. This is apparently normal and happened to me. To level this the instructions state you fill & level with the color compound (in the next step).

For the next step you go to the color compound, in my case with black leather seats all I had to use was the black - no matching or mixing required (Yaay!). You fill it into the cut/tear with the plastic spatula so that the surface is even with the top of the leather seat material (don't glob it on, you have to do this smoothly). Then you select a piece of grain overlay paper (3 different ones supplied) to place evenly on the top of the wet color compound, cut to fit the piece leaving it slightly larger then the wet area. After 14 hours you can remove it, I waited about 20 to insure complete drying. When I pulled my overlay paper I noted that the colored surface felt a bit rough to the touch. I used a very small piece of 600-grit sandpaper to smooth the surface out with good effect, then wetted & cleaned the repaired area to remove the slight dust generated from sanding the color compound.

When all was done you can still see the outline of the cut and it does present as a thin flat area in the middle of the perforated leather, but it's smooth and has bonded the leather well so it no longer has the possibility of tearing. I may do some more fill-in with another round of the color material to make the top surface even (instructions state use another round if the level is not exactly even with the surrounding good material), but for right now I don't have to get another seat skin as it's well bonded and color-matched. I can sit people in the back seat again without the hole re-opening or enlarging and that's good enough for me! My car's a DD, not a show car. Saved $135 since I didn't have to buy another seat set from a second salvage yard, or $199 buying a complete new seat skin - plus shipping & upholstery shop labor to have the old skin removed and the new skin installed. With a total of $10 total spent for the repair, win for me! And I have the rest of the kit remaining to use in the event something happens again. Focus now goes to cleaning the leather and using compound on it to soften it up like it should be.

One other note - the plastic outer trim on the center seat release (to flip the center down) is embrittled and a few chunks of the button surround have broken off leaving some sharp edges. I may try the SS seat button part as a replacement, as that part is still orderable. As long as there's interchange all I should have to do is take the desk surface off and then work underneath it (based on what is shown on the parts diagram).

Thanks
Eric
System Manager and your tour guide for the day. 2015 Caprice w/LFX, former NC DPS staff car. Partial hybrid G8/SS/Camaro SS interior mods, SS MyLink radio upgrade, 2016 Camaro V6 rims, GMPP Malibu chrome exhaust tips, otherwise bone stock for now.
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elc32955
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Re: Rear seat interchange

Post by elc32955 »

One last update on all of this, tonight I installed the emergency trunk release handle off a 2010 Camaro SS onto the small empty end of the emergency trunk release cable installed behind the passenger rear side seatback as the proper Caprice pull ring was missing from the end of the cable. The end for this cable (the plastic handle with the pull-me ring) for the Caprice is apparently a Holden part and I can't locate a number for it, so something US GM had to do even though it's not an exact fit. I'm not sure but I believe the handle is a US Federal safety requirement, I'm wondering how GM/Holden got away with de-contenting the pull handle from the emergency release cable. Miserly, purely miserly.

In order to get the Camaro handle to work I had to cut off the two little pieces of plastic which stuck out above the top of the handle on either side of the cable hole. The Camaro uses a "L" style fitting to grab onto the handle which my cable did not have, although there is a small fitting at the end of the cable which was of sufficient size to scruntch (yeah, technical term!) into a receptacle on the handle. There's not much slack on the end of this cable, but with my modification made there was sufficient room on the Camaro handle to make the cable attach securely. Hopefully I'll never need it but in the event someone is successful in stuffing my rotund posterior into the car trunk (oh that would be a sight!) I'm glad I can pull the handle, lol!
System Manager and your tour guide for the day. 2015 Caprice w/LFX, former NC DPS staff car. Partial hybrid G8/SS/Camaro SS interior mods, SS MyLink radio upgrade, 2016 Camaro V6 rims, GMPP Malibu chrome exhaust tips, otherwise bone stock for now.
Pursuit
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Re: Rear seat interchange

Post by Pursuit »

Eric,
On my 2011, the pull cable and handle were installed in the center behind the rear seat. I thought it was odd as the rear seat didn't have the fold down center. Once I installed the Statesman rear seats, the pull handle finally got used.

Maurice
Maurice Sheil

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2011 Caprice Phantom Black 9C3
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s/c'd cav
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Re: Rear seat interchange

Post by s/c'd cav »

here is the part # 92206015 for the emergency release cable , the handle is part of the cable

the cable show to fit all , 11-17's
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elc32955
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Re: Rear seat interchange

Post by elc32955 »

On my 2011 it was the same way, all components there. But, on the 2015 it was not. I found the complete assembly part number no problem, but at least with the Camaro there was a separate part number annotated for the handle. Holden may have not catalogued it that way as the pull handle is roughly 1/3 size of the big Camaro handle. Just have to keep my eyes open for a part-out car and eventually put the correct one in-place.
System Manager and your tour guide for the day. 2015 Caprice w/LFX, former NC DPS staff car. Partial hybrid G8/SS/Camaro SS interior mods, SS MyLink radio upgrade, 2016 Camaro V6 rims, GMPP Malibu chrome exhaust tips, otherwise bone stock for now.
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