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Tue Aug 25, 2009 9:31 am

The seats in my bus are shot. Should I buy seat upholstery, pads, and sisal to redo them, sew up new covers and attempt this on my own, or just replace the seats? I have a pretty nice industrial sewing machine that is more than capable, I have done some upholstery work, but nothing quite as complicated as seats.

Any thoughts,or experiences to share? It's a 1970 tin top Westy. I am not a restoration purest by any means, I just want it to look and feel nice.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:01 am

I think you should get the covers and do them yourself.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:11 am

mexican blankets work well.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:11 am

it depends on your budget and what you are after. There are some threads here where slip covers have been made from old sheets or T-shirts. Save them rather than landfill them.

Or if you want it to look like new and don't have t he time, get new sisal from Wolfsburgwest, TMI or Sewfine and have the seats redone professionally. Be prepared that when you pull them apart you may have springs to replace and welding to do.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:25 am

If you have an industrial sewing machine and know how to use it I say make the new upholstery yourself. You will save at least half compared to buying covers and you can use the best quality material which the ready made ones don't.

Choose cloth rather than vinyl. If you make a mistake you can pick out the stitches and do it over. With vinyl if you make a mistake the material is ruined. Buy the more expensive nylon thread they use for boats and cars. The cotton thread they use for house upholstery will rot off in the sun and your seats will fall apart after a few years.

My brother is an upholsterer and we have done several cars, it's not that tough.

Suggest you look up some books at the library or search online if you are not sure how to do it.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 2:58 pm

My seats looked pretty bad as well, and I looked at the prices of premade seat upholstery, and decided it would be cheaper to do it myself.

I took the seat material off the seat, cut all the stitches apart, and used the pieces to make a pattern on new material. I chose some quality dark tan corduroy.

Drivers seat: (bear in mind the passenger seat looked the same)

Redone Passenger Seat:

It's not exactly difficult to do, as long as you do them one at a time. Use one seat to find out how the stitches go together. It can be a bit confusing, but I've done it so how hard can it be?

Tue Aug 25, 2009 4:01 pm

Visinedrops wrote: My seats looked pretty bad as well, and I looked at the prices of premade seat upholstery, and decided it would be cheaper to do it myself.

I took the seat material off the seat, cut all the stitches apart, and used the pieces to make a pattern on new material. I chose some quality dark tan corduroy.

Drivers seat: (bear in mind the passenger seat looked the same)

Redone Passenger Seat:

It's not exactly difficult to do, as long as you do them one at a time. Use one seat to find out how the stitches go together. It can be a bit confusing, but I've done it so how hard can it be?

Beautiful job! You must be proud of your bus's new look.

One suggestion I would offer is not to use the old covers as patterns. They are usually shrunk and distorted.

The real "pro" method is to make paper patterns off the seat itself. Cut out the pattern and fold it in half so you can compare the 2 halves and "correct" by trimming so both halves are a mirror image of each other.

Another tip. Trace the pattern with chalk. This is the line you sew to. Leave a half inch extra for seams. When you line up 2 pieces for sewing, mark them by cutting a V with your scissors. This makes it easy to line them up.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 8:48 pm

Hey Man for the time and trouble It is worth the 120 bucks aseat to buy the kit and install them yourself. It is the first thing that I do After I get um running. I like the foam better than the sisal as the new re pop sisal is not what the Germans made and after 6 years of daily driving I can feel the frames and have to clean the dedris regularly. Dont get me wrong I like em but the material is just not what it was. My camper has the foam pads. Cushier TMI

Tue Aug 25, 2009 9:30 pm

For $120 you can buy enough material to recover both front seats and a back seat and it will be better quality too.

This is only an option if you have a good sewing machine and know how to use it. For most of us the ready made covers are a good deal.

$120 might get your steering wheel covered at a big upholstery shop.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 9:50 pm

Did mine a several years ago and they're holding up very well. I went with the leather/cloth combo. The seat and back portion is cloth material and the rest is leather. I'll post a photo. The best thing about them is that on the cold days the seats are warm and on the hot days the seats are cool.

Here are the photos:

Tue Aug 25, 2009 9:57 pm

You've got decisions to make. Better than your existing seats, reasonably acceptable, nice or wonderful? For a short while or many years? Low cost economy or what good seats cost? What do you have more of, time or money? Got skills? Got patience?
There are three things involved. The upholstery, the cushioning and underlying materials, and the seat frames. Skimp on any of that and you might as well skimp on the whole thing. You will probably have to restore/rebuild the frames and springs. If you buy the finished upholstery you can get cheap or quality. But not really both. Sewfine is top of the line in workmanship and very top quality materials. I did my bug and a bus with Sewfine products. 12 years now on the bug and still awesome. Also I highly prefer their foam cushions.
Doing your own you need an industrial machine. Driver and passenger seats are different. If you make covers for one it might or might not be the best for the other one. I pulled apart 2 full sets of old OG covers (8 covers) to get some kind of an average to start making patterns. The big amount of shrinking and stretching of the old ones was surprising. I got good quality vinyl but it still wasn't as heavy as Sewfines custom stuff. They are not easy to just whip out. If your time is money, just buy some. An advantage in doing it yourself is you can do the rest of the interior at the same time. Buy extra materials. You will need it. There are surprising things you will run into. Such as some vinyl stretches in one direction and not the other. Here are mine. All the stuff in the rear matches.

Doing them yourself you might get better quality than some of the brands but you won't make them better than Sewfine. That's a given.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:11 pm

Man 120 bucks is cheap for what you get and as often as you use them. Did I hear nickels squeek as you walk buy. Maybe you make your own mattress at home too.

Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:40 pm

ned wrote: Did I hear nickels squeek as you walk buy. Maybe you make your own mattress at home too.
English please.

Wed Aug 26, 2009 8:15 am

We took a class offered at the local community collage, redid seats for my morris minor(MG). I have rebuilt some seats by taking others apart usually the bench type as thats more common(back seat 60's Ford Falcon fit front bench 67VW bus). I like the sisal fiber stuffing better then the foam. I have also used "chicken wire" fence for seat and back support. I've also sewed plenty of leather on my regular singer treadle, even resewed my kevlar chainsaw chaps...SewFine looks good...

Wed Aug 26, 2009 8:50 am

Your seats look great Desertbusman! Nice job. I think I am going to give it a shot on my own. My machine is very tough. Its a Mitsubishi industrial with computer controlled speed, stitch count, back tack and auto thread cut. I am not worried about the capability of the machine, I am worried about the capability of the operator!
I like the idea of starting out with a nice fabric material. Probably less money and I can fix a few of my screw ups a bit easier. I love the look of the contrast piping. I will give that a try as well. I think a picture type story board project of the seat redo process might be fun. I will start a new thread when I get started to document the seat project. This weekend, re-do the brakes. Looking forward to the "winter-work-on-bus" time of year!

Wed Aug 26, 2009 11:24 am

Wow, with a machine like that it needs to whip out some bus stuff. Do you have any large upholstery supply houses in your area? You'll go crazy deciding on what materials to use. My bugs Sewfine seat upholstery is heavy charcoal tweed panels with vinyl everywhere else. The tweed is holding up real well. If you are planning on doing more than just the front seats it probably would be a lot easier to get your feet wet by starting with smaller, lessor, and simplier items such as the jump seat or spare tire cover, etc. I did the front seats after getting practice with the other stuff first. There was a lot to learn and figure out before trying the most complicated stuff. If you go for it keep us informed on how it works out. Another thing, choose material that they will have more of and will continue to stock in the future.

Wed Aug 26, 2009 12:55 pm

Great advice. I have sewn many things like cushion covers, spare tire covers, tents, sail boat sails, boat seats, etc. I can do deck seams, and a pretty nice faux version of a French seam. (you need a double needle machine for the real thing.) I don't have any experience with piping though. I also don't have experience with front seats. I am pretty much convinced that I need to try it myself. I need to redo the rear cushions in the camper as well as the door and side panels. I would love to have them all match. This is a big reason for me to give it a try myself I think. When I get started, I promise I will start a post with lots of pics and a write up of what I am learning. Sounds like fun.
I am getting some pretty cool ideas for the door and side panels. Two tone designs with embossed graphics!
Time I have, tons of extra cash, I don't.
Thanks for talking me into this. :D

Wed Aug 26, 2009 2:33 pm

Window Licker wrote: Great advice. I have sewn many things like cushion covers, spare tire covers, tents, sail boat sails, boat seats, etc. I can do deck seams, and a pretty nice faux version of a French seam. (you need a double needle machine for the real thing.) I don't have any experience with piping though. I also don't have experience with front seats. I am pretty much convinced that I need to try it myself. I need to redo the rear cushions in the camper as well as the door and side panels. I would love to have them all match. This is a big reason for me to give it a try myself I think. When I get started, I promise I will start a post with lots of pics and a write up of what I am learning. Sounds like fun.
I am getting some pretty cool ideas for the door and side panels. Two tone designs with embossed graphics!
Time I have, tons of extra cash, I don't.
Thanks for talking me into this. :D

You shouldn't have much trouble. I suggest you read a couple of books if you can find them. They will give you some new ideas and confidence.

I have done mechanical work, bodywork and upholstery work. Of the 3 upholstery is the easiest. It is also the least damaging to your body. I got my brother into the trade for these and other reasons.

As far as the piping goes that is dead easy. Upholstery supply shops sell a kind of plastic string sort of like what goes in your weed wacker. You cut a strip of vinyl or cloth and glue it or sew it around the string to make piping. Then sew it in when you do the seam. If you do this in vinyl you need a good machine, you are sewing thru 4 layers of material.

VW seats were made this way in the 50s, with contrasting color piping.

And for all you guys who like to sneer at us do it yourselfers. I think you would be more at home on a BMW BBS.

Wed Aug 26, 2009 2:42 pm

Be careful of your Seatbacks near the Top when you remove the old covering. :shock: There is a piece of Hard Foam Rubber that is glued to the top, rear bar of the seatback and it can crumble easily if you're not aware of it and careful when you remove the old cover. I ruined the one on my Driver's Seat because I didn't know it was there, and now, even with a new cover, it just doesn't look right. My Passenger Seat was spared that horror since I had learned my lesson, so it looks much better.

Fri Aug 28, 2009 9:19 am

Good tip Blu67Bug. I will watch out for that.

Rusty O'Toole, I was curious, do you need a special "Welting Foot" to accomplish this stitching so close to the piping, or can it be done with a standard foot. I will try to make a sample and see how it goes I guess.

No problem with the four layers of material. Just for grins I sewed a piece of vinyl to a 1/4" piece of Luan under-layment once! No problem, sailed right through (with just a bit of coaxing to get it started)!