Date: Sat, 22 Jul 1995 07:06:42 -0700 (PDT)
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From: "Tobin T. Copley" <tobin@freenet.vancouver.bc.ca>
Subject: Re-padding seats: HOW TO
On Fri, 21 Jul 1995, Lisa Quinn wrote:
> I'd like to repad the seats in the westy. They have good fabric, but
> the padding is shot. Hard on the fanny on long trips. Anyone here
> done this? Is it complicated and hard? Do you have to cut the old covers
> off? My husband thinks we should by some of those stretch seat covers,
> lay the padding on the old seats, and put the seat covers over them.
> Should I take the easy way out and do this?
Repadding your seats (your westy's!) will make a huge difference in the
size of your smiles while driving your westy. Christa and I did this in
our '76, and it was pretty straightforward, relatively easy, and worked
out very well.
Don't listen to your husband. Putting another cover over the old will be
unsatisfactory, and will continue to trash the original seat covers.
Don't take the 'easy' way out.
How to do it:
Remove the seats from the vehicle. In my bus, the driver's seat just
slides forward all the way off the seat rails. You may have to depress a
lever somewhere to get the seat past a stop designed to keep the seat
from derailing unintentionally. Snoop around as you're trying it, and
you'll figure it out--this isn't rocket science. I forget for the moment
how the passenger seat comes out, but it's fairly straight forward as well.
OK, you've got the seats out and they're sitting on your living room
floor. Look at the underside of the seats. The covers are attatched to
the seat by little pointy metal tabs spaced around the edge of the bottom
cover, and the tabs hold down a piece of wire that goes around the bottom
edge of the bottom cover. I hope this is making sense. Look at the seat
as you read this, and you'll see what I'm trying to say. Bend these tabs
back with a large flat head screwdriver or vise-grip or whatever works
for you. Try not to tear the fabric though!
The bottom seat cover should just lift off now. The cover, as you'll
see, holds the padding over a bed of springs. CAREFULLY remove the
padding--it'll be messy, 'cause it'll want to fall apart. You'll be
using this old padding as a pattern when you go to the foam store to buy
new replacement padding.
The cover for the back of the seat is secured in a similar manner. The
metal tabs are located at the bottom of the seat back, on the back edge.
The cover lifts off by working it straight up. If you've got headrests,
just leave the cover dangling just below the headrest inside out.
Carefully remove the padding for the seat back, draw the pattern for this
one too.
Clean the frame of the seat up. Check for broken springs, hoping you
have none. Check the condition of the covers. Mine had several holes
where the springs had poked through, so I patched them from the inside
with pieces of canvas fabric. Draw your patterns for replacement padding
using the old pads. Leave a comfortable margin all around--you can always
cut stuff off if you've got too much.
Go to your FLFS (Friendly Local Foam Store) and get replacement padding,
showing your patterns to the folks there, explaining exactly what they
are for. We had them laminate two types of foam together: a high density
foam for the bottom, and some softer stuff for the top layer. The also
have a band saw so they can cut the foam to exactly fit your pattern. We
really went for the high-priced stuff, and the foam cost us about $40.00
CDN to do but drivers and passengers seats. But we were heading off for
a 3 month driving trip, and we wanted to have comfy tushes for the 15,000
miles the trip would take us. And we felt like big shots. ;)
Stop by a fabric store or any place you can get a sheet of heavy canvas.
You'll need this. If you had any broken springs in the seat bottom, go
to a lumber yard and get a small piece of thin plywood as well. If your
seat cover were absolutely shot, order some replacement covers from one
of those places in the back of VW mags. Maybe someone on the list has a
good source for these. Oh, yeah, and pick up a couple of rolls of duct
tape.
Go home, check the padding for fit. Better too big than too small! Take
your canvas and use your patterns to cut the canvas into padding-shaped
pieces, but make them a bit bigger than the padding.
You're ready for re-assembly. If you've got broken springs, place a pice
of plywood over that are of the seat frame. Cut it fairly large, so it
covers a good part of the seat. Take your canvas, and duct tape it
securely to the outer edge (frame) of the seat. Leave some slack in it
so that it won't tear of the edge when you sit in the seat. Remember how
the seat bows? You need extra fabric to allow it to do that. Before
moving on to the next seat part, put on the padding you had cut, and tape
it down really securely. Really securely--and allt the way around. Tape
doesn't want to stick to the foam, as you'll see, so make it secure and
work fast. Use the tape also to get rid of the lumpies around the
edges. Make your work neat. Slip the cover on again to hold everything
together. You'll need someone to help you with this assembly part. Work
your way through all four seat cushions (2 on both seats). Wrestle the
cushions down enough to let you trap the little wire in the bottom of the
covers with those metal tabs on the seat frame. It may help to have a
friend sit in the seats to load them when you try to do this. Get all
the tabs done up.
Sit in the seats and admire your work. Big difference, right? Go
re-install the seats in your bus, and smile really wide as the
countryside slides by.
Happy camping!
Tobin
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tobin T. Copley Currently =============
(604) 689-2660 Occupationally /_| |__||__| :| putta
tobin@freenet.vancouver.bc.ca Challenged! O| | putta
'-()-------()-'
Circum-continental USA, Mexico, Canada 15,000 miles... '76 VW Camper! (Mango)