MyE28.com DEV

They seem to be willing to do anything, but communication is a challenge. I bought a seat cushion for my truck from eseatshop, which is the same business. I wonder if there is a better way to contact the actual business. Until I placed the order, I received one word responses to my questions. Be very clear what you want, send drawings, and whatever else you can. Read my post after install, be prepared to modify the covers. The e28 style maybe different, I'm not familiar with how the sport seat covers mount.

A guy on the Bigcoupe site used a set for e30 seats. He seemed to have good luck too.

http://bigcoupe.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=28930

brickwhite wrote:A guy on the Bigcoupe site used a set for e30 seats. He seemed to have good luck too.

http://bigcoupe.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=28930

And a decent tutorial on making basic door cards.

I ordered front and rear sets just a few days ago in "dark beige" believing this would be the shade that would most closely match my pearl beige interior. Now, I'm beginning to second guess this choice as a couple other colors on the lseat.com site also appear to be close matches. The seller is willing to send me some swatch samples, but based on some of the stories I've heard about them I'd rather not complicate things and maybe end-up delaying the shipment by many weeks.

Anyway, has anyone here used these to replace pearl beige leather? If so, what color did you purchase from lseat.com? Or, if anyone has their samples readily available would you mind taking a look at them and letting me know which one is closest? It looks like bisque, and ivory could also be close.

Cheers!
Sparkeysf

I really suggest you order 1sqft of the colors you think it is close to.

Sparkeysf wrote:I ordered front and rear sets just a few days ago in "dark beige" believing this would be the shade that would most closely match my pearl beige interior. Now, I'm beginning to second guess this choice as a couple other colors on the lseat.com site also appear to be close matches. The seller is willing to send me some swatch samples, but based on some of the stories I've heard about them I'd rather not complicate things and maybe end-up delaying the shipment by many weeks.

Anyway, has anyone here used these to replace pearl beige leather? If so, what color did you purchase from lseat.com? Or, if anyone has their samples readily available would you mind taking a look at them and letting me know which one is closest? It looks like bisque, and ivory could also be close.

Cheers!
Sparkeysf

Reid?

I really suggest you order 1sqft of the colors you think it is close to.

Haha... yes, I do know that would be the wisest thing to do. But, I'm too impatient to wait additional weeks to get my car finished. Just thought maybe there was someone who may have already gone through this exercise. I'd trust anyone here to make the right choice

Reid?

Yup! Hi Jay!

Sparkeysf wrote:

I really suggest you order 1sqft of the colors you think it is close to.

Haha... yes, I do know that would be the wisest thing to do. But, I'm too impatient to wait additional weeks to get my car finished. Just thought maybe there was someone who may have already gone through this exercise. I'd trust anyone here to make the right choice

A bad match will bug you more than a few weeks of waiting. You might look on rv3, pretty sure someone did PB on their e30. Good luck! I really had no issues on delivery time like everyone else says.

BimmerDan wrote:

Sparkeysf wrote:

I really suggest you order 1sqft of the colors you think it is close to.

Haha... yes, I do know that would be the wisest thing to do. But, I'm too impatient to wait additional weeks to get my car finished. Just thought maybe there was someone who may have already gone through this exercise. I'd trust anyone here to make the right choice

A bad match will bug you more than a few weeks of waiting. You might look on rv3, pretty sure someone did PB on their e30. Good luck! I really had no issues on delivery time like everyone else says.

That's absolutely true, it certainly would bug me I did see a thread on rv3 where someone did PB using a dark brown shade from lseat.com. In my opinion, it wasn't a great choice for that interior. I'll poke around a little more to see if I can find someone who ordered beige. Thanks Dan.

I would orderer Dark red

one could use leatherique to supply a dye to match OEM if necessary. That is what I am thinking anyway. Get a shade or 2 lighter and dye it to correct.

the Lseat covers look good

I wrapped the back of my seats with the hide I ordered from lseat. It turned out really nice, I ended up doing the pulls and door cards too.

I ordered a set as well and am working on installing myself. I ordered in Feb and had the covers in about 4 weeks.

Mine came the same day as brickwhite, which is the day the email suggested. Vacuum packed bag meant that it arrived safely and in a relatively small box. I opted for the piping to try to get close to the original finish of the seats. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the package came with a rear skin to cover the seatback in a matching leather. Upon initial inspection, it appeared that the color Ecru White was darker brown than the Pearl Beige. PB seems to look more green to the eye.



This was until I opened my seats and compared the color under the seatback. I was happy to find that the color was very very close (--glad I didn't order bisque color) to the original protected leather color. The grain in Lseat's covers is deeper and the overall finish is slightly less smooth, but overall it's going to be great for my car-- The above seat has been deteriorating like that since I bought it in 2010. For $370 I'm quite happy. With $450 and my time, I don't know that I could have done better even with vinyl.

I haven't done upholstery before but the DIY on here by Solarphil really helped for disassembling the seats and understanding how everything was assembled. I'm at probably 8 hours and I'm very close to wrapping up the passenger seat. I just need to use the skin provided to wrap the seat back but I don't have adhesive for the job. I will also use this chance to get my power head rests working, and do some maintenance on the one motor that didn't seem to work on this seat.

The headrest leather is looser than anywhere else, but it is possible that my headrest foam had been compressed.

Here's how it looked the other night when I was about to install the bolster adjustment trim.



The headrest and knee bolster seem to be the areas where I can't get it to look factory. I'm still happy and can't wait to finish them and install into my DD.

Wow, those look great for a DIY in a DD! Great job.

tschultz,
How did you get the wrinkles out? I tried and struggled with that.

That was just patience and order of operations I think, coupled with a bit of luck.

I started with the upper bolsters as they are a little simpler overall. After estimating and locating the skin to the bolster, I attached the metal wire to the seatback with hog rings making sure it was tight in each direction. Then I did the tops of each side bolsters by making sure to pull it tight and compress the cushion a bit when attaching the leather to the body. This allowed me to work down to the thicker section of the bolster with the rest of the skin tight. I realized any wrinkles here due to uneven pulling will just exaggerate later, so I checked to make sure it wasn't pulled too tight in any direction. I tried smoothing it by hand by working out the leather in the direction I wanted and placing the leather folds where it seemed correct.

So far I'm close with the second seat but the way it was packed, this second seat has a few more wrinkles. The headrest also has some wrinkles due to the cushion being a little compressed. Maybe I should have steamed it to expand the foam out... I'm thinking they will come out once they get a little heat and sun inside the car. 10 hours a seat for me, but I'm new at this and spent some time getting the holes cut out for attachments.

Maybe the E46 seats had a different amount of fabric or worse even pull with those non-symmetric bolsters?

I'll try to get a few more photos soon when I get them finished.

They look very good! The worst was when I ordered the hide for the door cards, I used a damp towel and Iron.

If you need a steamer I can loan you mine.

As for the e46 seats, the biggest issue I had was they use the bar with the plastic hook, which the new covers did not have. I had to have it cut off the old cover and attached to the new including the 6 inches of leather.

tschultz wrote:That was just patience and order of operations I think, coupled with a bit of luck.


Maybe the E46 seats had a different amount of fabric or worse even pull with those non-symmetric bolsters?

I'll try to get a few more photos soon when I get them finished.

I received my color samples from lseat.com this week. It appears my Pearl Beige seats are somewhere between Ecru White and Ivory. I'm having a difficult time deciding. Are you still happy with the choice of Ecru White after completing the upholstery project?

tschultz wrote:I ordered a set as well and am working on installing myself. I ordered in Feb and had the covers in about 4 weeks.

Mine came the same day as brickwhite, which is the day the email suggested. Vacuum packed bag meant that it arrived safely and in a relatively small box. I opted for the piping to try to get close to the original finish of the seats. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the package came with a rear skin to cover the seatback in a matching leather. Upon initial inspection, it appeared that the color Ecru White was darker brown than the Pearl Beige. PB seems to look more green to the eye.



This was until I opened my seats and compared the color under the seatback. I was happy to find that the color was very very close (--glad I didn't order bisque color) to the original protected leather color. The grain in Lseat's covers is deeper and the overall finish is slightly less smooth, but overall it's going to be great for my car-- The above seat has been deteriorating like that since I bought it in 2010. For $370 I'm quite happy. With $450 and my time, I don't know that I could have done better even with vinyl.

I haven't done upholstery before but the DIY on here by Solarphil really helped for disassembling the seats and understanding how everything was assembled. I'm at probably 8 hours and I'm very close to wrapping up the passenger seat. I just need to use the skin provided to wrap the seat back but I don't have adhesive for the job. I will also use this chance to get my power head rests working, and do some maintenance on the one motor that didn't seem to work on this seat.

The headrest leather is looser than anywhere else, but it is possible that my headrest foam had been compressed.

Here's how it looked the other night when I was about to install the bolster adjustment trim.



The headrest and knee bolster seem to be the areas where I can't get it to look factory. I'm still happy and can't wait to finish them and install into my DD.

Sparkeysf wrote:I received my color samples from lseat.com this week. It appears my Pearl Beige seats are somewhere between Ecru White and Ivory. I'm having a difficult time deciding. Are you still happy with the choice of Ecru White after completing the upholstery project?

I just got them in the car but still need to do the backing of the seat. I am happy with them, but if you are looking for a perfect match this is not it. The first photo I shared is a good representation of Ecru White to Pearl Beige. The PB color is slightly more of a green hue --I suspect their Ivory isn't going to be right either. In the car you can notice this slightly, but I wasn't going for a perfect match, just seats in much better condition.

When comparing the skin thickness, it seems LSeat's skins are not as thick. That or the crusted old skins that I removed just feel thicker.

I ended-up choosing the ivory. It likely won't be a perfect match.... but like you, I'll be happy to get rid of the old mangled leather. Interestingly, the FedEx tracking information I just received says the leather is being shipped from Texas. I had heard from others that they had issues with US Customs as they were shipped from somewhere in South America. What do the seat back covers look like? Are they sewn to fit? Or, are they just pieces of leather that need to be glued-on?

tschultz wrote:

Sparkeysf wrote:I received my color samples from lseat.com this week. It appears my Pearl Beige seats are somewhere between Ecru White and Ivory. I'm having a difficult time deciding. Are you still happy with the choice of Ecru White after completing the upholstery project?

I just got them in the car but still need to do the backing of the seat. I am happy with them, but if you are looking for a perfect match this is not it. The first photo I shared is a good representation of Ecru White to Pearl Beige. The PB color is slightly more of a green hue --I suspect their Ivory isn't going to be right either. In the car you can notice this slightly, but I wasn't going for a perfect match, just seats in much better condition.

When comparing the skin thickness, it seems LSeat's skins are not as thick. That or the crusted old skins that I removed just feel thicker.

They are cut pieces of leather ready to be glued to the backing.

Here a photo of the back seat, there is a blemish in the middle.

Received my "leather" sets from lseat.com a few days ago. While, the color is a fairly good match with my interior.... I have to say I'm extremely displeased with the quality. Nobody reviewing these on any forum I've read bothered to mention that these are not real leather. Even though the lseat.com site states "genuine leather" and "real leather" in multiple places what I received is very poor quality polyurethane bonded onto some kind of remanufactured leather waste. I guess it was a huge mistake to try to save some money on this project. I can't possibly spend the $1200-1400 I'm being quoted by local upholstery shops to install this stuff if it's only going to last a couple years in the car. I'm going to have to see if I can return them for refund, or I'm out $900. In addition, the armrest covers they promised were not included.

. it's not a bad deal.

Bonded leather is often used for upholstery materials, you see it quite a bit in home furniture. The Wikipedia description:

Bonded leather is made by shredding leather scraps and leather fiber, then mixing it with bonding materials. The mixture is next extruded onto a cloth or paper backing, and the surface is usually embossed with a leather-like texture or grain. Color and patterning, if any, are a surface treatment that does not penetrate like a dyeing process would. The natural leather fiber content of bonded leather varies. The manufacturing process is somewhat similar to the production of paper.

Lower-quality materials may suffer flaking of the surface material in as little as a few years, while better varieties are considered very durable and retain their pattern and color even during commercial use. Because the composition of bonded leathers and related products varies considerably, and is sometimes a trade secret, it may be difficult to predict how a given product will perform over the course of time. There is a wide range in the longevity of bonded leathers and related products; some better-quality bonded leathers are claimed to be superior in durability over low-quality genuine leather.

Manufacturers usually will state if their product is made from real leather hides or bonded leather. They do show two levels of kits on their website, one for real cow leather and one for faux leather, but it sounds like they're dancing around the actual definition of 'real'.

I'm no expert on leather, but when I ordered for my door cards the "hide" came in irregular shapes. Would bonded leather be a regular shape with square edges?

brickwhite wrote:Like I stated in my post, they may or may not be real leather.

However for $350 for the sewn covers and doing the work myself... it's not a bad deal.

Yeah, you did mention that. But, if you purchased both front and rear sets and they last no more than three years is it still a good deal?

stuartinmn wrote:Bonded leather is often used for upholstery materials, you see it quite a bit in home furniture. The Wikipedia description:

Bonded leather is made by shredding leather scraps and leather fiber, then mixing it with bonding materials. The mixture is next extruded onto a cloth or paper backing, and the surface is usually embossed with a leather-like texture or grain. Color and patterning, if any, are a surface treatment that does not penetrate like a dyeing process would. The natural leather fiber content of bonded leather varies. The manufacturing process is somewhat similar to the production of paper.

Lower-quality materials may suffer flaking of the surface material in as little as a few years, while better varieties are considered very durable and retain their pattern and color even during commercial use. Because the composition of bonded leathers and related products varies considerably, and is sometimes a trade secret, it may be difficult to predict how a given product will perform over the course of time. There is a wide range in the longevity of bonded leathers and related products; some better-quality bonded leathers are claimed to be superior in durability over low-quality genuine leather.

Manufacturers usually will state if their product is made from real leather hides or bonded leather. They do show two levels of kits on their website, one for real cow leather and one for faux leather, but it sounds like they're dancing around the actual definition of 'real'.

I'm familiar with bonded leather used in sofa and auto upholstery. It does certainly vary in quality. My 2011 328i has a form of bonded leather that's held up quite well. However, it's very obviously much higher quality than what lseat.com is selling. Right now, I'm kicking myself over this purchase. I could have gotten a high quality German vinyl with a much longer lifespan for not a lot more cash.

The seller most certainly is dancing around the definition of "real" and "genuine cow leather". What I noticed is the extra pieces of "hide" I ordered with the intention of doing the door cards is actually thicker than what's used in the seat covers. The seat covers have a padding sewed to the underside so it makes it impossible to determine if the content is actually a remanufactured leather, or is "faux" leather. The cover for the center armrest on the back seat, and the headrest covers are stretchy and feel like plastic. Really not happy about this.